Alter Education, Alter Society

Shattering cries led the government to amend the laws.
Could it remove the existing structural flaws?
Except the education model allowed the Norwegian companies in.
Government should search the answer if it is really keen.
Education on reproductive health and social credit score
May curb rape and alter the society to the core.

In an unprecedented scale, manifestations against rape, fuelled by women of all walks of life, gripped the country. Air is thick with cries demanding capital punishment of the rapists and an end to rape. So strong was the cry, the cabinet nodded to raise the ceiling of capital punishment for rape to death. Some even consider to amend the definition of rape in the law.

Skeptics have already put a question mark about its effectiveness. In a country where vulnerable groups, religious minorities are being persecuted continuously, where flawed education system does not make good citizens to make aware the rights of others and duties to the nation and society, it will be naïve to think amended law is a magic bullet to end rape.

In recent years, our education system regressed back to a period that is comparable to dark ages. Our syllabus was updated by dropping poems and essays written by authors belonging to different faiths. Pythons were further endangered in our alphabet book and even replaced by rituals pretty common in dominant faith group. Reproductive health is never discussed in schools. In fact, in university and colleges it is slightly discussed and never talked about at great length.

We allowed a Norwegian brand to dominate our cellular phone market but never tried to emulate successful reproductive health education system found in Norway. The country is considered a pioneer in this domain. Country's education ministry runs an educational program titled "Newton" on its national channel to create awareness on reproductive health issues among school students.

But here we face increasing difficulty to talk about such topic. An online educational content platform once broadcast one or two clips of menstruation but it later took down the contents after facing stiff resistance from a fanatic group.

In Canadian universities, students' association or individual student often receives free packages of toys used for orientation towards reproductive activity. These toys are pretty common and help a lot to check the reproductive behavior. Such toys are still seen as taboos in our society.

Back in December last year, I read an investigative report on the Dhaka Tribune on underaged sex workers of Bangladesh. Many of them were sold to brothels at an age when they even do not know what intercourse is. Many clients in Daulatdia brothel told the reporter they prefered to start their day with such activity and went the brothel couple of times in a week. If there were toys in our society, we might restrain the demand-supply mechanism and curb the number of sex workers.

Lowering the marrying age of women and drying up of the stipend program for female education are the two serious errors the government made in its tenure.

Just to inflate its popular vote bank , its erroneous decisions in the long run seriously harmed the society and the nation.

Political leadership at times nerds to be bold it is a pity that power grabbing generals introduced contraceptive and family planning in this society. No political leadership dared to take such bold decisions in such a regressed society like ours.

Prof Humayun Azad, academic and linguist, aptly captures Bengalis' reproductive life in one of his writings:

Reproductive life of the Bengalis is a big taboo. Seldom is known and written about that life. That life is banned and shrouded in mystery. As if any discussion about it were a serious transgression. It is an indication that life is dirty, polluted, full of sins, unnatural and devoid of orgasm. Bengalis are very keen in sex; every male is a Casanova, but their demand remains unmet. So their reproductive life is full of perversions. Adolescents engage in pervasive acts, youth stays sex starved, so does the grown-up and aged people. Most Bengalis take great pleasure in talking about reproductive life and spread rumors about others' reproductive life; this life occupies a great part of the discussion of the grown-up. They are sophisticated imposter; when you inquire them about sex they play ignorant as if they never heard of it and never knew anything about it. This is the pervasive part of Bengalis' reproductive life. Bengali children never get any education about it; they do not know about their reproductive organs; they do not know their use. They indirectly face some religious and social obstacles. These obstacles are unscientific. Bengalis' reproductive life is devoid of science and art. It is imbued with cruelty. Bengalis spend their youth with unmet demand, which results in perversion. Rape is a vernacular incident in Bengal, the Bengalis could be aptly described as racist race. And the reason lies in the absence of a healthy reproductive life.In the West, at the age when young men and women get closer and indulge in knowing each other, Bengalis spend that age in agony. Bengalis' youth is a complete failure, full of agony. Sane men never rape, sick men cannot help raping. Extra-marital life of the Bengalis is pretty wide, they are constantly in search of chances; but their married reproductive life is the sole area to meet the physical demand.Are the Bengalis satisfied in this life? No survey can be found in this regard; no discussion can be heard. Bengalis in this life remain unsatisfied and deeply unhappy. In the act of reproduction, Bengali male is the active participant; the female remains passive. The male only thinks of temporary pleasure and nothing else; he does not know that the partner also wants the pleasure; he never tries to know that.Bengali male and female never reach orgasm. They have no idea of orgasm. Most Bengalis lack the healthy and trouble-free ambiance to get orgasm. So instead of getting inspired, Bengalis quickly draw conclusion: it is the briefest task of their life though it is perhaps the greatest and important task of their life. Dissatisfaction they draw from this life surrounds their entire life, makes them sick. The sickness results in sudden desire. Whenever the Bengalis encounter a woman, they think of her an object of sex. They copulate with her in their minds. Such a sick race in reproductive life cannot become successful in other parts of their life. (Source: The Bengalis: A Sick Race? by Humayun Azad)

Prof Azad, who was attacked in the Ekushey Book Fair with machete in 2005 at the same spot where a blogger was killed in 2015, bluntly decoded the problem of our reproductive life in harsh language.

Since the source of the problem is known, government should take bold steps to address it. At the individual level, altering our education system is a good option to fight rape. At the aggregate level, some new concepts could be introduced in the society so that a reward and punishment mechanism being followed for individual conduct.

Social credit score, introduced in China, could seriously be thought an alternative for gauging good conducts, otherwise not reflected in social status or education or wealth, of citizens interested to avail some public goods and services or to engage in other aspects of life.

Frequent transgression could be reflected in poor social credit score and the individual will be barred from getting desired public goods and services. This in turn makes one more conscious about his social credit score and improves his public behavior and interaction.

A person who has less carbon footprint, less dependence on gov't money,less harassment record can possess high social credit score than a rich individual and that high social credit score could place him ahead of that rich individual in availing public goods and services.

So when a citizen sees his social credit score secures him some position in the society and at the national level, he should mobilize more effort to care about others, nature and cultivate good manners.

Right kind of education that incorporates education on reproductive life starting from the elementary level of schooling could churn out more sane and sensible individuals. Introduction of social credit score, on the other hand, nudges a society to embrace the right kind of conduct and reduce the incidence of social maladies.

La Semaine Dernière A Mes Yeux

(07 octobre --- 14 octobre)

Selon un reportage, des ouvriers bangladais qui travaillaient en Italie et au Qarar se sont manifestés devant les ambassades de ces pays à Dacca. Comme les deux pays ont interdit les ouvriers qui passent vacances dans leurs pays d'origine à cause de Covid-19, ils se sont retrouvés coincés au Bangladesh.

Selon un reportage, le conseil des ministres a donné son aval à la proposition de la peine de mort contre viol après une série de manifestations contre viol a bouleversé le pays.

Selon un reportage, une fusillade à Naniarchar , Rangamati a laissé morts deux membres d'un groupe indigène. L'armée de la terre s'est dite que son équipe était tombée dans une embuscade et elle avait répliqué avec fusillade.

Selon un reportage, Bangladesh est classé le neuvième parmi les pays sinistrés par un rapport baptisé «The Humain Cost Of Disaster: An Overview Of The Last Twenty Years 2000-2019». Le bureau de sinistre de l'ONU et CRED qui se situe en Belge ont fait le rapport.

Selon un reportage, un auto rickshawwallah, conducteur de rickshaw motorisé, est mort bizarrement dans l'état d'arrestation à la gendarmerie de Nawabpur. Ses proches soupçonnent il a été tué pendant interpellation. Police l'a appréhendé pour interroger son lien dans une tuerie. Police leur a dit qu'il s'est suicidé.

Selon un reportage, un tribunal de cybercriminalité a condamné une personne minoritaire à sept ans de prison pour avoir publié commentaire diffamatoire contre le Prophète.

Could The Sunny Spell Last?

Fallen income of household
Does not reflect in real estate market.
Onion price crosses the threshold,
Though some time later onion perishes in perfect.
Riding on fallen import and remittances
Current account registered a surplus.
Despite the sunny spell of some indices,
Slashed growth forecast makes some nervous.

The scars of corona virus for the last six months are gradually surfacing. Despite government's confidence in economy, multilateral institutions heavily downsized their growth forecast for Bangladesh. Drastic measures of lockdown, appeared unsuccessful, pushed further a good chunk of the population down to abject poverty. Even some government statistical institution acknowledged deterioration of poverty rate in its latest estimation. A 10% increase in poverty rate has made the task of poverty alleviation a grueling one as more resources have to be mobilized in order to meet the expenses of wider safety net.

Price of the main staple is rising, adding further woes to the have-not communities. Unusual rain, frequent flooding cast shadow over paddy yield. Other grains' prices are somewhat showing similar upward trend. What is puzzling was the sudden rise of the price of onion. Much of the spike in onion price was attributable to Indian ban ahead of an important state election. But onion is not a quintessential ingredient and it cannot be stored for indefinite period. In fact, many of the specially arranged consignments that made their way into Bangladesh were full of rotten onions. Though onion price is stable now, it hovered around Tk 100/ kilo for several weeks. This same incident happened a year ago. Again an important Indian state election provoked a ban on onion export. I am a bit puzzled why one has to spend Tk100 or more to buy a kilo of onion.

In computer accessories market, the higher prices of hardware and gadgets prevail throughout the lockdown and postlockdown months. Prices of imported gadgets and laptop show no sign to stabilize. Unlike the computer gadget market, smart phone and feature phone market experienced a drastic cut in prices, responding in alignment with falling income of the consumers. Unlike computer market, value addition in mobile phone market reached 60-70%.

Real estate sector is another sector where flat price remains as it was before the pandemic. A report published in a popular daily divulged that small flat like 800-square-foot registered an increase in price over the years. I have not checked the price of small flat right now. Another point is that real estate sector is the sector where undocumented money is melted. No one from the government asks the owner about the source of the money.

So falling income and rising price mismatch tells the presence of unexplained things in our economy. Perhaps that is reasons why some are more optimistic about achieving six percent GDP growth rate next year.

Online shopping platforms also did well during the lockdown. However, meteoric rise of an upstart platform and its failure to deliver goods in time prompted central bank's investigation and freezing of its accounts. Unusual monthly sales arouse suspicion as the paid-up capital is so little and the owners maintained silence about company's promotion and true status. Though High Court granted bail to the company owners, many allege that it is another edition of Ponzi scheme and is meant to legalize undocumented money.

Current account balance registered surplus.But it is mostly due to fallen import payments and increased remittances. Fallen import payments indicate demand for Bangladeshi goods has fallen in overseas markets. And remittances channeled through banks are mostly savings and dues transferred by migrant workers who are returning permanently as claimed by migration experts and analysts. In addition, most of the remittances come through a bank where Middle-East based owners have stakes. In the past, specially when disaster strikes, we witnessed benevolent donors donated huge some of money to government so that macroeconomic stability maintains and forex market gets a positive signal. This is too a disaster-like situation. However, it is not know whether any wealthy donor remitted huge money this time.

Part of the workers' protest before the Sonargaon Hotel for a ticket to Saudi Arabia is a reminder that relations between the two countries turned sour in recent weeks. And if it is not thawed we may see more workers coming back to Bangladesh.

Invisible part of the economy and remittances herald a sunny spell. But it is not clear whether this spell is temporary or long.

La Semaine Dernière A Mes Yeux

(30 septembre --- 07 octobre)

Selon un reportage, Bangladesh est classé deuxième dans l'indice des pays de personne déplacée. Selon un autre reportage, 388 Bangladais qui voulaient parvenir les pays riches de l'Europe clandestinement se sont abrités dans les forêts en Bosnie-Herzégovine .

Selon un reportage, vidéo de déshabillage d'une femme par des gens au début de septembre à Noakhali a causé polémique et bouleversé la société. Police a appréhendé une personne.

Selon un reportage, pandémie de viol a provoqué manifestation à travers du pays. Le grand rassemblement a aura lieu à la place Shahbagh où les manifestants gauchistes ont demandé justice pour les victimes.La cour d'appel a ordonné la Police de se plancher sur déshabillage de la femme dont la vidéo est devenue virale.

Selon un reportage, un groupe indigène a donné une lettre de protestation à l'autorité de Bandarban contre construction d'un hôtel cinq étoile là-bas. L'hôtel sera construit par l'armée de la terre et une société locale qui a causé polémique après un de ses dirigeants avait tiré vers dirigeants d'une banque locale.

Selon un reportage, un ouvrier chinois qui travaillait à la construction d'un pont à Pirojpur a été tué par un coup de couteau. Police soupçonne c'est un acte de vol.

Selon un reportage, la Banque mondiale a baissé sa projection pour la croissance du PIB pour Bangladesh en 2021. La nouvelle projection se dit que Bangladesh atteindra 1,6% de croissance du PIB en 2021. Selon un autre reportage, le gouvernement a divulgué que pauvreté a intensifié pendant confinement au Bangladesh. Bangladesh a connu 29%  taux de pauvreté en 2020. Néanmoins, les ONGs estiment que le taux sera plus haut que le calcul de gouvernement.

Attention!

Hi,

As I encountered some difficulties/ obstruction while putting up contents on my blogspot site in the first week of June, I resume posting to my WordPress site, https://www.rezaulhoque.wordpress.com , which was blocked for some time in Bangladesh.
However, I remain active on both the sites, depending on which one is blocked.

Thank you for staying with me.

Rezaul Hoque.

La Semaine Dernière A Mes Yeux

(22 mai --- 29 mai)

Selon un reportage, incendie a ravagé un hôpital à Dacca. Police y a trouvé 5 cadavres. Ils y étaient avant l’incendie frappait. Autre reportage s’est dit qu’ils ont brûlé à mort. L’incendie est l’issu de court-circuit de climatiseur dans la salle d’isolement.

Selon un reportage, le gouvernement bangladais a confirmé les mesures de déconfinement qui entreront en vigeur à compter de 1er juin. Les experts sanitaires s’ent sont pris à la décision, en craignant que cela amplifierait la propagation de pandémie. Le taux de contamination continue à croître chaque semaine. De plus, il n’y a pas d’indication quand le Covid-19 s’éloigne.

Selon un reportage, 26 Bangladais ont été tués par balles en Libye. Ils se rendaient à Tripoli depuis Bengazi. Une escarmouche entre traffiquants et Bangladais a mené la tuerie.

Selon un reportage, Bangladesh a enregistré plus de 2000 cas de coronavirus dans un jour. Jusqu’au vendredi plus de 40.000 Bangladais sont tombés victimes de covid-19 et plus de 500 Bangladais sont morts.

Doc, Quality Delivery & Experimentation

Increased health spending raises the number of caregivers.
Does it raise the quality of service delivery at the health centers?
In the face of threat tank, APC get NBC suit.
Health facilities need the same to stand resolute.
Bring back the bygone era enterprising class,
To instill values of experimentation among the mass.

1.

During this lockdown, I finished reading “Dhire Bohe Buriganga"( Gently Flows The Buriganga), the memoir of veteran journalist, political commentator and lyricist Abdul Gaffar Chowdhury. He is known to Bangladeshis and the world as the lyricist of Ekushey anthem written after the shooting incident of language movement. The book is unputdownable and packed with anecdotes unraveling the times of late 40s, Pakistan , infant stages of Bangladesh and its early years of democratic period. This gentleman has strong eyes to see subtle social changes and brought to fore many unpleasant truths. Everyone should read it.

From this book, I came to learn that prior to the tumultuous years of partition in the late 40s Savar, a countryside on the outskirts of Dhaka , housed a class of “Kabiraj” or traditional healers whose herbal medicines earned them reputation across India. The violent partition severely weakened the traditional medical practices. I also met some of them during my childhood. Unlike the present ones who promised to cure cancer and AIDS, my childhood “Kabiraj” sold medicines to cure fever, sore throat, headache, back pain, acidity, attention deficit. And they also had tonics to build a strong body, to increase memory power. The medicines were prepared based on some formula. Some of the formula books were printed and published in Kolkata, maybe by those migrated “Kabiraj”. These formula based medicines had great demand. I was specially attracted to one particular type called “Chawanprash”, a sticky mixture that promises good health. It tasted really good. In my native village in Chittagong, neighbor of my paternal grandfather practiced this kind of herbal medicine based on the formula book printed in Kolkata. They spent nights and days with their ingredients to prepare those mixtures. They made it really good as those were sold thousands of examples as far as Akiyab in Myanmar. If they had a good season, “Guda Dada"(Young Grandfather), as I used to call the neighbor, took me to have breakfast in the village bazaar. We ordered molten dalda (made of animal fat )draped parathas and downgraded version of Havshi halwa. I preferred to have my parathas dipped into thick milk tea where the dalda floated like “premer mora jole dobe na"(unsuccessful lover’s body never drowns) and refused to settle at the bottom of tea cup.

Dalda, another example of colonial rule, destroyed the market of local mustard oil and ghee(clarified butter made of cow milk). Gaffar Chowdhury’s book offered an account of it.

The point is prior to Pakistan period, we had these vibrant enterprising classes of professionals who experimented with local herbs and made traditional medicines. Though after Pakistan came into being, Kundeshwari, Sadhana, Hamdard, AP did remarkably well but turbulent time of liberation war broke that ecosystem. The glorious days of herbal medicine never returned. Research and experimentation not only in herbal medicine but in the health sector in general are conspicuously absent.

2.

Govt has taken plan to increase its health spending manifold in the next budget. Now it is time to see how it will spend this money. Coronavirus unveiled that many of our government health facilities do not have enough ICUs and specialized beds in the ICU across the country. This pandemic may be over in future but it proved how vulnerable and less equipped our health system is. We spend more on APC, Tanks and defense facilities to make them NBC(Nuclear, Biological and Chemical) compliant. Time has come to replicate the process in health sector as threat of another pandemic or chemical or incendiary disaster looms large. We need to build NBC compliant ICUs, doctor’s chamber, patient’s ward across the health facilities of Bangladesh. Most importantly, we have to train and churn out health providers. I tried to build a model with data available in BER2018, Henley Nationality Index and Odhikar to see what influences producing doctors in Bangladesh. The period chosen was 2006-2017. For constructing the perfect model I chose Leamer’s extreme bound analysis (EBA) approach. I picked up number of registered doctors (Doc), number of beds in government hospitals and dispensaries(Bed), number of medical colleges(Med), number of dental colleges(Den), ADP spending on health, population and family welfare (ADP) and victims of political violence(Pol). The idea was that with number of increased hospital beds we need more doctors. Number of Medical colleges obviously influences churning out doctors. So does the number of dental colleges. Increasing health expenditure could also play role a role in delivering health professionals. I was eager to see whether governance could shape churning out doctors. A lagged variable was chosen in this regard as political turbulence this year could delay graduation of doctors in future. However, I treated this variable as a doubtful one and considered Bed and Med as free.

First, I regressed Doc on Bed. Then I regressed Doc on Bed and Med. After that I regressed Doc on Bed, Med and Den. Later I regressed Doc on Bed, Med, Den and ADP. Then Doc on Bed, Med, Den, ADP and Pol(1-period lag). Subsequent stages of regression increased both the R² and Adj R². We have five coefficient estimates for Bed, 4 for Med , 3 estimates for Den and 2 for ADP. The coefficient of Bed oscillated between 0.13 and 0.377. That of Med varied between -0.186 and 4.4. The coefficient of Den ranged between -0.2 and 43.56. The coefficient of ADP moved between 10.9 and 11.38.

I put my trust on Bed, Med and ADP as inclusion of other variables did not produce fragile estimates of their coefficients. I also noticed that inclusion of Pol(lagged) variable yielded wrong sign for Med variable which is contrary to the conviction that increasing number of medical colleges produces more doctors. So I went for other variable to measure the governance. I went for Kälin- Kochenov Quality of Nationality Index (QNI). QNI ranks qualities of nationalities. Each nationality receives an aggregate score based on economic strength, human development, ease of travel, political stability and overseas employment opportunities for citizens. So I thought QNI could be a better measure for governance. But data were available for 2011-2018. So I ran the regression for this period. After the regression, I found that Med produced opposite sign. So I discarded this variable too and my attempt to see role of governance in making doctors turned out to be damp squib.

And I finally rested my trust on the following model:

Doc_t = a + b Bed_t + c Med_t + d ADP_t

The result was:

Doc_t = 20088.07 + 0.16 Bed_t + 0.37 Med_t + 9.87ADP_t
(t = 3.86, p=0.00 , se=5194.24) (t=2.25, p=0.05, se=0.069) (t=0.16, p=0.87, se=2.35) (t=2.54, p=0.034, se=3.88)
(F=49.33, p=0.00)

The model fit well. However intercept demonstrated a huge standard error and coefficient for Med turned out to be insignificant. It appeared ADP expenditures on health and number of hospital beds in govt hospitals play the big role on the number of registered doctors. In my model, an increase in 1 crore taka in ADP on health led to churning out around 10 registered doctors every year in the given period. Though Bed turned out to be significant, its coefficient is less than one.

3.

Increasing health expenditures may lead to raise the number of healthcare provider. But I do not know whether it is enough to raise the quality of service delivery. Abdul Gaffar Chowdhury in that memoir shared an anecdote of service delivery at Dhaka Medical College Hospital in 1953. In the general patient ward, paratyphoid patient Gaffar was staying few more days to get cured. As in those days, the patients who managed to buy medication for paratyphoid had better chance of survival. Those who could not mange to buy medicine were succumbed to death. Medical authority could not do more. A well-to-do leukemia patient was also admitted to the same ward. He did not know his days were numbered. One day the patient died. Relatives came and engaged in an altercation with the medical staff as the naked dead body was draped in white bed cover and his silk Punjabi, moneybag, golden necklace were missing. 67 years later one may still call into question the improvement of service delivery in our health facilities. Increase in health spending may increase the number of healthcare providers, but whether it may ensure quality service delivery and spur research activities in the health sector is a subject of another scrutiny.