Jailing Rajshahi University
teachers and rule of law
Four university teachers of Rajshahi University have been convicted and sentenced to two years’ rigorous imprisonment for violating Emergency Power Rules, 2007. The accusations that the state brought against them were three counts and the court accepted one — for bringing out a silent procession against atrocities at Dhaka University. My intention is not to discuss the verdict but the intention and the role the state has played in the process of bringing teachers before the trial.
All of us know what flared up Dhaka University incident and its subsequent events. At some points there was teacher-student procession against the emergency rule. This is what decided the current fate of the teachers. If this event is dissected it is evident that: a) the teachers’ procession was not a four-plus-four-men show; and b) there was participation of a huge spontaneous mass.
This raises a serious question why only four teachers have to bear the consequences when hundreds of teachers and students participated in a spontaneous movement? Why the state is so eager to penalise these four whereas other hundreds who participated are at large? Interestingly, in one hand, RU teachers are punished by the so-called zero tolerance of the state, on the other hand it is in the air (as report quotes Vice Chancellor of DU) that four DU teacher are likely to be released who are allegedly accused of on the same count. This is not to suggest that four DU teachers should be punished rather to show the discrepancy and unfairness that the state is promoting through these trial proceedings. It begs another question: does the state has the ability and courage to bring ALL the participants under justice? If not, under what moral ground does it bring these four-plus-four?
This is not a unique example of our one-eyed caretaker government. All of us know that before the caretaker government’s takeover, some sections of Jamaat-BNP politicians and businessmen formed an unholy alliance to choke the country to its end. Upon arrival, the caretaker government declared war against corruption and asserted their commitment for institutional reform to bring the ‘train back on track’. Unfortunately, many of these earlier commitments are now compromised as we see many corrupt politicians and business leaders roaming free. Some of the politicians and their patrons are even more articulate in their stand and dare to depict the liberation war as ‘civil war’. Their vicious statements are not deemed as anti-state and the state remains silent whereas four RU teachers pay for their moral stand (because the state sees it as the violation of law!).
All the actions of the caretaker government (or its de-facto leaders) indicate that it intends to teach the university teachers a ‘lesson’. A lesson also for others so that none can challenge the current ‘off-track’ status of the caretaker government train. By punishing the teachers the caretaker government and its de-facto leaders are setting the state and the university system at the course of collision. We must remember the history of this land and its university system. History suggests that it never brought
any good when state intimidated the universities.
Hasan Reza
Doctoral Student, the University of Chicago & Assistant Prof (on leave), SUST, Sylhet
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If these teachers have broken the law of the country, the verdict that sentenced four Rajshahi University teachers to rigorous imprisonment for two years should be accepted. Be it teachers, be it a common man everybody should respect rule of law.
A teacher’s job is teaching and not doing politics or polluting the academic environment.
An expatriate
On e-mail
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Judgement of a court should not be underestimated or ignored by anybody and for any reason whatsoever. Teachers and politicians have no right to denounce a verdict given by a court of justice. If a verdict is not good, one should seek judgement from a higher court. It is as simple as that.
Those who do not understand this simple concept regarding a court judgement need not be teachers.
TH
On e-mail
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This is in reference to the statement of the law adviser that, ‘Govt still has scope to be considerate’.
This comment is misleading and ambiguous to many of us. How can the government be considerate after the verdict of an independent and honourable court has been given? If the government can be considerate after the court verdict, it implies that courts are not independent at all and are still giving their verdicts under the dictation of the government. It may also imply that the government doesn’t have any respect for the judiciary and it can change and/or manipulate the verdicts of the courts. We humbly request for a clarification from the honourable law adviser in this regard.
Mostofa Kamal Khan
Carleton University, Canada
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It is good to see if nobody escapes the long hand of justice. Even the teachers of highest seat of education have been sentenced to jail terms. I do not dare to question it, as ‘contempt of court’ is a term I think is yet to be clearly defined. But from the incidents in Pakistan, all I can say is that justice is something beyond my understanding while I do understand the meaning of emergency (I guess, now we all do).
No one is above the law. But we can also make a little ‘arrangement’ for the ones who have ‘enough money’. A truth commission will be there to do it ‘lawfully’.
History never had pleasant consequences for rulers who were obsessed with brute force and liked to persecute the intelligentsia. Unfortunately nobody learns from history.
Saif
Dhaka
Government’s colonial attitude
This in reference to the news item, ‘Govt must change colonial attitude: Akbar’. The most important thing is to change the attitude of the civil servants. A capable civil servant can initiate changes and convince his/her political masters to go for the changes. A good and conscientious civil servant knows the actual requirement of the changing time and also knows what can or cannot be done.
If the political master and his top civil servant agrees on a particular issue and want to make it citizen/client/business friendly, it has ninety-five per cent chance of being adopted by the ruling party.
The most important thing is the attitude and willingness to do something for the good of the society.
This is what is lacking most of the time.
ChoudhuryS
On e-mail
Bali conference, Sidr and related issues
I have read an article on climate change, republished last week, originally from The Guardian 30 Nov 2007 in your newspaper. The article says, ‘...Tivoli and southern part of Bangladesh will be submerged under water by 2040.
So the question of migration to countries, which have lots of land and wealth, naturally comes. If we really think of ‘one planet theory and new world order’ then this question should be raised in the ongoing Bali climate change conference. Surprisingly, nobody has raised the issue so far. Bangladesh would submerge because of pollution of somebody else’s conscious or unconscious crime. But the people of Bangladesh have the right to exist. G7, UN and the Kyoto policymakers should seriously think over this issue and come to a consensus.
Furthermore, the victims of Sidr may not be a separate issue. These people need food, shelter, pure water. But the survivors also have hunger for life and they have ‘hands’. So they need cooperation and help to start working rather than remaining dependant on temporary relief.
Can this caretaker government and the NGOs arrange loan quickly for starting cultivation, fishing, cottage industry in the cyclone-affected areas?
Dr Azizul Karim
Victoria, Australia
Biman and its Hajj flight
The mismanagement of Hajj flights and the mess with scheduling even the shortest flights are just the latest in the series of regular failures of the Biman. No amount of pseudo-corporatising has helped the national flag carrier. And it won’t. Just as such half-hearted measures will not help the BTTB or the nationalised banks.
The fact is that bureaucrats are not fit to run businesses. When civil servants run enterprises, such organisations reach the nadir of their customer service, their payrolls (and hence the taxpayers’) are burdened with unnecessary and corrupt employees, and they become cumbersome bureaucratic entities rather than dynamic businesses. All the while, the citizenry gets a two-fold dose of suffering: poor service and bleeding the national exchequer. Let us not mince words here. You and I both know that the Biman, BTTB, and the nationalised banks are simply employment-generation extortion rackets of powerful labour unions. The solution is pretty simple too: crack down hard on such elements, privatise the entities and let the citizens get the proper service they are entitled to.
Whether even this caretaker government is bold enough to undertake such reforms, in the face of self-serving criticism from all the vested interests, is to be seen. And we know that no political government will even consider such reforms.
BT
On e-mail
Ibrahim’s new party
It is very difficult to guess correctly what has prompted Major General (rtd) Ibrahim to form a new political party when freedom of politics is restricted to in-house politics only. We will have to wait for some time to see its impact on public life and national politics. Ibrahim is undoubtedly a very respected person. The ideology of his party seems to propagate tolerance, unity and national reconciliation. We only hope that the new party would be able to contribute towards this goal with popular support, and not with the support of the ‘party makers’ believed to be active nowadays to promote a new dimension in Bangladesh politics. The emergence of a new party also gives a signal that the nation will experience a lot of political adjustments in the future. Nevertheless, I will keep my fingers crossed and wait to see that the democratic culture is strengthened and ‘mango trees are bearing mangoes, not jackfruits’. We wish best of luck to General Ibrahim and his new political party.
A reader
On e-mail
‘Lifebuoy for each home in coastal areas’
I took pleasure in reading in New Age on November 3 the article titled ‘Lifebuoy for each home in coastal areas’ by Maswood Alam Khan. Indeed, to fight natural calamities we have to find solutions that are very much hidden in nature. Maswood’s suggestion to make rectangular or circular fences by Palmyra trees (Taal Gach) at the backyard of each home in coastal areas with rafts made of banana plants placed inside as a lifebuoy for marooned people to escape from cyclone undoubtedly deserves thanks and draws urgent attention of the disaster engineers. If initiatives to grow groves of Palmyra trees in extensive scales are taken right away, next generations in coastal areas may find the palm trees as their permanent source of both income and shelter.
It will take not less than 15 to 20 years for Palmyra trees to grow tall enough to bear fruits and provide shelters as lifebuoys. Moreover, rural people are a bit prejudiced against the tree which, according to folklore, is associated with ghosts. To encourage developing groves of Palmyra trees the government and NGOs may offer incentives to coastal people by promising to pay Taka 500 for each tree if they can show after five years fences of specific designs made of Palmyra trees.
Raiyan
Dhaka
Muralidharan makes it
It was the most tense and eagerly waiting hours for the Sri Lankans as well as the cricket lovers of the world to watch Muttiah Muralidharan, the wizard of both off and leg spin which he calls dusra, setting a new world record in taking wickets in Test cricket. Muralidharan surpassed Shane Warne’s record of 708 wickets by taking the wicket of Paul Collingwood of England in his home ground in Kandy. He levelled the record when he took the wicket of Ravi Bopara, another English player, caught down the slip. But Murali had to wait patiently for his prized position because rain played a delaying factor for his success. However, the lady luck finally smiled on him. We congratulate Murali for his success.
Humayun Hyder
Zigatola, Dhaka
Kevin Rudd and positive changes
That Kevin Rudd’s victory would mean reversal of Australia’s unpopular policies previously pursued by Howard became clear when he took a step in the right direction by ratifying the Kyoto Protocol. This is certainly a commendable decision taken by the new prime minister of Australia. Howard most likely would have thought that a strong economy would once again cement victory for him. But he was wrong. Howard’s recalcitrant attitude towards ratifying the Kyoto Protocol, refusing to make a formal apology to indigenous Australians for past injustices and, most importantly, his support for the Bush Administration on the ‘war on terror’ — all these unfavourable factors led to his downfall.
On the other hand, right after stepping into office, Rudd is now seen determined to bring changes to the above-mentioned unfavourable factors. He has already pledged to bring back 500 troops from Iraq by mid-2008. Kevin Rudd’s administration has been handpicked by him; a deviation from Labour’s traditional selection system. One area of importance for Kevin would be to avoid inflationary pressures which might arise due to rising interest rates.
If he can control wages and government spending then he can put the economy back on track. There is no doubt that Australia has picked the right man to run their country. But what remains to be seen is whether he manages to handle matters with precision. And one really hopes he does not become a staunch ally of the USA.
Best of luck!
Wasif Wahed
Old DOHS, Dhaka
US intelligence report on Iran
A US intelligence report, issued this week in Washington, has dropped a bombshell on the White House. The report has said that Iran dropped its programme to build a nuclear bomb in 2003 and has since pursued only the peaceful use of nuclear power, just as its government has claimed. Recently, the United States brought 50 states, including the Arab states, harping on dangers of a nuclear Iran to forge a Sunni solidarity in the ME to help achieve a resolution of the Palestinian problem.
The credibility of the US is already at an all-time low following its failure to discover WMD in Iraq. The latest intelligence report should just not add to that loss of credibility but also shame the US administration. Unfortunately, it has not and a shameless Bush has addressed a press conference to stall any further damage to his historically low popularity with his people by claiming that Iran is a threat to international peace and the report is a reminder to that!
The intelligence report has also come as a great disappointment to Israel that has been urging a compliant Bush administration towards another pre-emptive strike on Iran just as it had done with Iraq. Short of claiming that the report is incorrect, Israel is stubbornly sticking to its stand that Iran is a country that exports terror and therefore should be the next target for
pre-emptive strike by the USA.
Bush and Israel notwithstanding, the report has created an uproar in the USA where the media has put Bush on the dock. Bush denounced Iran as ‘an axis of evil’ and made Iran as a target for its alleged attempts to build the nuclear bomb. The US Congress, now under Democrat’s control, has called for diplomatic dialogue with Iran in order to obviate the initiative of the Israel-inspired neocon-dominated Bush administration to make Iran the next target of pre-emptive strike.
As for Tehran, it is rejoicing at the US intelligence report and has used it to show that the US foreign policy is based on a pack of lies while its foreign policy is based on principles. Taking advantage of the favourable wind blowing in its favour, Iran’s President Ahmedinejad has used his country’s first-time participation in the Gulf Cooperation Council Summit to call for the establishment of a European Union-type economic organisation in the Middle East with Iran as an integral part of it. The CIA report should make such a call appear reasonable and desirable, a proposition which should cause great worries to the US policymakers who are trying to isolate Iran as a rogue state and using that to forge unity in the ME to back the US.
One wonders how a superpower can pursue foreign policy based on such blatant lies.
Shahjahan Ahmed
Dhanmondi, Dhaka
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This is in reference to ‘Fighting in Iraq, but thinking of Iran,’ by Dr Zakir Husain (Op-Ed, December 6).
Dr Zakir Husain may be a little out of date when he says: ‘Fighting a losing war on Iraq the US is thinking of attacking Iran.’ Despite sabre-rattling by the US President George W. Bush over Iran’s nuclear aspirations, the latest American intelligence report that Iran has stopped its activities to acquire a nuclear bomb four years ago would put an end to all speculations. The National Intelligence Estimate reported that Iran, guided by sober cost-benefit analyses, decided not to pursue its efforts to acquire any nuclear capability.
Although the report says Iran has left the door open to pursue its earlier desire to acquire the bomb, it estimates that Iran doesn’t have the technical capability to develop such a weapon in the near future. The National Intelligence Estimate represents the consensus of 16 separate American spy agencies and is provided to the US military and political leaders to help craft strategy or response to perceived threats.
A full report was provided to Bush last week before a declassified version was given to the US legislators by Michael McConnel, the director of national intelligence.
The report, which represents a complete about-face from a 2005 report on Iran, brought memories to the fore of the botched 2002 intelligence on Iraq about its weapons of mass destruction (WMD) which was used to justify the invasion of Iraq. The latest report will put an end to all talks about striking Iran’s nuclear installations. ‘We judge with high confidence that in the fall of 2003, Tehran halted its nuclear weapons program,’ states the report.
The report contradicts the White House position in virtually every area. ‘Tehran’s decision to halt its nuclear weapons programme suggests it is less determined to develop nuclear weapons than we have been judging since 2005,’ it says.
Why then Bush has been warning about Iran’s nuclear weapons only a few days ago? This may be he was trying to take the attention away from Iraq. This may be exactly the opposite of what Dr Zakir Husain says: Bush was thinking of Iraq while talking about Iran. In any case, the report has put an end to any chance of going to war against Iran during Bush’s short tenure of presidency.
Mahmood Elahi
Ottawa, Canada
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Recent US intelligence report concerning Iran’s nuclear build-up dealt another blow to Bush’s credibility. It is gathered from the intelligence that Iran abandoned its nuclear programme in 2003. Iran
is also under observation of the
UN nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
Despite repeated statements issued by Iran denying their involvement in making atom bombs the Bush administration accused Iran of deceiving the world and progressing towards making nuclear weapons by enriching uranium. Bush administration also branded Iran as one of the most dangerous nations in the world and insisted that harsher sanctions must be imposed to punish Iran.
US secretary of state Condolezza Rice is trying her best to safeguard the image of Bush but will she really be able to do that.
Humayun Hyder
Zigatola, Dhaka
