the latter would remain temporary and cosmetic. Two, space ought to be created for law abiding businesspersons to invest in big business. This ought to include even financial incentives to newer business ventures. Three, the electronic and print media should be made a partner to the government's goal of reenergising the economy. This could only come about by ensuring a free media devoid of the restrictions imposed under the state of emergency and other governmental regulations. Licensing of community radio, indeed, of all kinds ought to be made a priority in this context. Four, business rules should be made more transparent to the prospective investors both at home and abroad and bureaucratic hurdles should be minimised. Independent watchdogs ought to be established to see whether or not someone is deliberately slowing down the process of business communication and licensing. Finally, new business and employment opportunities should be created by way of aggressively engaging with private investors, both foreign and local, including the Bangladeshi diaspora. Here too independent watchdogs ought to be established to make the process transparent and ensuring an environment of pro-people investments. The last cluster of challenges facing the caretaker government could be called social. The caretaker government has had some success in containing religio-centered terrorism, namely the violent activities of Jama'atul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB),5 by sentencing to death six of its key leaders. This should not be taken to mean, however, that the issue of religio-centered terrorism is over. Instead the fear is that those who have suffered politically and/or financially in the wake of the state of emergnecy may now be tempted to form an alliance with the religio-centered extremists and create havoc in the country. The task in this context is three-fold and the caretaker government seems to have focused only on one or two. The caretaker government has had some success in incarcerating the militants. They have also raised the level of intelligence networks, which is still inadequate. This is mainly because the caretaker government is yet to come up with a structure of combining traditional security networks with the agencies of civil society, including the academia and research institutes. This certainly calls for a newer structure of intelligence, one which would be able to contain the contemporary forms of postglobalisation non-state terrorism. Finally, the government has yet to undertake the intellectual task of containing religio-centered ideas bordering on intolerance and rigidities or what has come to be known as the “Wahhabisation of Islam”. The Election Commission can certainly play a critical role in this by making it clear that no political party would be registered and allowed to contest elections if discriminatory provisions like limiting the leadership to only male members or keeping the party membership to only one linguistic or religious community are found codified in the party constitution or otherwise practiced. In this light, it would only be prudent for
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the caretaker government to at least start the process of identifying war criminals and those responsible for the 1971 genocide. A step in this direction would certainly rescue the peaceful religion of Islam from the seemingly empowered hands of the intolerant and distorted followers. In this age of globalisation this is as much a global task as it is a national one. Interestingly, if all the clusters of challenges are put together, there arises yet another kind of challenge—public fear with respect to how much the caretaker government can deliver and, more importantly, now that the election year has started, how much of its reforms can be sustained in post-election era. Critics with a sense of humour and a mindset of yesteryears will probably refer to this as a desperate search for an “exit strategy” of the military-backed caretaker government but that is not what I have in mind. Except for the first few years of independence, all the previous regimes—whether popularly elected or not—had active military backing, including the latter's alleged periodic “inaction” as well. Following the 1991 popular upsurge, the “exit” was limited to a military person in the name of Ershad and not the military as an institution. And now, given the experience of two subsequent caretaker governments, with the military remaining “inactive” and “active” in the first and second caretaker government respectively, there is no reason to believe that the public fear would vanish the moment the elections are held and the military demonstrably goes back to the barracks. This calls for the establishment of a “public” or “national” security council, with an overwhelming civil content and a structure where the government and the opposition would have no recourse but to meet and work together and keep the problems of the pre-1/11 emergency era at bay. A creative combination of political insight, long-term vision and a passion for democracy and democratisation is what is required to have it institutionalised and make it acceptable to the people. But public fear is neither linear nor does it seek state protection all the time. Indeed, if there is any setback or derailing of the democratic process, including the announced roadmap of parliamentary elections, the public could start fearing the caretaker government itself, and therein lies the greatest challenge. In fact, Bangladesh's history has repeatedly shown that once the public starts feeling betrayed there is a quick turn of events, from a state of public fear to a state of public fearlessness. However, this is a prescription for suicide not so much for the nation as it is for the caretaker government. The challenges are enormous and one would expect the caretaker government to work on some of these in the remaining months without creating newer ones from illdesigned or half-hearted policies. Once the challenges are met it would certainly go a long way in restoring confidence amongst the people and those seeking to contribute to democracy and democratisation of the country. The post-emergency caretaker government can then rest its case and claim a place in history.
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