Unheard Voices

The original exam schedule for BUET has already been moved from May to August – because the students had a very important business to take care of during the months of June and July – watch world cup football.

Apparently the students were still not ready for the exams, and went on a rampage to vandalize the faculties’ personal properties when their “demand” to delay the exam schedule was not paid heed by the administration.

It was a very disappointing news to digest being an alumni (OK at least one-eighth an alumni, having spent one full semester there). These are supposed to be the brightest of all – the pride of our nation – the cream de la cream of the society as the students used to boast in those days. I remember a day when I was genuinely elated to discover that the big padlock on the main gate to BUET was sealed with lead by the perpetrators on the day the semester final was supposed to begin. Not wise enough to fully grasp the consequences my selfish mind was thrilled with the idea of having the extra time to prepare better for the exam.

Almost 100% of the students in BUET study there on scholarship. So majority of the tuition costs are provided by the BD govt. Every single day the university stays closed puts a burden on the budget for the fiscal year. And then there are the uncertainties for the students who live outside Dhaka and have a hard time finding a place to stay when the dorms close down. Not to mention the strain it causes on the parents and guardians when the news breaks down that the there was chaos in the campus. The delays in the scheduled graduation causes problem for the students trying to correspond with graduate schools outside BD.

I wonder if the young students of BUET these days realize how unfortunate the event is, or are they just enjoying life too much to care.

Rice was en route to Beirut when the world became dismayed with the horrific mass-killing launched by Israel on innocent villagers in Qana. The disparity of the so called fight between Hezbollah and Ehud’s army is astounding!

Israel is as usual “sad” and promised an investigation.
What a joke!! They used missiles that are precise on the targets. It was not an accident! What is there to investigate? The 48 hour cease fire is just the time they are using to absorb the indignation cast on by the rest of the civil world.

Rice declared in Israeli media the day she thought was going to be her last day in Jerusalem:
“I am convinced that only by achieving both (cease-fire and lasting settlement) will the Lebanese people be able to control their country and their future, and the people of Israel finally be able to live free of attack from terrorist groups in Lebanon”.

By lasting settlement they of course mean that no force will exist in the entire mid-east that is not in complete accordance with U.S. policy.

And what does Rice mean by “Attack on Israel”? Isn’t it the Palestines and Lebanese who need protection from Israel’s aggression and occupation? It is the same Qana where Israeli artellaries hit an U.N. shelter a decade ago and killed 100s of Lebanese who were desperately seeking refuge.

It was well understood when Lebanese Prime Minister Saniora told Rice she needed not visit Lebanon and better stayed in Jerusalem.

“We received yesterday at the Rome conference permission from the world… “

Israel declares after US stops the world from demanding an immediate ceasefire. US rather wants Israel to complete it’s mission.

And this is the mission US wants Israel to complete and the World gives Israel to go ahead with.

While 54 innocent civilians with 34 children die, our CNN claims 19 chidren is killed as if it is OK to kill 19 children. And our liberal friend New York Times’s headline picture is angry ” Hizbollah supporters” ransacking UN building in Beirut. Nothing about those dead children.

And US keeps on saying Israel has the right to defend herself. Defend from these elderly women and children or defend from UNIFIL observers?

”Israel was attacked two weeks ago. It was Hezbollah who started this and crossed the blue-line,” Repeats US leadership.

It’s always the other side when comes the question of who started it. It’s never Israel. Even nobody ever bothers to note, over the months preceeding Hizbollah kidnapping of Israeli soldiers, how many cross border raids Israel conducted to kidnap Hizbollah leaders from their bedrooms. At least terrorist organization Hizbollah did the kidnapping from an army base, not from a bedroom.
You don’t want to discuss whether it was Zionists who occupied Palestine to start with, you better only condemn the terrorist Islamist Arabs who is bothering good peace loving Israel.

And then comes the question of all these crimes against humanity, the world only can remain “deeply shocked”, “Deeply saddened”. Forget about punishing the war criminals from IDF or Israeli leadership, you even can’t condemn it. Uncle Sam will twist your neck if you dare do so.

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Drishtipat is a Bangladesh related blog site and remains committed to Bangladesh issues. However Drishtipat bloggers simply fail to keep silent in the face of the atrocities by Israel and it;s backers.

It’s worth mention that Israel Palestine issue is the only issue that can unify Bangladeshis across the divides.

34 children among 54 civilians killed by Israel today

Dear Nur Hossain, Please forgive us

Nothing about Bangladesh politics surprises me anymore. And I am quite sure most Bengalis or Bangladeshis (depending upon our identity politics) are like me. It is rare for us to get shocked by anything. Although, I will be surprised if we have a visionary leader in the near future. It is impossible for us to be indifferent about politics, but we have learned to live with the daily injustices, even when they occur in front of our eyes. This is Bangladesh.

Our national leader talks to us from her dais and she is as distant as a star in the sky for most of us. Our opposition leader confuses justice with tyranny by constantly vowing to avenge killings by more killings. I rest my case!

It takes a lot to make us complain now publicly. The quiet peasant revolution in Kansat is of course an exception. But again, our law enforcement agencies ruthlessly crushed it. Don’t get me wrong. In private, when we meet for our adda, with a cup of tea in our hand, we may start discussing literature, love, life, and jobs; but we always come back to politics. We grieve over our current politics. There is a gulf of difference between us, the ordinary citizens and the wealthy elites. They can afford to totally ignore us and do whatever they want with our lives and our homeland.

Except for election time! Then they suddenly remember that their power is at stake. It is time for another game of chess.

Am I going insane? Or are the politicians really that incapable of making a moral choice? I don’t care whether or not Ershad is being cajoled to join BNP led coalition for the next election. I don’t care about BNP’s fear about losing that election. And I know for sure our politicians don’t care about me or as a matter of fact for any ordinary citizens. They don’t even care about our history, our nation’s past. But how can I hold back this burning rage within me? Yes, we are a nation which pardoned the razakars and reinstated them back to power. Yes, we forgot 1971. And yes, 1990 happened a long time ago.

‘We already forgot how corruption spread to every segment of the society
like a virus during his authoritarian rule. We are unable to recall how
the Ershad regime ensured the political and ideological space for
razakars. We suffer amnesia when we are asked how Bangladesh moved away
from moderate politics.

And now a former dictator is the key element in deciding who is going to
win the next democratic election!

Did Nur Hossain die in vain in 1987? Do we really remember Dr Milon who was gunned down in November, 1990? And what about the mother and child who were shot dead by the stray bullets of the military during the late 80s? What about that student demonstration when the army drove their trucks into terrified activists?

Before 1996 election we saw Sheikh Hasina making a pact with Ershad and now we sit quietly to watch another drama unfolding.

Am I the only one who can hear Nur Hossain crying? Am I the only one who can see his slogan?

Shoirachar Nipat Jak, Gonotontro Mukti Pak!

‘Down with Autocracy, Let Democracy be Unchained!’

Dr Bina D’Costa
Australian National University

Zoe Rahman, one of the most talented up and coming musician in England has been shortlisted to win the mercury award, a very prestigious recognition in England.

Described in The Observer as “one of the finest young pianists in Europe”, Zoe Rahman has firmly established herself as one of the brightest stars on contemporary jazz scene.

I mentioned her music briefly at a review of a concert I went to.

You guessed it. She is of Bangladeshi origin.

Guardian covered this nomination like this

Jazz pianist Zoe Rahman was born in Chichester and studied music at Oxford University and America’s prestigious Berklee College of Music before becoming one of the most acclaimed artists on the UK jazz scene. Melting Pot, recorded with Rahman’s acoustic trio, was released on her own Manushi label in November 2005

The judges said: “One of the UK’s most distinctive jazz talents, pianist Zoe Rahman draws the listener into her own absorbing world.”

We said: “Rahman’s wayward and mobile left-hand patterns swerve under crisp postbop swingers, soft meditations with repeating low themes emerging under treble trills.”

We met the proud father after the Bangla beat concert. He was as Bangali as you could get inviting some of us for Daal-Bhat on a weekend. Sohini and the dad started singing “O nodire” spontaneously at the back stage.

Best of luck to Zoe!! Others can buy her album from here

“He came in for a “tune-up.” He was 64 years old, with a “history of noncompliance,” according to the resident, and he hadn’t taken his diabetes or cardiac medications for weeks. We weren’t quite sure why. He was alert, he appeared to be intelligent and interested in getting well, and he was able to get his prescriptions filled at a reduced cost. Before he went home, we explained why he needed to take his medicines and reviewed the frequency and doses with him several times. He told us he would follow up with his doctor (though he couldn’t remember the doctor’s name or telephone number) and left the hospital with a handwritten discharge summary.

Five months later, he appeared at the community clinic. He said he was taking his medications, but he wasn’t sure of their names or how often he took them. A medical student and I reviewed the regimen again. The student typed up simple instructions in big letters for him to follow, as well as a list of dates and times at which he should record his blood sugar levels. We asked him to come back in two weeks.

When he returned, the student saw him first — and made a diagnosis that no one else had considered: illiteracy. The clue lay in the jumbled mess of his glucose log. Many of the sugar values were written next to future dates. We quietly asked him to read his list of medications aloud. Haltingly, he told us he couldn’t do it. Born in the rural South, he had left school in the second grade. He lived alone. He had been able to support himself as a gas-station attendant and handyman, but he had never learned to read.

We were stunned. We had tried to avoid jargon and to use simple language in explaining our instructions, and he had seemed to understand everything we had told him. He had seen scores of doctors, nurses, and social workers over the years without anyone’s guessing he had a reading problem.

Although we had been blind to his illiteracy, our patient’s problem is not uncommon.”

For full article: http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/full/355/4/339?query=TOC

____ VS _____
photo: Abdus Salique, who is leading the campaign against the filming of Brick Lane. Photograph: Guardian/Sarah Lee, Monica Ali, picture washington post

Monica Ali is again in the headline in the community in England. The shooting of her film got cancelled due to some members of the community protesting.

For a bit of a background for those who don’t know much about her, here is a recent video interview from BBC.

Also check out this piece on Washington Post about her writing life

where she incredibly says the following:

When Brick Lane was published, I was repeatedly asked how much research I had done. How did I go about it? When I said that I had done research but didn’t consider it hugely important, I was met with a baffled response. Now, with Alentejo , I can say again, truthfully, that I have done the research. It seems to satisfy people. For me, research is a useful means of procrastination. (I’m not being entirely flippant. One needs to hesitate.)
But research is about knowing, and knowing is easy. Anyone who cares to can find out that there is overcrowding and drug abuse in the Bangladeshi community in London’s East End. You don’t even have to go there. You only need to know how to use a search engine.

Do you agree or disagree? Is research really a form of procastination for the writers? What are the thinking of the writers and readers out there? How important is research for a fictional book?

Update: Also if you want to participate in the debate on the protest. There is a good debate going on in Guardian. Jonathan Heawood’s piece (did he pick the title from our previous blog entry?) sums up the issue pretty well. Take a look and participate and see how one sweetshop owner can have the nationals going ga ga over his protest. Overreaction by the media and the production house? Do people really feel that strongly against that film.

On the other side, Germaine Greer explores whether this shopkeeper has a point. What Greer said has summed as the crust of the protest is here:

Ali did not concern herself with the possibility that her plot might seem outlandish to the people who created the particular culture of Brick Lane. As British people know little and care less about the Bangladeshi people in their midst, their first appearance as characters in an English novel had the force of a defining caricature. The fact that Ali’s father is Bangladeshi was enough to give her authority in the eyes of the non-Asian British, but not in the eyes of British Bangladeshis.

Ironically, when you piece together Ali’s comment about research or lack of it for Bricklane, the discontent makes a bit of sense. Ali, recreated the sterotypes from a very superficial level. Whatever the case, this allowed us to have a dialogue on the issues that plagues the community. However, with the pseudo censorship, that door is now closed.

A very different transition zone. The story of the journey of a heart from a donor to a recipient. Also the tumultuous emotional journey of the carier who wrote the story.
Read it here.

There are a few things in the world I have difficulty expressing. I kind of get speechless or don’t get the write words while expressing these things.

Bangladesh police is one such thing.

Two news item in Bangladesh newspapers of today give us a glimpse of Banglades police.

This news reports release of “Mora” after being acquitted of charges of raping four year old Taniya. Taniya was a street child living in the porch of Dhaka court house. She was taken to adjacent police control room and was raped. It is open secret that she was raped by members of police force stationed at the control room. However, police, in an attempt to divert the charges from their members, put the blame on poor street vendor “Mora”, whom they found handy to detain and powerless to protest. Today “mora” got released after 8 years of unjust imprisonment as court found the whole investigation report as false.

And this report, also published today, gives a random peek in how bangladesh police works.

They want to return home.

“So far we came to know, some 300 Bangladeshi nationals have expressed their willingness to return home… I hope we will be ale to let you know the detail shortly. We did not receive any information of casualty,” Foreign Secretary of Bangladesh Hemayetuddin told reporters in Dhaka on Monday.
An estimated 10,000 Bangladeshi nationals are living in Lebanon, mostly in Beirut, now strafed by Israeli air strikes following the worst breakout of conflict in the region since 1967.

Also to get a more human face to this story, read Naeem’s article.
The following picture was taken by him during his visit before the bombing began.

I had several interesting observations while revisiting the Col Taher event.

1. Taher was a very smart, brave, revolutionary leader. However Col Taher is Col Taher today because he was hanged. Look at all his revolutionary comrades;

Maj Jalil: Later became an Islamic leader.

Sirajul Alam Khan Dada: Gone into oblivion, became insignificant.

ASM Rab: National laughing stock, Ershad’s domesticated opposition.

Maj Zia/MR Manna joined AL.

Hasanul Haq Inu, SN ambia, Dr Akhlaqur Rahman have become politicians with no popular support.

2. In his statement, Taher himself took the responsibility of overthrowing Khaled Mosharraf. He mentioned Khaled as villain several times. In the statement he also mentioned of some Army officers who ” begged on his foot for life” .

With this statement it becomes a more and more clear that Taher apparently klled Maj Gen Khaled Mosharraf And Col ATM Haider.

3. Will there ever be a call for justice of Khaled Mosharraf killing?

4. I wonder, all these emotion sorrounding Col Taher, is it out of love for Taher or out of hate for Gen Zia?

5. Zia probably didn’t have any option but to hang Taher. With Taher living, Zia’s control and leadership would have been seriously undermined and his efforts to stabilize Bangladesh armed forces into a disciplined conventional traditional military would have been seriously hampered by Taher who clearly wanted a non conventional people’s red army. ( However I don’t know whether Taher’s dream peole’s army would have been worse or better for Bangladesh)

6. The counter coup, valiant freedome fighters Khaled and Haider did, is probably the least bloody and most misunderstood coup in Bangladesh. When CIA link was surfaced in 15th august killing, these two patriotic freedome fighters could not but take up arms. It should have already been done by then Army chief Maj Gen Shafiullah and then Rakhkhi bahini chief Tofayel Ahmed ( Both AL leaders now).

7. Countering of Khaled’s coups probably saw the strongest and most prudent use of ” India fear”. And Col Taher spearheaded the use of this ‘card ‘, as it is evident from his statement at the martial law court.

8. During the period between 72-75, one reason behind the perceived failure of Bangabandhu governmnet was the activities of the leftists, the so called ” Peking left”. The armed wing, ” Gana bahini” has been implicated in thousands of murders including those of 7 MPs. Has there been any concerted effort to bring those involved in this mass murder to justice?

It was Colonel Taher’s death anniversary today. Like every other year, there were newspaper memoirs, articles/columns along with discussion and protest sessions in Bangladesh.

This years events also included an additional attraction, a key note addresses by American journalist Lawrence Lifschultz.

Lawrence Lifschultz, in his speech today, urged the concerned authorities for ensuring a fair re-trial of
1. Jail killing of four national leaders
2. Taher death sentence
3. All the freedome fighter killing during coups against Zia rule,
4. General Manjur Killing
5. Death sentence and execution of freedome fighter officers convicted of murdering Zia.

I find these demands quite logical and I belive nobody will cringe too much at these demands. However I get curious when I see some ommission in Lifschultz’s list.

Is there any significant killing missing from this list?

Do we remember valiant fredome fighter sector commanders Khaled Mosharraf and ATM Haider?

Khaled Mosharraf was arguably the best of the military leaders during our war of independence in 1971. He almost died in the war with a bullet hitting his forehead.
ATM Haider was also another valiant freedome fighter who represented Bangladesh during Pak surrender on 16th December.

Do anyone clearly know how they were killed?
Exactly who killed these brave souls?
Who ordered the killing?
In what situation they died? Were they executed? Or did they die in gunfight?

Why these two sector Commanders deaths are not mourned every year as it happens in case of Colonel Taher?
Why nobody demand a justice for their killing?
Why Lawrence Lifschultz does not mention Khaled Mosharraf and ATM Haider in his list?

If you are feeling homesick for Dhaka this weekend, take a ride with Ihtisham to Old Dhaka.

Here

Once a while, there are some voices of reasoning. I was surprised to read these comments by CNN anchor Lou Dobbs.

While the United States provides about $2.5 billion in military and economic aid to Israel each year, U.S. aid to Lebanon amounts to no more than $40 million. This despite the fact that the per capita GDP of Israel is among the highest in the world at $24,600, nearly four times as high as Lebanon’s GDP per capita of $6,200.

Lebanon’s lack of wealth is matched by the Palestinians — three out of every four Palestinians live below the poverty line. Yet the vast majority of our giving in the region flows to Israel. This kind of geopolitical inconsistency and shortsightedness has contributed to the Arab-Israeli conflict that the Western world seems content to allow to perpetuate endlessly.

Today I had another discovery, i.e in the US media an Israeli casuality is mourned more than a US casuality. While in the last week 29 Isreali lives have been lost, In Iraq 10 American lives have alos been lost. But these ten American got miniscule media attention compared to those Israeli casualities.