La Semaine Dernière A Mes Yeux

(20 décembre --- 27 décembre)

Selon un reportage, Bangladesh a installé une banque de lait pour les orphelins. En dépit de protestation depuis les groupes ultra-orthodoxe, Bangladesh poursuit les exemples de Malaisie et Iran.

Selon un reportage, Lumpy Skin Disease a ciblé 862.000 bovins à traverse tout le pays. La maladie a déjà 111 bovins. La maladie a  causé assez dégâts aux bovins à Chattogram.

Selon un reportage, élection commission a affirmé la date d'élection municipale. Le 30 janvier est fixé la date d' élection.  Il se peut que l'opposition puisse participer à l'élection.


Selon un reportage, le mardi des ouvriers d' un atelier de confection ont manifesté pour les arriérés. Une escarmouche entre la police et les manifestants s'est aussi déroulée.

Selon un reportage, Bangladesh a connu une courte offensive du froid pour quatre jours. Presque 216 enfants ont été hospitalisés à Kurigram.

Selon un reportage, un homme d'affaires a été brutalement tué chez lui à Chattogram. Il était disciple d' un groupe de Soufie islam, situé à Chattogram.


J'ai enfin acheté un laptop d'occasion depuis IDB. C'est un notebook de Toshiba.

Time To Look For Alternate Overseas Job Market

External job market for Bangladeshi workers does not look that good. Traditional market like Saudi Arabia remained stagnant. Only conditional recruitment is going on there after it remained closed for Bangladeshis for sometime: Bangladeshi female domestic worker should be sent to resume recruitment of Bangladeshis.

Meanwhile, Malaysia, another major destination for Bangladeshi workers, has launched an amnesty program for illegal immigrants. "Back for Good" program, launched in August 1 and will expire by December 31, aims to curb significantly illegal foreign workers who have overstayed their visas by sending them back to their country of origin after paying a punitive fine. One year later they will be eligible for re-recruitment. News report hints that around 30000 undocumented Bangladeshi workers will face full brunt of B4G program. Situation is so dire that national flag carrier, Biman Bangladesh Airlines, has increased frequencies of flights between Kuala Lumpur and Dhaka to meet the deadline so that stranded Bangladeshi workers do not face severe punishments.

Falling remittances flow from traditional sources and adverse policies in some markets cue new efforts to search alternative markets. There are some destinations  that look promising but series of bad incidents overshadow the good prospect.

Series of killing by gunshots imperil the very existence of Bangladeshis in South Africa, where they successfully started grocery and other small businesses. In the  last five years, around 400 Bangladeshis were gunned down. News reports indicate that South Africa too is a popular destination for undocumented Bangladeshi workers. Having worked for two or three years, many managed to grab legal documents. Even these undocumented workers are not insulated from ghastly gun violence.

Earlier, law-enforcement agencies back home arrested cohorts of abductors resided in Libya for abducting Libya-bound illegal Bangladeshis and asking for ransoms to relatives back home.

In Saudi Arabia, tortures meted out to female domestic help of Bangladeshi origin turned Bangladeshis' stomach. Reuters carried a report that claimed that there was an online site for selling poorer women, hailing from third world countries, to Middle Eastern clients. In that nomadic culture housemaid does not enjoy a respectable life.  Once a migrant worker told me that God made "halal" till knee part of a washerwoman's body. I don't know how much truth it contained but I was shell shocked. Even I find the French word, "femme de chambre" or "bedroom woman",  for a domestic help shocking. The French colonized a large part of sub Saharan Africa and part of Middle East. Maybe the word has its roots from that part of the world. Look at the final resting places of the Pharaohs whose decorated secret chambers also contained mummies of slaves. The film "Charlie Wilson's War" offers another account of sporting spectacles of slave girl trade.

In the movie, a congressman throws party for elites and stages a funny slave girl trade. These social elites get along well with their Middle Eastern partners. Perhaps the auction is intended to entertain the guests. Since vestiges of nomadic culture is still prevalent in those societies, we should take precautionary steps while sending housemaid there.

Back in last week of November, around 35 female workers took refuge in a repatriation center in Saudi Arabia, fleeing violence at workplace. Luckily, frequency of such horrifying incidents precipitated the Saudis to launch a special service to take calls from housemaid in distress.

Bangladeshi government needs to do more: recruiting more Bangladeshi staff who speaks dialects of workers at the embassy in Riyad, signing more complementary agreements  with the Saudis to ensure safety of these workers and stalling the recruitment for sometime if necessary.

 In Karnataka ,India, a drive against Bangladeshi domestic help was launched couple of months ago. Karnataka government alerted the apartment owners and advised them to discharge their domestic help as soon as possible. It appeared that Bengali domestic helps cook very well and very docile so Bengali middle class there prefers recruiting them. Language barrier does not appear to be a major problem in communicating like Saudi Arabia.Somehow the xenophobia that evil quarter may misuse the poor workers led to this anti-Bangladeshi drive in the region.
Given the dismal picture in existing overseas employment markets , searching new one as well as more efforts of engagement with the existing markets are called for.

(Source: Bangladesh Economic Review 2018)

If we take a close look at the remittances for the last 10 years we will see that remittances from Saudi Arabia and UAE declined for the last five years. Meanwhile, remittances from USA,UK and Malaysia increased significantly for the last ten years.
Since we inclined heavily towards sending semi-skilled and unskilled workers, it is better to devise new ways so that we could send more workers to new overseas markets and induce others to take more workers from us.
Bangladesh could lobby other traditional markets to replicate the Malaysian "B4G" program. Under the program, workers in rotation will go abroad and come back to home for a predetermined period. Government initiatives can assure the participating workers that government will take care of their housing and healthcare needs if they comply with the rules of the program. Government can also build subsidized housing unit for this target group of workers.

Bangladesh could also sign special agreements with India to send domestic help, construction worker and agricultural laborer. If any major Indian city does not have reservation from hiring Bangladeshi domestic help, then under government-to-government contract special work permit can be awarded to this kind of workers. Local Indian High Commission can ensure smooth distribution of the permits and can make sure that remittances sent by these emigrant Bangladeshi workers may end up in right hands and may use in home renovation, providing good education to children and providing good medicare.

There are many humanitarian NGOs in India. They work for vulnerable groups and operate many safe houses. Unlike Middle Eastern countries, Bangladeshi domestic help will enjoy safe and secure life there as the population in general is not hostile towards them.
In exchange, Bangladesh can issue more professional visas to Indians, hailing from those Indian States that welcome Bangladeshi workers, to work on RMG, textiles and IT sectors. It will help tremendously to balance the remittance flows between the countries.
Iran and countries belong to former Soviet Union could also be viewed as potential destinations of overseas employment. Unfortunately,Bangladesh never explore the Iranian construction, agriculture and shipbuilding industries where Bangladeshi workers could make valuable contribution.US sanctions could cause some trouble as Iranian central bank also falls under the new sanction, but Bangladesh could join multilateral initiatives to bypass them.

African countries could be destinations for setting up small businesses and agricultural farms. Bangladesh could ink deals with South Africa and Libya to provide law enforcement assistance in those countries in a bid to reduce the incidence of gun violence and human trafficking. If Bangladeshi financial institutions are allowed to operate in these countries, then small businessmen could get easy credit to start businesses.


Tragic tales of our migrant workers in Saudi Arabia , South Africa and Libya insinuate that overseas employment industry is infested with thugs and they act here without facing any obstacle and remorse. While innocent souls perished abroad, reputation of the country took a bad hit. Undeniably foreign hands also took part in this kind of criminal act. Unfortunately, from our part, we have not yet taken any step to identify the culprits and to bring them to book. Nonchalance stance hampers the traditional markets and puts obstacles to finding new ones for our workers. Unless we address the issues at home, chances are slim that things will be better for our overseas employment situation.

La Semaine Dernière A Mes Yeux

(13 décembre ---- 20 décembre)

Selon un reportage, incendie dans une usine d' éventail a tué 10 personnes à Gazipur. Plupart d' ouvriers sont morts asphyxiés au 3 ème étage.

Selon un reportage, le bilan de mort  depuis l'incendie à Keraniganj a augmenté à 19 personnes.


Selon un reportage, le gouvernement a publié une liste de collaborateur, pleine d' erreur. La liste a tellement heurté des guerriers de la guerre de 1971. Des manifestants ont aussi demandé démission de ministre responsable.

Selon un reportage, police a arrêté deux agresseurs après ils avaient tenté de violer une voyageuse étrangère à Cox's Bazar.

Selon un reportage, le fondateur de la plus grande ONG du monde est mort. BRAC est aussi la grande organisation microcrédit qui lutte contre la pauvreté au Bangladesh. Il a aussi créé BRAC Bank et BRAC Université qui a mis le premier satellite en orbite.

Don't Ignore Refugees' Rights

The coming years are going to see lots of refugees around the world. Many of them will be displaced due to political tension or climatic conditions. Bangladesh's mega cities have long been hosting villagers fleeing horrors of river erosion. Recently, the country welcomed nearly million refugees from persecution in the Rakhine State in Myanmar.

In addition, huge number of Bangladeshis work in Middle East and South East Asia. Any kind of geo political tension in these countries could lead to massive evacuation program like that happened during the gulf war or second world war. The prospect of a refugee like situation is pretty high for Bangladesh.

Across the border, tension is rising among different communities.  There is a mild chance that we may host some political refugees from India. But for the next few years, it is highly unlikely that this may happen. It all depends on how the Indian government is going to implement the the National Register Citizens and to deal with the aftermath.

In dealing with the Rohingyas, Bangladesh already met some harsh truths: pledged promises of aid never translated into actions, economic opportunities or alternative livelihood for the Rohingyas have never been devised, market access to some developed countries for Bangladeshi goods as a gesture of acknowledgement to host stateless people has yet to take place and no policies have been devised to spell out how the refugees' rights over resources( what they earn through their participation in economic activity)  will be ensured and their free movement will be respected.

No one accepts willingly a refugee life in a foreign land. At the same time, economic opportunities and freedom to move without obstacles are extremely difficult for a refugee in a foreign country. Often, the condition facing a refugee turns worse if the hosting country becomes hostile or the population hold animus towards the refugee. Furthermore, there are lack of international efforts and agreements that ensure refugees' rights of their earned earnings and resources. From day one, a refugee becomes a subject of intense exploitation.

In the surrounding villages of Rohingya camps in Cox's Bazar, many Rohingyas forced to sell their labor at a wage rate far below than the market in face of grinding poverty.I had the experience to travel on a rickshaw  in Cox's Bazar back in 2010  or 2011 at a fare much lower than the market could offer. Later I figured out the rickshaw puller was a Rohingya.

The movie "Gangs of New York" offers another vivid account of the impact of refugees could play in the society and labor market. In the movie, the Irish immigrants greatly shape informal labor market. Many are conscripted in the US army and sent directly to the battlefields, unknown and treacherous ,to embrace cruel death. Their dues are never paid. Some of these poor migrants fall into the lure of notorious gangs.

In Thailand, another group of Myanmar refugees have taken up hazardous jobs to sustain families. They extract copper from dumped electronic gadgets and laptops in awful working environment. Many burn their hands while doing so, as reported by the New York Times.

In the neighboring state of West Bengal, a small mangrove forest island once became a tension point between refugees of Bangladesh and state government. Poor refugees came in droves and started living in the forest despite repeated warnings from the government. Later police and ruling party cadres cleared the island launching a brutal crackdown. The killings in Marichjhanpi island still rankles with the refugees living in West Bengal.

To insulate the refugees from exploitation and to safeguard their interests, multilateral bodies should step forward. For instance, many nations can welcome a particular group of refugees. But due to statelessness , they cannot go/travel  to those countries. UN can make special arrangements / travel documents that allow a refugee to move freely within a country and between friendly countries.

More precisely, a family may be separated by a tragic event and may become refugee. Sole bread winner may reside in a richer country but the rest of the family members may remain stranded in refugee camps of a poor country. In this case, UN may issue special travel documents to help the family reunites without violating laws and regularities of the hosting countries.Furthermore, migrant member of a refugee family may need to remit money back to the host country where his/her family members live. Due to the status of refugee, they cannot engage in legal financial transaction. Often the host country allows the refugees to engage in economic activities like farming, pisciculture, small business etc. Again due to their status, they cannot do banking legally in the country. UN can launch initiative through UNHCR so that refugees can open bank account using their refugee identity, can do financial transactions legally and can protect their resources.

Just to provide shelter is not enough for the refugees. As they are subject to exploitation and vulnerabilities stemming from the situation exists in the ground of hosting countries.Multilateral bodies  need to take initiatives to find ways for economic opportunities for the refugees, instead of relying heavily on aid, and to make sure they move freely between countries that are amicable towards them.

To market the goods and produces of refugees, some solution should be devised. Like duty free shops at airports, we can introduce duty-free  market place for refugee made goods in major cities. They can be given credit, subsidized seeds, fertilizer, land and pond . Special haat could also be arranged for their produces in week days and weekend. This can all happen under the good care of UNHCR.

Many countries are tremendously friendly towards the Rohingyas. These countries can fix a quota of RMG items , wear by defense personnel. Bangladeshi government in turn can redistribute quotas to Bangladeshi RMG manufacturers who will help prepare Rohingya entrepreneurs or offer jobs to Rohingyas in their factories. Their earnings could go directly to the bank accounts operated by UNHCR. This initiative, if work, will create a new breed of  Rohingya entrepreneurs whose ventures will lift the community up from dire poverty.

Meanwhile, Myanmar government can give Rohingya originated traders some special permits to do trade of kitchen commodities in the country. This will open up another alley of opportunities for the Rohingyas. Uninhabited islands of Myanmar could also be leased to Rohingyas so that they could grow their own food, do farming and sell their produces to outside world. This will partly assuage their economic and financial woes. If Rohingyas are reluctant, then able Bangladeshi farms can be invited to lease those agricultural plots inside Myanmar.

Last two initiatives are bilateral in nature, depending much on how other friendly countries appreciate the ideas. Multilateral agreements like banking operation and travel documents for refugees can effectively materialize them. Since pledges of aid recede as time progresses, it is not a good idea to rest solely on aid to solve refugee problem. Mainstreaming the contribution of refugees towards the economy could be good alternative.

La Semaine Dernière A Mes Yeux

(06 décembre --- 13 décembre)

Selon un reportage, un Chinois est mort dans la centrale charbonnière à Payra, Borishal. Il a échoué à boucler sa ceinture quand il travaillait à la hauteur de 80 feet et est tombé.

Selon un reportage, un homme d'affaires chinois a été tué et enterré près de son appartement à Banani. Sa famille est en train de passer vacances en Chine pendant que la tuerie se déroulait. Police soupçonne désaccord dans les affaires s'est soldé par la tuerie. Les caméras de surveillance n'ont pas marché en ce moment là.


Selon un reportage, incendie a ravagé une usine du plastique à Keraniganj, tuant onze personnes.


Selon un reportage, les ministres des affaires étrangères et de l'intérieur du Bangladesh ont reporté leurs visites officielles en Inde afin de la situation sulfureuse là bas. Selon un autre reportage, la véhicule de l'ambassadeur adjoint du Bangladesh à Guwahati a été ciblé par les manifestants.

Dismal Job Market: Who Gets The Blame?

A recent study on unemployment reveals that 34% of the graduates are currently unemployed. The study in progress has found that the  performance of graduates in job is not as good as the employers anticipate and the education system is not compliant with the job market.

I have not got the chance to leaf through the study in question. So I am not going to comment on the study.

However, it is not clear how many of the graduates have lost their jobs due to stalled growth in private sector. Vibrant private sector is conspicuously absent in Bangladesh, a place dominated by crony infested businesses. At the same time, slowing down of growth in major economies also affects the private sector here. In recent months, many multinational companies have wound up their operations in this part of the world to expand their operations or to reduce cost significantly.
A recent news report says 64 RMG factories have been closed down in 10 months of this fiscal year as they are unable to cope with government's new salary decision and lack of bank support for this crucial sector in the wake of piling up of non performing loan. Lugubrious air prevailing in the financial sector is largely due to squandering of bank money and mismanagement.

So banks grow cautious to lend further and trust deficit stalls the growth of private sector. Sometimes policy decision also plays a role influencing the job market. We witnessed plenty of examples in telecom sector.
Citycell laid off thousands of workers after regulatory authority had shut it down over due payments. Angry workers descended into the streets and staged protest against the decision.

Two other major operators declared a merger and fought a legal battle with the government over contested tax. The operators lost the battle and were asked to pay the tax money to the government. One of the operators has launched a voluntary separation scheme for its employees in order to economize its labor force.

Their actions lend credence to the argument that consumers and workers bear full brunt of cost cutting measures.

Tension is also  brewing in media industry. In the beginning of this year, an association of broadcast journalist was formed to protect the interest of the journalist from the whims of the owners. Most of these outlets are set up with political blessings where professionalism has little role to play. Indiscriminate termination of journalist is pretty common. A TV channel drew ire of the journalist community after the TV authority had fired the whole reporting and editorial team of the news department.  More recently, fired journalist of a TV channel laid siege to TV premises. Many journalists have not been paid their dues. Even the experienced and senior ones face the music.

It is more or less pretty evident that experience and skill has no role in recent termination in the media. Business model may be wrong or the  outlets  were set up on different purposes. In the face of increasing cost, they simply scuttle the journalists.

Truth is there is no vibrant and free private sector, where ups and downs reflect rules of free market. Question remains on how one can blame performance and skill set of an employee in this crony infested and politically aligned private sector.

Drawing lessons from our RMG industry offers some objective explanation. When it all started back in late 70s, bureaucrats and people closer to power corridor managed to grab the permit to set up factories. RMG buyers from Hong Kong and South Korea trained the initial work force made them ready to deliver the desired product. This in-house training program prepared the skilled workforce. None back then envisaged that our RMG industry would reach such stage. Obviously we need more specialized institution to churn out more knowledgeable employee to deal with the challenges when the industry is on a firm footing.

When the industrial revolution was unfolding,  European countries did not target job market and did not churn out market desired workers.  Rather back then those countries produced finest quality of mathematicians and innovative minds. Instead of job market soothsaying , we need to take cue from those periods.

Look what happened to the Indian IT sector. New rules by the American government and trade war between US and China made a heavy dent in Indian IT job market. It does not mean that those who got fired do not have the skill . Rather, they fell victim of a bad patch in Indian IT industry.

What we are missing here is crux of the problem. Quality of education is the area where we should concentrate instead of making workers. We have to ensure quality education at all levels. If that happens then we will get good citizens who will be able to contribute tremendously to the society through their thoughtful duties and deeds. They will be able to meet the challenges of the future at the same time.


At the moment, we are pursuing an educational policy that is parallel to feeding a cub semi prepared food by a carnivore. There is always someone to crack the problem for a  student.  Omnipresence of these coaches seriously hampers the learning process of a student. A student does not stumble upon a problem more often and solves the problem by himself. The result is we are getting dependent generations who have no confidence in themselves. Appalling state of innovation, lack of quality books, lack of pioneer in every field are tell-tale signs.


Repository of knowledge, book, that helps a learner in his/her formative years is not easy to find. Libraries, where a learner gets a chance to find them, are drying up. Government and private donations that sustain them are rare.

Journalist Samanth Subramanian once wrote a feature about the public libraries in the state of Tamil Nadu, one of the Indian states that produces super IT professionals and  scientists. Central and local government allocated special funds to the libraries scattered across the state, according to him. The fund used to buy various genres of books and magazines, including foreign ones, to quench the thirst of the bibliophiles. Thanks to government patronage, these institutional buyers help flourish local publication industry and dawn a breed of readers.

Red=2015 & Green=2017. Num of Technical Institution. Source: BANBEIS

Meanwhile, to instill special kind of technical knowledge, we need technical schools and teachers' training college. We failed miserably to  groom our future teachers. Stat furnished by BANBEIS on the number of technical institution is pretty disappointing. I find the SSC and HSC vocational training institute number pretty erroneous. However, number of Technical School, Graphic Art Institute, Textile Institute, Survey Institute, Agricultural Training Institute,Marine Institute and Medical Training Institute stands pretty much same in 2015 and 2017. There have been slight increase in the number of Polytechnic Institute and Technical Training Center.

Similarly, we need to recruit good teachers for these technical schools. If we are really serious , the number of institutions and teachers should have gone up.

Quality text books also lack here. Unfortunately, we do not have enough good educational content writers or academic to write legible and good text books that explain things to a learner crystal clear. Another hint that our education system is really poor.
Instead of going after the indirect reasons, we should focus on the right target in order to get good citizens and world class workforce.

Quality education is not a privilege to few but a right for all that holds the key to augment the threshold quality of a typical learner. Attaining that goal obviates the need to do research on such trivial issues on our labor force and spares the fund for more pressing one.

La Semaine Dernière A Mes Yeux

(29 novembre --- 06 décembre)


Selon un reportage, Bangladesh a demandé aux Philippines de divulguer l'identité des pirates qui avaient piraté la Banque centrale de Bangladesh. De plus, Bangladesh a aussi demandé de partagé l'amende, recueilli par la Banque centrale de Philippines après une enquête sur le rôle de Rizal Bank dans le piratage.


Selon un reportage, l'Université de technologie du Bangladesh a donné son aval aux demandes de manifestants qui se sont insurgés après tuerie macabre d'un étudiant. L'autorité a aussi licencié 26 étudiants pour avoir engagé dans ragging.


Selon un reportage, police a appréhendé deux personnes pour avoir tué deux femmes à Mirpur 2.


Selon un reportage, un cadavre d'une fille de policier s'est trouvé dans une rue à Malibagh. Police a appréhendé son ancien copain pour interpellation. Ses camarades d' une université privée sont descendus dans les rues et ont manifesté pour justice.

La Semaine Dernière A Mes Yeux

(22 novembre --- 29 novembre)

Selon un reportage, une cour d' antiterrorisme a condamné à mort 7 coupables et libéré un autre pour avoir assisté à la tuerie macabre dans Holey Artisan Bakery, revendiqué par Daech et bouleversé le monde.

 Selon un reportage, Australie a retiré l'alerte de voyage sur Bangladesh, imposée après Holey Artisan Bakery Attack.

Selon un reportage, presque 35 femmes de Chambre ont pris refuge dans un centre de rapatriement en Arabie saoudite et prié au gouvernement bangladais de les rapatrier dès que possible.

 Selon un reportage, une explosion de mine en Birmanie, a tué un Rohingya et blessé deux autres.

Mon portable est tombé en panne pour 60 heures. Il ne se ravitaillait pas. Puis je suis allé chez ingénieur de portable. Maintenant ça marche. Mon laptop est aussi tombé en panne il y a trois mois.

Man Vs Wild

A trivial news emanating from Boalkhali of Chattogram caught me off guard. The news reads three lives perished in an attack by elephant herd. One met the death while gardening his cultivable land. The other person was struck by an elephant while he was picking arum leaves behind a saw-mill. An elderly man was trampled down by a herd of elephants after he had finished his morning prayers. Earlier, two baby elephants had been killed: one was drowned in a pond and another one was electrocuted by a trap set by villagers. Villagers claimed more and more elephants descended on villages, located on the fringes of forests of South Chattogram and Bandarban, in search of food. This is happening due to shortages of foods in the woods.

This tragedy is a stark reminder that trappings of development are making a heavy dent in the nature. The result is obvious: the elephants could not sustain in receding forests and devoured the surrounding paddy fields on far too many occasions.

This tragic encounter is also taking place in other parts of Bangladesh: in Moulvibazar wild cats are caught by locals while they try to catch fish. In villages close to Sundarban, Royal Bengal Tigers often prey on livestock. In Rajshahi, a mango orchard is occupied by Shamuk Khol birds' nests, prompting local administration to issue notice against orchard owner of causing any damage to the nests and doling out compensation.

Stray incidents call for urgent policy action so that man and wild can live in harmony. Many of our neighboring countries make great progress in this regard, significantly reducing incidence of tragic encounters and loss of property. Bangladesh can draw lessons from them.

To accommodate growing population, houses are being built in cultivable lands. Cultivable lands are being used to grow cash crops that fetch more money for farmers. Moreover, for the sustenance of growing population, forests turn into cultivable lands. For this reason we see paddy fields invade forests where elephants roam free. Trees used to grow in the woods were cut down and agricultural land were transformed into orchards. So desperate birds like Shamuk Khol make nests on mango tree tops. Pisciculture is so widespread and profitable that no pond or ditch is left unused for desperate "mechho bagh" or Fish Tigers to fill their stomach. Thin vegetation, disappearance of mangrove forests due to increased human settlement and agricultural activity are pushing the deer stock further from the reach of tigers. Evidently the hungry Maharajas raided the nearby villages in search of food and made headlines on the newspaper.

Development and preservation of forest can go hand in hand, contrary to the argument that stresses on the tradeoff between the two. A symbiotic relationship could be explored so that the two could coexist in harmony.

Peasants would not lay traps if there were incentive /compensation to damaged crops stemming from marauding elephants. Subject to the report of forestry officials in the wake of such incident, local administration could hand down cash or subsidized rice, more than the value of damaged crops,to the victims. In this situation, any approaching herd of elephant does not pose any threat to harvest, so the peasant is no longer hostile to elephants. Meanwhile, the starving elephant gets an alternate source of food in the paddy fields and becomes more docile at a later date.

Shamuk Khol nest incident in Rajshahi is an eye opener. There local administration gave words to the orchard owner that he would be duly compensated and issued a notice for not obliterating the nests. The assurance and local support from the villagers salvaged the nests.

Similarly, Sunderban villagers could be given wild hogs or piglets so that the tigers prey on them instead of the cattle. Proper training can be introduced to take care of the mangrove forests. In addition, subsidized rice could be distributed among villagers who comply government instructions to preserve the forest and to be kind to the wild.

Local administration and forestry officials could initiate advocacy campaign in the target area in a bid to disseminate information on incentives. Awareness building is at the core of this advocacy campaign. Special job program and scholarship for children at school in target area could also be introduced.

Most of our public fund is squandered away because of corrupted projects and mismanagement. Projects aimed to preservation of the wild will not demand more money. Government could easily allocate fund for this kind of initiative that will in the end bridge two hostile communities.

In Africa, parents of a newborn of a primitive society take the umbilical cord to a nearby forest and bury it. It is done so that the baby develops a bond to mother nature and performs its duty diligently at a later stage.

This kind of practice is conspicuously absent in our society, which receives lights of education and enjoys all the marvels of modernity. Government cannot sit idle and needs to act fast.

Any encounter with wild tiger may end up with tragic consequences. But that does not bar humans to preserve endangered species like tigers. Because we know the value of such species in nature and have the vision about what the world will look like without them. For this reason, elephant trek, Shamuk Khol nest, safe preying zone for fish tigers and undisturbed habitat for Royal Bengal tigers should be included in our development agenda. A society is recognized as developed when it mourns loss of its wild. Do we really progress to that stage?

La Semaine Dernière A Mes Yeux

(15 novembre --- 22 novembre)

Selon un reportage, un gazoduc à l'intérieur dans un bâtiment a explosé, tuant 7 personnes et blessant plusieurs autres à Chattogram.

selon un reportage, Biman Bangladesh et Boeing ont encré un accord d'achat, qui vaut $585 million, pour acheter deux Dreamliners.

Selon un reportage, un Chinois a été tué par un coup d'arme blanche à la centrale charbonnière à Payra, Patuakhali.

Selon un reportage, une frappe aérienne en Libye a tué 7 personnes dont 1 Bangladais.
Selon un reportage, 3 dirigeants de Jana Sanghati Samiti ont été tués par balles à Rangamati.

Selon un reportage, des voleurs ont volé Tk 1 million depuis les GABs de Pubali Bank à Cumilla et à Chattogram. Police soupçonne qu'ils sont tous les étrangers.

Selon un reportage, l'Université de technologie de Bangladesh a annulé inscription de 26 étudiants pour avoir assisté dans la tuerie d'un étudiant.

Selon un reportage, un train a renversé à Kishorganj. Pour 5 heures le service de train y a été annulé.

Don't Discard Tatmadaw

A recent scheme gestated by Gambia to try the Tatmadaw generals has garnered lot of media attention. It has come at a time when repatriation of the Rohingyas has completely stalled because of the dilly dallying by Myanmar and prevailing restive conditions in Rakhine State, where the Rohingyas lived centuries after centuries. Bangladesh already signed bilateral agreement with Myanmar, a powerful neighbor who will undoubtedly play a crucial role in the development of Bangladesh years down the line, to defuse tension following events of Tatmadaw's drive against the Rohingya. To Bangladesh's despair , such agreement has yet to come to fruition as the hostile atmosphere in the ground in Rakhine State and other feuding parties' lack of interest to integrate the Rohingyas back to nation building process.

Bangladesh has to stick to this agreement as we cannot afford losing the favor of a big neighbor like Myanmar. Recent genocidal allegations against Myanmar generals have received the nod of Muslim countries as well as the occidental ones. However, what difference this kind of trial can make could only be told by time. Many argue that this will generate pressure on Myanmar generals. There are other ethnic minorities of Myanmar who have been living in the camps of neighboring countries for decades. If the UN were able to document those atrocities, the the holistic allegations of human rights abuses by Myanmar generals would become a formidable one. Myanmar,on the other hand, made its own investigations of torture and killing in the wake of growing international criticism heaping on Tatmadaw. Tatmadaw did acknowledge some of its units had involved in gross human rights violations. In fact, mild punishments were awarded to culprits. So efforts are there from the part of Tatmadaw to address the issues attributed to it by international human rights organizations.

Myanmar has been  going through a transitional phase for the last couple of years. In this phase, Tatmadaw will play an important role to get the country back into the track of participatory democracy.

Unlike other regional armies, Tatmadaw has some unique features. It is an organization that was not modeled after the outgoing colonial master's army and that does not hinge on its former colonial master to train its personnel as some of its neighbors do. Home-grown and oriental orientation to training and grooming of future military leaders have its pros and cons. Often in our region we see regional armies have officers whose views and convictions are moulded by the country of origin of their trainers. At various stages, they developed some kind of split loyalty and embarked upon misadventures that froze constitution and took away freedom of expression for several years. This derailment of democracy, often happens through bloody events, crippled institutions that are quintessential to flourish democracy.

Tatmadaw is no saint, however, its personnel are loyal to its own code of conduct and there has been deep understanding among the various branches of this large monolithic organization. It is translated into lack of coups and counter-coups and lack of defection in the history of Tatmadaw. Meanwhile, if we take a look at the history of Armed Forces we will notice that it is plagued by tragedies and bloody fracas. In addition, defection and desertion soiled the reputation of our Armed Forces. It may sound harsh but the truth is our Armed Forces are a demoralized political entity that urgently requires a complete revamp like a vanquished army.

  Despite a long ban on Tatmadaw,none of its generals perked their wealth in the west and defected to a western country in the face of odds. Rather, most of them banked with Chinese overseas banks located in the South-East Asian countries. So this kind of steps at the end of the day would be rendered useless.

  In recent years, Tatmadaw helped international community to curb drug invasion. It allowed reporters to investigate the drug empire of a drug kingpin, known as "El Chapo of Asia".By the same token, it would be in a far more formidable position to implement bilateral agreement if there were peace in Rakhine State.

In contrast to Tatmadaw, we have not seen yet any concrete step inside Bangladesh that insinuates that accountability has been ensured in Armed Forces. We do not know how many senior army officers and rank and file personnel have been brought to book for breaching discipline or committing crimes. People are eager to know the fate of rogue law-enforcement personnel who killed the local counselor in Cox's Bazar. There has been a wild rumor that siblings of a senior Army officer have been listed as fugitives by Interpol. In the past we witnessed sensitive surveillance technology was used to influence city corporation election outcome. People placed in important position at the parliament to look into the defense matters have been found involved with groups engaged in lucrative business dealings and laundered money in offshore heavens.

Many of the dual citizens and Army bureaucrats who tried to cleanse politics or engaged in corruption found safe sanctuary in the west. Same holds true for corrupt businessmen and politicians.

Point is despite being a democracy, our journey towards stability and progress is not not as impressive as that of Myanmar, which has just reached the highway of participatory democracy stripping of authoritarian practices of trampling down over free voices.

Myanmar senior Army General and Chief of Staff donated to the renovation project of a historical mosque and paid a visit to the the mausoleum of last Mughal emperor Bahadur Shah Zafar. This is a gesture to indicate that he is willing to reconcile with the Muslim community of his country.

Myanmar is also important for our economy. During the last Bakri Eid, Myanmar sent shipments of cattle to keep the Bakri Eid cattle market stable. In the recent onion crisis, Myanmar exported 35000 metric tons of onion to stabilize the local onion market.

This is undoubtedly a friendly gesture to keep the kitchen market stable. For our growing economy, Myanmar has many resources to offer. In addition, we could export commodities to meet Myanmar's domestic need. As its RMG industry is growing, Bangladesh could make some strategic alliance with Myanmar on which RMG items each ofthe two countries should produce in order to avoid stiff competition in common export market.

More importantly, Myanmar will help us to dismantle methamphetamine infrastructure built across the other side of the border. Prerequisite is maintaining a warm relationship with the country. Bangladesh could also invite FDI in financial service industry so that Chinese community in Malaysia and Singapore sets up overseas bank where the Myanmar nationals could do banking.

In recent months, there have been hawkish cries menacing to shatter regional peace if there is no peaceful end to Rohingya crisis. Some retired Army bureaucrat in seminar even went further to portray the future Rohingyas as would-be bombers. This kind of portrayal neither helps ending Rohingya crisis, nor depicts them as a peace-loving community to the world.   It is not clear which section of Rohingya community the military  bureaucrat in question talked to and got that shocking picture. But more or less Bangladesh should be committed to not repeating another Charlie Wilson's war , which tremendously helps this kind of army bureaucrat, in this part of the world.

Reaching out every segment of civil and military leadership of Myanmar does not only dispel ambiguities in each country's concerns, but also gives a strong message to our future economy that needs to grow at far more greater pace.For this reason, I think Bangladesh should take distance from Gambia initiative to try the Tatmadaw for war crimes. Let the multilateral body do this. Bangladesh should not veer off the path of thawing relations with the Tatmadaw since it is the best alternative we have to connect ourselves with the East and to solve more pressing issues at hand.

La Semaine Dernière A Mes Yeux

( 9 novembre --- 16 novembre)

Selon un reportage, cyclone BulBul a frappé l'île indienne Sagardwip et Sundarban. Bangladesh est aussi tombé dans son chemin. Les villageois bangladais dans la région du sud a nié aller aux refuges anti-tempête. Sundarban a faiblé le cyclone. Bangladesh a appris des pluies faibles deux jours. A Barguna, un bateau de pêcheurs reste disparu.

Selon un autre reportage, 17 Bangladais ont été tués par cyclone Bulbul. 7 sont victimes arrachement d'arbre. Le cyclone a balayé presque 5000 toits en chaume. Cadavres de 9 pêcheurs ont été découverts depuis Barishal. Le cyclone a causé des dégâts de Tk 5000 million aux champs de riz.

Selon un reportage, Gambie a porté plainte contre Birmanie à l'ONU pour avoir mené génocide contre les Rohingyas dans le Rakhine State.

Selon un reportage, collusion entre deux trains à Brahmanbaria a tué 15 personnes. Quelques jours plus tard, un autre train a quitté son trajectoire à Sirajganj. Le feu a envahi le train ensuite. Personne n'a pas heurté dans l'accident.

Selon un reportage, chef de GrameenPhone a accusé BTRC dans une conférence de presse pour avoir forcé de payer les taxes disputés.

Selon un reportage, UltraTech Cement a affirmé qu'il avait vendu ses actions à Heidelberg Cement à $29.5 million.

Selon un reportage, International Finance Corporation a lancé Bangla Bond à la bourse de Londres pour financer les projets au Bangladesh. Pran Agro va recevoir $19 million depuis IFC.

Make Good Use Of Our Satellite

Government official disclosed to the media that the country is going to put another satellite into the orbit. Though it was presented as a replacement ot supplement to the Bangabandhu-1, country's sole geostationary satellite, officials stressed that it would be a multirole satellite. Its role will not only limited to communication and broadcast, but will encompass to provide information on weather.
Bangladesh joined pretty late in satellite possessing countries. However, owning a communication satellite is boon for the country as the country has dozens of satellite TV channels, radio stations and overwhelming number of internet users. Despite its commencement few months ago, Bangladesh has yet to yield benefits from its sole communication satellite. One area that deserves urgent attention is the education sector, where the satellite can be used to broadcast high quality educational contents in a bid to provide quality education and to bridge digital divide among hard-to-reach groups.

Many of our neighboring countries have made good use of communication satellites to teach children and educate generations on science and environment. A village student does not have access to a good teacher or lab demonstrator to learn about laws of physics, properties of compounds, gas, lights etc. He/she remains dark about application of these things around him / her. To popularize science and engineering among budding population, communication satellite could play a crucial role.

Contents can be brought from abroad and be dubbed in Bangla. They can be outsourced to local production houses. There are a good number of foreign educational contents on popular science and mechanics. To meet syllabus of local school and college, tailor-made contents can be created by local production houses or universities. Ministry of Information can buy those contents and broadcast them at a convenient time. Primary schools in remote areas can be equipped with wide-screen TV and multimedia projectors and can broadcast those contents at the scheduled time.

Apart from broadcasting educational contents, communication satellite can also broadcast entertainment and news programs in popular regional languages. Government owned television channel has a large repository of entertainment contents, which can be dubbed in regional languages. At the same time, private consortium of media houses should be allowed to use it to broadcast news items in various languages. Since our media houses have fallen into the clutches of ideological groups, independent news and views have still great demand among the people.

Bangladesh can encourage launching of another international broadcasting services in collaboration with foreign entrepreneurs to cater to the need of local and regional audiences. Two-prong purposes will be served: professional and independent attitude in news making will be ensured and Bangladeshi narrative of regional and international events can be shared with international audiences.

With much fanfare we introduced Space Research And Remote Sensing Organization (SPARSO), but unfortunately we do not make good use of it. Unfortunately, we do not have any good dedicated meteorological and imagery satellite, vital for weather forecast and studying environment. BRAC Onnesha has phased out in May this year. It did provide little educational imagery data. Being a disaster prone country, having a weather satellite is call of the hour.

We also lack a navigational satellite. Our sea-going vessel needs this kind of satellite. It is also useful for digitized traffic system. Our communication satellite can play a limited role in vessel tracking and vehicle tracking. We can manufacture special communication / radio devices and install them on vessel or vehicle in order to communicate with them or track them. In recent cyclone Bulbul, a fishing boat sank off the coast of Barguna, 15 sailors / fishermen remained missing. Bodies of nine fishermen were later recovered from Barishal coast. Had there been satellite radio communications system installed on these sea-going vessels, regular updates on storm might be relayed to the fishermen.

Meanwhile, radio communications systems may also be used to keep a close tab on the movement of vehicles of public transport pool and unfit vehicle on the road. Round-the-clock surveillance through satellite radio may significantly reduce the incidence of road mishap.

Many countries in the neighborhood employ their universities to design and develop their own remote-sensing and meteorological satellite. Bangladesh should take cue from them. Government has to make sure SPARSO and some universities take part in design and development of future satellites. So far only a private university demonstrated knowledge of designing and operating a nanosatellite. A cash-strapped government may not have the resources for satellite design and development, but whatever resources it keeps aside should go to the right institution to increase its capacity and meet the needs of evolving time.

La Semaine Dernière A Mes Yeux

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(1 novembre --- 8 novembre)

Selon un reportage, police a appréhendé la femme de chambre, coupable d' avoir tué deux femmes dans un appartement à Dhanmondi.

Selon un reportage, effondrement d'un bâtiment à Narayanganj a tué un garçon.

Selon un reportage, la destruction de chez BGMEA a été  reporté à cause d'opposition par l'agence responsable pour le démanteler.

Selon un reportage, tamponnement entre un bateau et une croisière a resulté par naufrage de bateau. 3 personnes sont mortes et 12 restent disparues.

Selon un reportage, Amnesty International dans un rapport se dit que plus de 400 personnes ont été tuées dans la guerre contre drogue au cours. Beaucoup de victimes sont innocents.

Big Brands Ditch Bangladesh

More and more multinational companies are winding up their operations in Bangladesh. The latest incident took place when foreign investors of Dutch-Bangla Bank, which is doing well amid troubled commercial banks, declared that they were going to sell their shares to Bangladeshi investors.

The decision was not greeted well across the market and to a great extent highlights the sorry state of business. It came at a time when GrameenPhone and Robi, two leading mobile phone operators of the country, are at loggerhead with the government over contested due taxes. Robi divulged to the press that consumers would pay the extra cost if government planned to go ahead with the collection of contested dues by hook or by crook, bypassing the arbitrary settlement process. Sea changes took place in telecom industry  when GrameenPhone and Robi agreed to merge their operations in Asia. Following a negative reaction from the press , Telenor said they had postponed the decision.

Despite significant improvement of Bangladesh's ranking in World Bank's "Doing Business Report", world's leading brands and investors are leaving Bangladesh one by one. This does not lend support to the claim that sound business climate prevails in Bangladesh. At the same time major economic zones across the globe are crippled by economic slowdown. The situation is writ large on the falling order of RMG industry. The cash cow of Bangladesh economy has not registered the anticipated growth target in the ongoing fiscal year.

Even the domestic demand does not look so promising to many foreign brands. Singer sold all its sales outlets in Bangladesh to Turkish home appliances manufacturer Arcelor. Bata with its more than 1000 sales centers across Bangladesh made a profit of Tk 50 crore in 2018. Meanwhile, a sprawling slum could generate that much of money each month provided that we take into account regular cash given by the drug lord operating in the sum. I recently went to a Bata discount shop and saw shoes were up for sale at a quarter of their original price.

In the pharmaceutical industry, GlaxoSmithKline announced its closure of pharmaceutical division two years ago. Its consumer division was making profit back then. So the announcement came as a total surprise. This year French Sanofi declared that it would sell its operations here. Purdu pharma made similar declaration. Being a least developed country, Bangladesh enjoys some WTO advantages for making cheap drugs. This advantage did not bar these companies to take such harsh step. There has been some issues in the business environment or governance. None bothered to search the answer.

In IT, Accenture, an Indian IT firm doing some content related work for Telenor in Bangladesh, abruptly declared closure of its operations in Bangladesh. This kind of announcement did not send positive signal abroad to foreign investors. Meanwhile, key businesses and funds to stimulate business are being concentrated into the hands of some cronies who have proven that they are unable to bring the much needed wind of change in the economy. From garbage collection to public infrastructure construction, one can see the footprints of powerful oligarchs who spare no means to get rid of any competitor or obstacle. Recent drive against casino is an eye opener. Greed of the few brings down the whole system and corrupts the process of transparent dealing. In the end, government spending does not stimulate the private sector, plays no role to create any meaningful jobs and finds innovative ways to be laundered abroad.

A handful of groups are responsible for the bad loans that cause bankers and government officials to spend sleepless nights as piling up of bad loans poses serious menace to the economy. From container transportation through waterways to direct to home TV services, powerful oligarchs control the vital businesses , leaving little room for private sector, which will take the onus to propel the economy, to play any leading role.

This is indeed not a very promising sign for the future course of the economy, which requires a holistic growth approach to create more opportunities for all and to accelerate the trickle down process to dispel inequality.

One global brand after another abandons Bangladesh, mocking the indicators that say business climate is improving. Meanwhile, concentration of wealth into the hands of the powerful few augurs ill for Bangladesh economy.

La Semaine Dernière A Mes Yeux

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(25 octobre --- 1 novembre)

Selon un reportage, une logeuse âgée et une femme de chambre ont été massacrées dans un appartement à Dhanmondi. Police soupçonne que une autre femme de chambre a tué les deux.

Selon un reportage, un étudiant a été électrocuté dans un anniversaire de magazine pour les adolescents.

Selon un reportage, explosion d'une bouteille de gaz a tué six enfants à Mirpur. 20 enfants ont été aussi subi des blessures.

Selon un reportage, tamponnement entre un chaland et un pétrolier léger s'est soldé par nappe de pétrole dans le fleuve de Karnifuli.

Selon un reportage, International Cricket Council a interdit le cricketer bangladais , Sakib Al Hasan, de tout type de criket pour un an. Il a caché sa conversation avec un parier dans la messagerie de What'sApp. Quelque jours plus tard, une vidéo est devenue virale où l'on voit que le président de Bangladesh Cricket Board joue le casino au Singapore.

Selon un reportage, les actionnaires néerlandaises veulent vendre leurs actions de Dutch Bangla Bank au Bangladesh.

What Does Bhola Violence Portend?

An unprecedented jingoistic and communal movement swept across the country since Bangladesh and India had agreed to implement coastal surveillance system under Indian defense credit line. Many did not like the deal and voiced strong opposition to such deal. Ultranationalists tried stir some movement, capitalizing this feverish anti-Indian feeling harbored by a tiny group of people, but did not get the desired momentum.

First sign of troubles was definitely the brutal death of BUET student Abrar, whose last Facebook post deemed critical of Indo-Bangladesh cooperation. Any tragic death at university usually triggers anti-government movement. That was what happened in the past. This time his fellow classmates keep protesting for a change in party politics at campus and do not demand anything for the national politics. They successfully limit their movement within the campus and give it apolitical look. Death of Abrar, in the end, turned out to be a brutal manifestation of student politics.

Second incident took place in the frontier. A raiding team of elite force, chasing a group of drug traffickers, crossed the border near Tripura and surrounded by Indian villagers. After a brief spell of humiliation, they were handed back to Bangladesh Border Guards by BSF. Few days later a group of Indian fishermen were catching fish near Bangladeshi waters in Rajshahi. BGB caught them red handed and brought them to camp for further questioning. Then plain clothes BSF personnel entered Bangladesh and unofficial talk at one stage went horribly wrong. Pandemonium reigned in the spot until a BGB shot killed a BSF sergeant. Two BSF men were also detained and later released at a flag meeting. The incident caught military bureaucrats and the press off guardis. Press accounts however differed greatly across the border how the event was unfolded but never stirred any hyper nationalistic feeling among the readers.

The last incident struck in Bhola. A Hindu young man's Facebook post was hacked and a group of men tried deliberately to cause some trouble out of that post. District administrators and police officials were outnumbered by a mob while they were holding meeting inside a building. To disperse the angry mob, police fired few shots , killing four and injuring hundred more. The number of the wounded gave an idea to understand the gravity of the situation prevailed in the ground. A certain quarter tried to stoke the fire of communalism. Hefajet chief appealed his followers for restraint. The disciples obeyed and protected a century old temple in Hathajari, setting a fine example of communal harmony.

Meanwhile Police with the help of Facebook team in Singapore identified two people in the hacking and alleged defamatory post. The two and the young man whose Facebook account was hacked were arrested for questioning. Another school of seminary however joined the fray and kept stoking the fire of ultra nationalism and communalism. I myself witnessed few of such gatherings in Dhaka. Their endeavor receded fast for lack of popular support. So the whole anti-Indian campaign turned into a damp squib.

Why did this happen?

Role of India in Bangladesh politics and economy has changed significantly over the years. India has emerged as a development partner by offering several billions dollar of credit line. In addition, it also opened up its market for Bangladesh RMG industry. Bangladesh 's export to India is about to touch the $1 billion mark. In the wake of slowing down of global economy, greater access to Indian market came as a boon for Bangladesh, diversifying its export market and giving it a cushion for adverse time in traditional export destinations.

In the cultural arena too, we see great changes taking place. Indian Film Industry opened up its door for Bangladeshi actors, actresses, directors. Collaboration projects are being undertaken. Literary festivals and musical soirées are bringing noted musical and literary personalities closer.

Press and cultural people, who shape and mould public opinion, and businessmen, who keep running economy, did not join this fray. They did not lend their support to this anti-India movement to initiate a nationalistic air among the crowd.

For long, defense, or defense procurement to be precise, remains an exclusive matter to a certain group, which raised all sorts of obstacles to talk about it and to demand explanation or transparency in this sector. Press has been kept aside for the sake of "national security or interest". Unfortunately, on many occasions this interest has been compromised by the same forces who are about to uphold it.

Lack of transparency in defense procurement opened a route of steady benefits to this privileged group. In India, press is free to cover defense related issues, even the controversial one. Bofors debacle dethroned Congress party. It was first reported on the Press. Rafale deal controversy tarnished the image of BJP. Again it was covered and raised by the press. In addition, other defense corruption issues like Adarsha Housing scam were on the press radar and brought to the book because Indian media's relentless efforts to expose the murky truth.

Bangladesh partisan media never treaded that path as such adventure may jeopardize its bread and butter. Many of the crucial defense deals signed with friendly countries have never been discussed in the parliament, a place where issues of great national interests should be discussed at length. We also see by ignoring parliament and the press, this kind of defense agreement is leading to send troops in conflict zones where no multilateral body is present. Maybe some institution and military bureaucrats get benefited from such deal , but Bangladesh as a whole suffered a lot. In many of these conflict zones, security personnel of neighboring countries are working and earning huge forex. Perhaps this may lead to ink this cooperation, keeping the parliament in the dark.

We also see the internal reward-punishment system, which needs to be done in a transparent manner, of the Armed Forces is very weak. No news of the verdict of the offenders has been divulged. For instance, the press is eager to know the fate of the two commanding officers involved killing councilor Ekram in Cox's Bazar. What lapses of security establishment did make Bangladesh a Tk 5000 crore yaba market? Parliamentary committee never convene special hearing or summon people or organization's head to question about defense related corruption, abuse of power by security personnel and injustice purported on civilians under the cover of immunity.

The more transparent and open our defense sector is, the more strong will be this institution and democracy. At the same time, understanding of the relationship between defense and the civilian will be lot easier.

This much needed transparency is detrimental to the ecosystem, developed over the years and feeding a certain group, exists already in this sector. Bangladeshi press may overlook defense procurement issues but Indian press will question on every rupee spent on the procurement program and demand explanation. This pressure will prompt to change the things that have been going on over the years. For this reason, we see voices strong against possible defense cooperation took resort to stoke anti-Indian wave and to spur nationalist movement. This tactics is passé as people do not fall into that trap and have easy access to information.

It is indeed silly to hear that with the installation of coastal radar system India will have greater access to Bangladeshi coast and keep a close tab on the Bay of Bengal. Without official channels India has means to oversee things at Bay of Bengal. Official cooperation will augment our capability as well as keep us abrest of Indian plans and motives about this part of the world.

Another crucial aspect of this defense cooperation is that it will dilute the influence of that quarter inside the Armed forces that keeps a link with ideological groups and promotes misadventures.

Gone are the days when this kind of feverish hostile feeling towards different religion equated with hatred towards a country was used to resurge nationalist movement. People start to ask questions why the suited-booted patriots' children are not there in street agitation, why retired military bureaucrats kept mum about wrongdoings inside garrison. At the same time, let this kind of cooperation between democracies ushers in wider transparency and accountability in defense sector.

Social Credit Score For Bangladesh

Death of a child domestic help, resulted in the arrest of wife of a government engineer, has almost gone unnoticed in the social media and the press. She was recruited when she was 8 years old as her father could not bear expenses of her and her siblings.She lasted in this profession about 4 years, enduring all kinds of hardships and tortures. At 12, she finally gave in. Freedom at last! Her body bears all the marks of torture.

In Dhanmondi, another domestic help was choked to death after electric short circuit caused fire to a flat. She was too old to evacuate the building in time. Landlords of the flat where the fire originated were out when the tragedy struck.I am appalled to see no significant reaction, even lukewarm, to death of these people. Having read this sort of news on too many occasions, the society has grown inured to such tragedies.

Culprits purport this kind of crime to working class often perch on upper rung of the social ladder and often go scot free.

Often we see that people get fired or get scolding from school or college authority for social media posts that deem unacceptable to certain quarter. It is because they hurt their values or do not get along with their policies.

Different groups of people and companies have different policies. And they reward or punish their employees or disciples who do comply or do not comply with these policies. Apart from that we also see too many incidents of fake news, cyber bullying and social media account hacking. This kind of conduct destroys life, property and social harmony.

To check this kind of behavior, we should take cue from China that is introducing a unique social credit score for citizens and businesses.Based on this social credit score, individual and business will be rewarded and punished.

How one interacts with others, treats his surroundings, performs his role as a social creature, leads a lawful and ethical life, upholds consumer rights, pays taxes , undertakes corporate social responsibility and patronizes good initiative will be reflected in the Social Credit Score.

You may be a topper in the class but you regularly bully one fellow classmate at school, give troubles to your teacher and spread hatred through Facebook. It will reflect in your Social Credit Score and ultimately downgrade you in your year-end final school report card, which will take into account a student's Social Credit Score.

You may be a government employee, got the job by passing BCS exam, but shirk your duties, take bribes to delay a project, overrun project costs to gain benefits, mistreat subordinates and intimidate others who hold different views than yours. Your Social Credit Score may cost you your next increment or promotion or downgrade you to an inferior position.

By the same token, Social Credit Score can do a lot of benefits to improve business environment. A businessman who fails to repay his loans in time, launders money abroad and cheats friends and clients is worthy of a poor Social Credit Score. It may cost his exclusive right to a business association, MP seat, his children's right to get admitted into elite schools and further loans.

Obviously communist China envisaged such score to carry out massive surveillance on its own citizens and dissenters. It presented Social Credit Score in such a way to convince others and to hide its true intentions. Whatever the motive is, the idea sounds good and if it is implemented by welfare countries where market economy is already functioning by stripping of some of the transgressions.

Despite being a dysfunctional democracy, there is no wrong to get inspired from an idea, mooted and popularized by a communist country. I think this concept of Social Credit Score will find huge audience in democratic west, where it will be put in to test and will work more properly because there already exists enlightened societies who know how to put new ideas into action.

You will alter your conduct towards housemaid if mistreating housemaid costs you your job or promotion. In this sense Social Credit Score nudges one change his or her behavior to others.

Individual traits , good deeds have never been reflected in formal dealings and transactions. Social Credit Score has the potential to formalize our good behavior into our day-to-day dealings and affairs.

It may not root out the social evils overnight, but its nudging effect will reduce the incidence of social vices and value good conducts in the society. Its impact on society is enormous, leading us to the ultimate welfare country that we have been harboring for far too long in our minds.

Doomed is the society that does not recognize contributions of an honest individual ,who does not engage in evil doing but suffers all sorts of evils of an unlawful society, and prizes the evildoers. Swollen bank balance, property and show of wealth cannot distinguish the type and contributions of the two categories of people. Time has come to float Social Credit Score that duly recognizes good conducts of a citizen.

La Semaine Dernière A Mes Yeux

(18 octobre --- 25 octobre)

Selon un reportage, une cour bangladaise a condamné à mort 16 coupables pour avoir brûlé à mort une étudiante d'un séminaire. La tuerie a attiré l'attention du monde. Le frère de la victime a dit à la presse que la famille était inquiet suite au verdict.

Selon un reportage, police a appréhendé un conseiller pour extorsion et terrorisme. Il était un rebelle du parti en exercice.

Selon un reportage, il y a une éruption de violence à Bhola, une île de la mer de Bengale , laissant 4 morts et centaines blessés. Un poste ,présumé diffamatoire, dans le compte de Facebook d'un homme hindou, a déclenché la violence. L'homme a porté plainte dans la gendarmerie locale sur piratage de son compte. Police bangladaise avec l'aide de Facebook  a appréhendé deux pirates.L'homme hindou et deux pirates ont été placés en détention préventive.  C'était le troisième grand incident après Premier ministre a encré un accord avec l'Inde pour mettre en place le système côtier de surveillance au Bangladesh. Il y a beaucoup de gens qui n'aiment pas coopération entre Inde et Bangladesh dans la défense.

Selon un reportage , un médecin, connu comme «médecin pour les pauvres», a été tué par coup d' arme blanche à Chittagong devant chez médecin, fondé par lui.

Selon un reportage, 3000 Rohingyas ont exprimé la désir pour se rendre à Bhashan Char , une île où l'armée de la mer a installé des camps pour Rohingyas.

Selon un reportage, un dirigeant indigène a été tué par balles à Rangamati.

La Semaine Dernière A Mes Yeux

(11 octobre --- 18 octobre)

Selon un reportage, l'organisation des droits de l'homme, ASK, dans son rapport s'est dit que la tuerie extrajudiciaire avait coûté 309 vies dans 9 mois de cette année. De plus, 160 événements violent de politique ont péri 34 vies et blessé 1867 personnes.

Selon un reportage, la force frontière a tiré vers dans une escarmouche pendant élection municipale et tué deux indigènes et blessé trois autres à Bandarban.


Selon un reportage, la société française Sanofi cherche des acheteurs pour ses affaires au Bangladesh. Son PDG a affirmé la nouvelle à la presse.

Selon un reportage, El Chapo de l'Asie, un homme d'affaires thaï, avait des laboratoires d'amphétamine dans la forêt de Shan State en Birmanie.

Should It Be Stopped?

The brutal killing of Abrar Fahad, a BUET student, brought to forth an age old issue: should student politics at public university be banned?

The unsettled issue has already divided the society into two broad groups: those who advocate student politics at highest learning centers and those who voice strong opposition against such politics.

Another group emerged slightly moderate by holding a middle ground and sticking to the point that no student wing of political parties will be allowed at the campus but students' representatives should be at the campus to speak for the grievances and woes of the students.

Student politics shares a glorious part of creation of Bangladesh. Often this glorious part is presented in such a way that any criticism towards the anarchic behavior is brushed aside as attempt to silence freedom of expression at universities.

Many veteran politicians also feel certain apprehension of rise of fundamentalism at universities in absence of student politics.

Student politics took a virulent form immediately after the independence of Bangladesh. I am not going to touch the details what led to such a violent student movement that ultimately contributed to the brutal assassination of Bangbandhu, contaminating neutral political atmosphere of the cantonment.

As soon as the politics of ruling elite took a U-turn after 1975, student politics turned violent. Islamists were let loose on the lefts at key public universities. Instead of encouraging debate at universities, students were indoctrinated with regimental belief and course of action. They later never learnt to appreciate different views and engage in any constructive debate. And the picture is more or less apparent at the national level: there is no reconciliation among the feuding parties, even over petty issues.

From the very beginning, students have never been in charge of student politics. It is steered and controlled by a certain quarter outside of the campus. Intervention is always there. Students are being used as pawns to protect regimented interests.

Many of these behind-the-curtain string pullers prefer to hide their pug marks. Sustaining this anarchic form of student politics yields tangible benefits to them: winning contracts of building infrastructure, roads etc, keeping a firm grip over extortion revenue generated by this kind of politics, maintaining businesses and office spaces at business centers and university adjacent areas with the assistance of party cadres.

Student politics and universities earned a bad name while many of these string pullers went scot free. However, many of them do not dare to introduce student politics at private universities. Why? Is there a collateral damage? Many members of board of directors and trustees are former and current politicians, who rose to prominence through practicing anarchic form of student politics. Or their party cadres turned academic hold important positions at these universities. Public universities are run by public funds whereas private universities hinge on students to run their expenses. Many view setting up private university a lucrative business. By introducing student politics into private universities, they do not want to put their business interests at risk or draw the ire of elites.

On the other hand, deteriorating learning environment at the public universities compelled parents to send their students to private universities.

Most of the sons and daughters of our former student leaders and politicians are never admitted at public universities. In fact, they go to abroad to pursue higher education. They lost the moral high ground to put argument in favor of current trend of student politics at public universities and colleges, where sons and daughters of ordinary citizens face full brunt of it.

I am appalled to see many of the former student leaders, who brought the academic activity to a complete halt by locking into fratricidal and rival clashes, managed to settle abroad. Many amassed huge wealth and started new life there. It is true for leaders irrespective of their political creeds.

In independent Bangladesh, student politics gave rise to another form of colonialism, where troublemakers of the campuses are the rent collectors of a foreign lord. Unabated anarchy in the pretext of student politics produced a breed of graduates who forget to pose questions to authority, to offer solutions to social and personal problems, and to elevate the society to a higher ground in terms of intellectual advancement, innovation and entrepreneurship. During their formative years, they have been coerced in such a way that they have become docile instruments at the hands of the ruling class who influences and shapes their future.

This status quo tremendously helped the quarter who does not want to see democracy flourishes, corruption dissipates and people get empowered. "Hold your ground", "Do not cede an inch", "Do not compromise with the enemy" are found in the lexicon of regimented groups. They could be a political party or an organized group like men-in-fatigue. A student who is being mentored at a learning center should know the difference between "competitor" and "enemy".

Often in the name of student politics,party cadres are tasked with "campus policing". They possess fire arms and beat black and blue students who do not comply with their rules. This should be stopped. Only police will do policing and in a sensitive place like university special police units can be formed. Harvard, MIT, Princeton all the universities have their own campus police. Since we are concerned about freedom of expression at the learning centers citing examples of first world, we should take cue from them to allow campus police at the tertiary learning centers. In this regard existing laws have to be amended or new laws have to be introduced.

Many of the anarchist leaders, who somehow got empowered and absorbed into the society, eulogized their anarchist conducts in their memoirs, anecdotes and interviews accorded to the press. This kind of conduct should not be encouraged and sold as part and parcel of a healthy student politics. A shameful conduct, acted upon an individual whom one did not like, should not be replicated as a reprisal.

While other nations are sending robots and satellites to the moon and Mars , we do not tolerate debate or dissident voices in the campus,which is our beacon of hope.

It is a pity that parties, rigid in belief and ideology, take full advantage of student politics and freedom of expression at the campus. Will they allow such practices when they form government? Look at the communist and theocratic countries.

Student politics needs to evolve. Laws should be amended to bar parties raising student wing at the universities, laws should be introduced to bar former and current politicians, student leaders, teachers taking part in bidding process of development projects at universities, a grievance redress system should be installed, harsher measures should be introduced against law enforcement agency / personnel who tries to stir trouble at the campus in connivance with student wings or anarchists. Moreover, foreign teachers should be allowed at the highest learning centers. It will improve the learning environment there. Laws should be amended to make this happen and UGC can maintain a roster of foreign teachers who are willing to work in Bangladeshi universities.

There is no doubt that most of our graduates are not on  par with graduates churned out by other South Asian universities. The education-industry ecosystem developed over the years due to anarchic student politics is turning our employers to recruit foreign workers to ward off future troubles. While saboteurs of a new kind of colonialism act with impunity at the campus, our highest learning centers are becoming lawless jungles. Our inertia to ongoing trend of student politics is only accelerating that process.

La Semaine Dernière A Mes Yeux

(04 octobre --- 11 octobre)

Selon un reportage, des fidèles du parti en exercice ont battu à mort un étudiant de l'Université de technologie ,BUET. La tuerie a bouleversé le pays. Police a appréhendé 11 coupables. La tuerie a aussi causé condemnation internationale. Le chef de l'ONU a été appelé chez ministère des Affaires étrangères et a été demandé explication.

Selon un reportage, une personne indigène a été tuée par balles à Rangamati. Il n'est pas appartenu aux groupes rebelles.


Selon un reportage, un garçon a été tué par un coup d'arme blanche à Narsinghdi. C'était le dernier jour de la fête de déesse Durga.


Selon un reportage, la société japonaise Zerra a acheté 22% des actions de Summit Power.


Selon un reportage, une raide par police afin de couper les câbles d'électricité à campe de Mohammapur s'est soldé par une escarmouche entre police et des Biharis, laissant 50 personnes blessées.


Selon un reportage, une cour de travail a ordonné un mandat d'arrêt conte Prof Muhammad Yunus, fondateur de Grameen Bank. Deux salariés licenciés ont déposé plainte contre lui dans cette cour.


Selon un reportage, un conseiller de Mohammadpur a été appréhendé depuis Brahmanbaria. Il recueillait frais électricité et locations depuis les marchés clandestins de Mohammadpur. Deux CasinoMoghols
étaient ses fidèles. Un journaliste en exil dans son compte de Facebook s'est dit que le frère de ce conseiller avait été tué par un frère de chef de l'armée de la terre.


C'était une mauvaise semaine pour moi. J'ai eu un accident le 7 octobre. Un bus de Transsilva,où je montait, a été percuté par un autre bus de Baishakhi Paribahan (Dhaka Metro Ba- 13 04 60) devant House & Building Research Institute à midi, laissant moi légèrement blessé aux pieds et une personne gravement à la tête. Le bus assaillant était complètement vide. Le conducteur et son adjoint ont fuit la place et il n'y avait pas de passager dans le bus de Baishakhi. Il se peut que le bus ait de mauvaise intention. Le bus coupable a foncé à la derrière de Transsilva. Je m'assoyais avant de la dernière place de Transsilva. J'ai déposé une plainte à ce propos dans la gendarmerie qui avait saisi le bus de Baishakhi.

La Semaine Dernière A Mes Yeux

(27 septembre ---- 04 octobre)
Selon un reportage, le parti en exercice continue son purge contre casino. La Banque centrale a demandé  info sur les comptes opérés par les dirigeants qui opéraient casino dans les clubs de sport.

Selon un autre reportage, presque 100 Népalais ont franchi la frontière Indo-Bangladesh suite à commencement de la raide contre casino. Ils assistaient à l'opération de casino.

Selon un reportage, National Board of Revenue a imposé restriction sur importation des équipements de casino dans un communiqué.

Selon un reportage,  l'achat de microscope et oreiller pour l'école de médecin à Chattogram, en payant prix exorbitant , a causé polémique dans la presse.

Selon un reportage, la force élite a appréhendé un homme d'affaires pour avoir opéré casino sur le cyber monde. Des Nords Coréens ont été identifiés pour l'avoir aidé. Un parquet l'a condamné à six mois de prison pour avoir gardé des animaux sauvages.


Selon un reportage, Henley & Partners a baissé le classement de Bangladesh par deux points dans l'indice de passeport. Bangladesh est classé au 99ème en 2019.Bénin et Djibouti ont révoqué l'avantage d'arrivée sans visa pour Bangladais. La décision a influencé le classement de Henley & Partners.


Selon un reportage, prête bouddhiste Satyapriyo Mahathero est mort. Il travaillait toujours pour les âmes pauvres.

Fading Passport, Fading Identity

This week Henley International Passport Index 2019 downgraded Bangladesh further, severely weakening the green passport for another consecutive year. Previous year it was ranked 97 but this year it slipped down two notches due to Benin and Djibouti's revocation of on arrival Visa facility for Bangladeshis. These two African countries are in far better position in terms of GDP per capita but the size of their economies is not as good as ours. In Benin, the Muslims constitute the second largest group of the population whereas the Muslims dominated the population in Djibouti, where both the Americans and the Chinese have strong military presence.

The group feeling did not come into play when the countries took their decisions regarding Bangladeshi nationals. The Henley Passport Index ranks passport of a country in terms of its national's ease of access to other countries. It extensively used International Air Transport Association's database to create the index.

Immediately after the country's worst terrorist attacks, Sri Lanka temporarily suspended on arrival visa facility for foreign nationals. Sri Lanka's biggest heroin seizure also occurred because Bangladeshi drug traffickers misused the facility to a great length.

Even Bhutanese parliament did not approve a bill to allow free movement of vehicles of South Asian countries in fear that small Bhutanese law-enforcement personnel will not be able to deal with an overwhelming number of vehicles and foreign nationals.

And there is more , neighboring Myanmar is still dilly dallying to take back 700,000 of Rohingyas, unjustly dubbing them illegal Bangladeshi.

The point of bringing all these examples here is to underscore our neighbor's view about us. This simply does not make us proud, give us a feeling of grandeur and an aura of being special.

Even small island nation Vanuatu, one of the few countries that give visa free access to Bangladeshis , is likely to review its decision after more than hundreds of Bangladeshis stranded in the island nation falling into the lure of human traffickers.Stranded Bangladeshis were promised to be taken to Australia. Instead, traffickers brought them to Vanuatu to extract money from them, taking full advantage of visa free facility. The Vanuatu court was taken aback by the fraudulent incident and urged the International Office for Migration to intervene.

The weakening of our passport has been going on for the last six years. In 2013, our passport was ranked 85 in HPI. In 2017, the green passport was slided down by 10 places to 95. In 2019, its rank worsened further to 99. Perhaps not all the countries are buying our staggering economic success stories.

Henley Passport Index Source:Henley & Partners

In many countries of Europe, Bangladeshis topped the list of boat-riding asylum seekers. War-torn Syrian refugees, whose 14-year of quality schooling made them more sought after refugees, are welcomed in many countries but not the Bangladeshis, whose 14-year of schooling is not as good as that of other refugees.

This is also writ large on the quality of nationality index (QNI), conceived by Dimitry Kochenov and Christian H. Kälin. QNI ranks qualities of nationalities based on factors like economic strength, human development, ease of travel, political stability and overseas employment opportunities. In 2012, Bangladesh was placed at 129th position. In 2015, it was downgraded to 138. In 2017, it was further downgraded to 149. Like HPI, QNI is also maintained by Henley & Partners. I am sure these guys did not start a malign campaign against us.

Quality of Nationality Index Source:Henley & Partners

Another interesting measure of how other nations view us would be the kind of foreign envoys they send to our country. Last three of the US diplomats were at the last leg of their diplomatic careers. State Department did not give them new assignment. At least two of them, including the current ambassador, are close to defense establishment and held important posts in war-ravaged and corruption-stricken countries.

Previous British High Commissioner to Bangladesh was sent to Afghanistan. At least two of the former British High Commissioners to Bangladesh were sent to the Caribbean islands as envoys. One of them, who played an instrumental role during the 1/11 government rule, was recalled by the UK foreign ministry on disciplinary grounds and the other one was never integrated into the system.

Meanwhile, we sent our crème de la crème of career diplomats to these countries. However, during the 80's and early 90's we sent controversial political appointees to developed countries. One powerful EU country even refused to accept one such appointee as ambassador because he was not worthy for the position. It appeared that he was father of a secret lover of the then powerful dictator. Government changes but this kind of behavior left a negative impression on bilateral relations, which is often reflected in reciprocal conduct. Even Myanmar receives career diplomats of powerful countries as top envoys since its resumption of democracy.

Much trumpeted social indicators and economic achievements did not bar others to quarantine us in barbed wire encampments. Now we see this barbed wire also exists in bilateral relations. It is evident that sweat-money filled forex reserves, inequality driven GDP growth rate, eye dazzling structures and military strength did not convince others that we deserve to be treated as equal global citizens.Downgrading of our passport and nationals is an eye opener to the fact that we need to do lot more to develop our human resources.

La Semaine Dernière A Mes Yeux

(20 septembre --- 27 septembre)
Selon un reportage, des dirigeants du parti en exercice se sont enfuis après le gouvernement a entamé une série de raide contre casino clandestin. Police a alerté la force frontière sur leur.

Selon un reportage, police a aidé des Népalais à enfuir l'appartement dans lequel ils résidaient.
Selon un reportage, police a appréhendé deux dirigeants des clubs où les casinos clandestins avaient été mis en place et saisis des argents et d'or depuis chez eux.

Selon un reportage, une explosion de mine a péri un Rohingya à Bandarban, près de la frontière entre Bangladesh et Birmanie.

Selon un reportage, naufrage a tué 10 personnes à Sunamganj.

Selon un reportage, police afghane a appréhendé des terroristes présumés dont un Bangladais à Kaboul.

Selon un reportage, l'armée de la terre a appréhendé un membre blessé d' un groupe rebelle de CHT après une fusillade courte à Khagrachhari.

Selon un reportage, la société française Sanofi va bientôt arrêter son opération au Bangladesh. Il prépare à vendre ses actions. Pendant que tous ses rivals au Bangladesh détiennent 2 pourcent du marché pharmaceutique, il y détient moins de 2 pourcent. Avant la société anglaise GlaxoSmithKline avait arrêté son opération ici.

Selon un reportage, 4 membres d'une famille ont été massacrés à Ukhia, Cox's Bazar. Le patron travaille à Dubaï.
Selon un reportage, presque 110 femmes de chambre dont 26 sont victimes de violence, sont retournés depuis l'Arabie saoudite le 26 août.

A Campaign Far From A Complete Success

Government boasts its "Digital Bangladesh" campaign as one of its most successful projects. But when it comes to realize this dream, it has miles to go to call this campaign a complete success. A quick look at some of the projects under the banner reveals that people's right to information and as well as access to public information has been digitized to a great length. Spread of e-commerce and online payment system led the new entrepreneurs to embrace ICT to overcome major stumbling blocks of a new business.

However, there are still unexplored territories that call for urgent attention. Why these crucial and vital sectors have not yet brought under the clutches of this Digital Bangladesh campaign remains a mystery to many, including me.

Take for instance, the delay in launching the planned automated payment system of Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation(BPC). BPC is undoubtedly the country's biggest company with annual turnover of TK 500 billion. The planned automation is supposed to cut the payment time to 4 days from 10 months. BPC faced stiff resistance from a certain quarter that does not want to see BPC receives revenues from its oil sales from state-run petroleum products marketing and distribution companies in such a short span of time.

If payments take as long as 10 months to reach BPC coffer, then it is pretty understandable that those who benefited from this delay will leave no stone unturned to strew the road to automation with all kinds of hurdles. Holding BPC's payments for 10 months , they can invest it to somewhere else and make lots of money. Frankly speaking, they can open 3-month or 6-month-long deposits at banks and earn huge interests. Or they can erect a whole new multi-storey building at any part of Bangladesh. In addition, such time lag also raises the possibility of leakages in the system. A news report divulged that a local company already developed the payment software, but it could not proceed with the scheduled launching due to the resistance from this vested quarter.

Another area that requires attention of staunchest advocates of Digital Bangladesh is the transport sector. Reckless driving and utter disregard of traffic rules everyday kills scores of people in Bangladesh. Even the issue was advanced to wage a popular movement to change the rules and ongoing practices. Little changes took place. In Dhaka, we had once a well installed transport policy that was literally thrown away because of political consideration.

A World Bank study revealed that politicians and corrupt bureaucrats involved in the transport business, which is merely a mean to whiten illicit money. Urge to start the change is not there. These public transports ply over from one end to the other end of Dhaka. So it is easy for a quarter to transport contraband from one entry point to other entry point using this transport system since it is not subject to police checking.

Despite an overwhelming number of casualties from road mishaps and drug invasion, we do not see any concrete step from the government to regulate the sector. For instance, in light of digital Bangladesh government can easily set up a database containing names and addresses of drivers and assistants of buses and taxis. Similarly vehicle tracking system, radio communications system can be introduced so that traffic department can monitor in real time the status of a vehicle in a busy working day. This will also help in check the plying of unfit vehicles.

Unfortunately government is not enthusiastic to digitize the transport sector.

We also witnessed from the part of government to launch a local social media platform. In this end, our neighbour surpassed us with the launch of MM Social. It all happened when Facebook took off several pages and accounts regarding Myanmar Armed Forces. Now Myanmar will have a leading advantage in operating this kind of platforms and problems they pose.

Ours still remains a dream. We have no short of talents at home, but we should not be shy taking assistance from outside. A country that can easily be made a strategic partner in our Digital Bangladesh endeavour is Russia, which is already implementing several energy and military procurement projects. Russia also has social media platform like Vkontakte. Bangladesh can invite Russian Social media platforms to launch joint initiatives in this country, opening up opportunities for local tech savvy population and small entrepreneurs.

Russia has also made great leap forward in innovative textiles, which have technical challenges in making them. According to a news report, Russian innovative and smart textiles market is estimated at $1.3 billion and is growing at pace faster than European countries. Using the thawed relations, Bangladesh can embark on collaborative projects with Russian textiles universities and manufacturers to speed up its ongoing automation, to manufacture smart textiles that will dominate the future clothes market, to initiate research on effluent plant to deal with hazardous textiles residue and to have a leading edge in computational textiles that will help both the countries.

It is indeed disappointing that government's "Digital Bangladesh" is trapped inside banal slogans and lofty ambition. No concrete plan has yet been unveiled in crucial strategic sectors. Noticeable is the politically biased implementation of some digital Bangladesh projects. To create continuous ripple of change, Digital Bangladesh campaign should focus on the crucial sectors.