Vol 1 issue 5 (1)

Being a modern mother 6

A dodgy friendship 17

FRIDAY MAY 17 2013

vol 1 Issu e 5

Obey the law, save a life 20

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CONTENTS This Week Whose Line Is It Anyway?

Jumping the ship Big Mouth Strikes Again Some mothers do have ’em Post-Riposte Banning newspapers and TV channels 9 Top 10 Vacationing away 10 Thought Plot Thatcherism on foreign shores 12 6° of Connotations How to deal with disastrous situations in Bangladesh 13 Photo Story Rain 17 Realpolitik A dodgy friendship 18 Digital Bangladesh Selling through social media 19 Interview Legally regal 20 What’s the Problem?

Obey the law, save a life 21 Stranger in a Strange Land Deny, deny, deny!

22 Tough Love 23 Backbenchers’ Club 24 Day in the Life of A photographer 25 The Way Dhaka Was Sadarghat 28 Last Word

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A Weekly Pro du cti o n o f

Vo lume 1, Issu e 5 MAY 17, 2 0 13

6 Feature Being a modern mum

Acting Editor Zafar Sobhan Magazine Editor Faruq Hasan Weekend Tribune Team Fahim Razzaq Sumaiya Shams Faisal Mahmud Tamoha Binte Siddiqui Sheikh Mohammed Irfan Yusuf Banna

26 Culture Vulture Reinventing oneself

Photography Syed Latif Hossain Cartoonist Syed Rashad Imam Tanmoy Contributors Naheed Kamal Ikhtisad Ahmed Bassema Karaki Dina Sobhan Omar F Ahmed Ibtisam Ahmed Design Asmaul Haque Mamun Mohammed Mahbub Alam Production Masum Billah Email: info@dhakatribune.com Web: www.dhakatribune.com

27 Obituary Andrew Simpson

EDITOR’S NOTE

A tribute to mums L

ast Sunday, we cherished mothers all across the world, and my mum joined in wearing a stoic grin. At any given mument, motherhood is a trying, joyous, exacting, painful, thrilling, scary experience, all rolled into one. And yet, like good wicketkeepers and math teachers, you only tend to notice them when they are not around. Much as I hate “Hallmark greeting card” days like Valentine’s and Friendship Day (I still can’t figure the last one out), I simply can’t get enough of Mother’s Day. Naheed Kamal and Dina Sobhan share different perspectives on the day where all mums deserve a big hug.

Elsewhere, Margaret Thatcher probably doesn’t evoke motherly images, yet even in death it’s impossible to ignore what she stands for. Ikhtisad Ahmed explores the Iron Lady’s influence in Bangladeshi politics and how, even after three decades after her demise in the UK, Thatcherite philosophy transcends national borders. With summer in full swing, we also give you a heads-up on the best holiday destinations in Bangladesh, interview a young barrister who is making headway in teaching legal studies, and pay tribute to an Olympic sailor whose boat literally became his coffin. Read, relax, and ruminate! n

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THIS WEEK IN INTERNATIONAL REUTERS

Men take photographs of fireworks while celebrating the passing of a new political isolation law in Benghazi on May 6, 2013 AFP

Nawaz Sharif waves to his supporters in Lahore on May 12 as he declares victory following a historic election marred by violence. Sharif’s main opponents were the celebrated cricketer Imran Khan, who chairs the PTI, and Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, leader of the PPP and the son of assassinated former prime minister Benazir Bhutto

Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro (L) speaks with Cuba’s President Raul Castro during their meeting in Havana, in this picture provided by Miraflores Palace April 27, 2013. Maduro is on an official visit to Cuba.

REUTERS

On May 9, a statement published with Stephen Hawking’s appproval said his withdrawal of academic boycotting of Israil was based on advice from academic contacts in Palastine W E E K E N D TRIBUNE F R I DAY, M AY 1 7, 2013

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NATIONAL

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1. Standing crops and roads were inundated by heavy downpour and onrush of water from upper stream at Srimangal and Kamalganj upazilas yesterday (May 8) Focus Bangla 2. Rescue operations following the Mirpur garments factory fire on May 8. Mahmud Hossain Opu/Dhaka Tribune 3. The war crimes tribunal has sentenced Jamaat-e-Islami Assistant Secretary General Mohammad Kamaruzzaman to death on charges of genocide, rape and torture of unarmed civilians during the War of Independence in 1971. The ICT 2 found the Jamaat leader guilty on five charges out of seven brought against him for committing crimes against humanity.

The prosecution failed to prove two charges, the tribunal said while reading out the verdict.

The tribunal also sentenced him for life on two other charges and 10 years of imprisonment in another

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4. Reshma, a garment worker, is brought out of the Rana Plaza rubble yesterday and carried by rescuers to a waiting ambulance May10 STR/AFP

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whose line is it anyway?

Jumping ship “This will be my last series as captain.

I am no longer getting support from my fellow team members.”

Mushfiqur Rahim, former captain of Bangladesh national cricket team

Cartoons:Tanmoy/Dhaka Tribune

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Big Mouth strikes again

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Naheed Kamal

Some mothers do have ’em Certain occasions just pass me by and Mother’s Day is one of them

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s far as I am concerned, May 12 is the day after Bob Marley died.

I am too busy mourning my one true love to bother with anything else.

What? You think I am talking rubbish?

So, maybe I am. Who’s to say?

As far as my relationship with my own mother goes, we love each other, am sure, but we can’t always bear to be with each other. In fact, three days is the longest we have gone without having an argument, which entails me walking out and doors slamming. Yes, even now. Dysfunctional much? Yes, we are, totally!

Growing up, there was no such day as Mother’s Day ever celebrated in Bangladesh. Or maybe I missed that day. So, this sudden celebration of an altogether American “holiday” that reeks of Hallmark Greeting Cards has sent me off on a tangent of Googling and Wikipedia cross-referencing. I had to get to the bottom of this … phenomenon.

But, obviously, the first port of call for me is to my mother. I ask her if she remembers how and when it started, and have I been remiss for long in not appreciating her with flowers and cards. She laughs, and we end up having one of our trademark arguments.

Happy Mother’s Day! To the internet, and what do you know?

A lady called Anna Jarvis started the ball rolling in 1908, or 1912, to honour her own mother. Why she had to make this into a big deal is lost on me, but it seems the idea was soon beyond Jarvis’ grasp. She worked tirelessly to make

I am not the mothering kind; hence, I have no children of my own, and I don’t intend to have any biologically if I can help it. Even if I had children, the idea of them bringing me soppy cards on just one day from school and then return to being brats would simply not suffice! the day an official holiday, charmingly rhyming “second Sunday in May” with “Mother’s Day,” which it did become in the US in 1914. But, as such ideas tend to do, it became a farce. Apparently, the commercialisation of Mother’s Day was so unpalatable for Jarvis that she

distanced herself from the holiday she created. By 1920, disgusted by the onslaught of commercialisation, she was urging people to stop buying flowers and cards, calling florists and greeting card manufacturers “charlatans, bandits, pirates, racketeers, kidnappers and termites that would undermine with their greed one of the finest, noblest and truest movements and celebrations.” She started to collect petitions to rescind Mother’s Day. Anna Jarvis spent the rest of her life trying to abolish the holiday she had founded.

But my quest to discover the advent of Mother’s Day in Bangladesh was going nowhere. Wikipedia tells me: “Mother’s Day is celebrated on the second Sunday of the month of May. In observance of the day, discussion programs are organized by government and non-governmental organizations.

Reception programs and cultural programs are organized to mark the day in the capital city. Television channels air special programs, and newspapers publish special features and columns to mark the day. Greeting cards, flowers and gifts featuring mothers are in high demand at the shops and markets.” How awful!

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he entry was obviously made by someone with an American background – note the spellings – and a very Dhaka-centric frame of mind. If we are to believe what we read here, only Dhaka celebrates Mother’s Day with receptions and cultural “programs,” and it sounds extremely commercial and bleak.

This is not the kind of honour my mother or her mother would appreciate. My mother is one of the most patient and toughest women I know of. Once she was such a beauty, men fell at her feet like flies. I am in awe of her. But my mother was young when she had me. She was naive, and she paid for her naivety in ways I am not permitted to write about. After all, it is my mother’s life. My grandmother was even tougher; she gave birth to 18 children, of which 12 survived, six boys and six girls. She outlived my grandfather and saw her youngest child die before her. She was tough. I couldn’t keep secrets from her; she knew everything.

How could she not? She was a mother dozen times over!

I am by no means an expert on motherhood, on mothering, on being a mother, wanting to be a mother or understanding what it is to be one. I have spent most of my adult life avoiding pregnancy and am proud of myself for having managed to do so. When a friend’s spouse snapped at me, “You have never been a mother, so you can’t know what I am talking about, unless you get pregnant. Wait till you are a mother,” I told her, if I had managed to avoid conceiving for all these years, there was no way I was going to have a moment of oopsie and get pregnant now, was I? Needless to say, she wasn’t amused.

Naheed Kamal is an irreverent and irreligious feminist.

An old soul of indeterminate age, with one too many opinions and a very loud voice (for a little person), she laughs a lot, mostly at herself.

She lives in Dhaka, against her best judgement. Mostly, Ms Kamal rants, a lot!

If social media is anything to go by, everyone loves their mums and they have the bestest mothers in the whole world. Really? Such perfection in such an imperfect world. Nothing like my mother then, full of faults and flawed, just like me Don’t jump to conclusions and start shouting at me for belittling mothers, please. I am a woman, and I understand what it is to have responsibility for another life, and I don’t have to give birth to know that. But, last I checked, being a mother is a full-time job, and it does not equal being a martyr. So I don’t always understand the sentiments so many mothers tend to pile on to their offspring. Nor do I appreciate it becoming a Hallmark event with candy hearts and red hearts, just like that other ridiculous celebration.

Several years ago, I did miss a period and freak out a little. So I announced to my father, with whom I live, if I was pregnant I was keeping the baby. Not because I am against abortion, but because I thought it would be too much trouble to get one in Bangladesh. To that, my ever-patient father lost in his newspapers said, “Is that a good idea?” and left me to ponder upon that thought. When I said the same thing to my mother, she had a minor fit, until I assured her I was joking; she was not amused. I thought it was hilarious.

Then again, I am not a mother. n

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FEATURE

Motherhood

Being a mum in 2013 Dina Sobhan writes about what it’s like to be a mother in 2013

Motherhood, indeed, is one of the best things in a woman’s life. It gets even better when it’s a choice and not an obligation W E E K E N D TRIBUNE F R I DAY, M AY 1 7, 2013

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used to be one of those women who looked at children as little noisy creatures who belonged to someone else. They were cute to look at and nice to talk to, or play with occasionally, but had no relevance in my life. I had always been ambivalent at best as to whether or not I wanted children of my own. While I felt no particular affinity to other people’s children, I was fairly sure that I would like my own well enough.

Of course, there were moments of extreme broodiness, when I wanted to experience the joy that others mothers talked about, but there were also

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moments when they seemed to be more of a complication than anything else. There were too many things I wanted to do with my life before becoming a mother. There are women out there who can juggle both a fulltime career and a family, but I knew I would not be able to do both. I was just starting to practice counselling again and felt that a full-time career would require time and dedication. I had also not met the right person with whom to start a family. While I flirted briefly with the idea of having a child without a partner – and I know many women who have – I was neither brave nor

capable enough to do it myself.

All that changed when I met my present husband. We married within a month and I became pregnant almost immediately. While we had discussed starting a family as soon as possible, mostly due to our age – he was 42 and I was 38 - we had certainly not intended to have a family so soon after marriage. Perhaps it was the lack of foresight and planning that ultimately worked in our favour. Had we thought it through – with both of us at the time residing in different countries and with no fixed idea of what the future held – we might never have had any

7 children at all.

I have friends in their late 30s who feel that it’s too late to have children, that they’re just too old, or that their careers are too important for them to contemplate starting a family at this stage. Conversely, I have unmarried friends who desperately want to have children but are afraid to challenge convention by having children on their own. Others are simply biologically incapable of having children and have been unsuccessful with their attempts at IVF. I consider myself lucky to have had not only a healthy pregnancy but a healthy delivery as well. Many women now opt to have elective C-sections to avoid the pain and the discomfort of labour. One friend of mine actually said: “Caesareans are so much more civilised.” While I strongly believe that this is a matter of personal choice, for me it was an option I would not have considered unless it was absolutely necessary. The way I see it, if my mother and my grandmothers were able to deliver a baby the normal

way, why couldn’t I do it? It certainly wasn’t what I would call a pleasant experience, but it’s something I’m proud of having done, almost an accomplishment of sorts. However, since having my baby, I have had all kinds of women, from friends to the girls at my salon, congratulating me on my choice. Apparently, I don’t seem like the sort of woman who would opt for the difficulty and messiness that labour entails. Perhaps more to the point, many of them just didn’t think it was possible for a woman of my age to have a natural delivery. Doctors in Dhaka particularly frighten women beyond a certain age into believing that complications are a natural consequence of late pregnancies and thereby force them into having caesarean births. Complications can occur with any pregnancy and/or delivery, regardless of age, as I have recently witnessed in the case of many of my younger friends. Similarly, I know women in their 40s and 50s who delivered their babies the good old-fashioned way. The most

interesting aspect of being a mother later in life is not so much how it has affected me personally, but how it has affected other women, single and/or married without children. One friend, in particular, has told me more than once that I’m a “hero” to her for having had a baby so late in life, and through natural delivery. Every time her mother bemoans her single and childless status at 34, she cites me as an example of someone who subverted the idea of being “too old for marriage and children” after a certain age. A cousin’s wife, who has a PhD in mathematics and didn’t marry until she was in her late 30s, congratulated me over lunch the other day for getting myself “off the shelf” and married with child at my age. It amazes me that, despite having successful careers and financial independence, a benchmark of success for a woman in this society is still marriage and children.

In that sense, my mother’s generation and older generations in our society have yet to come to terms with the concept of “choice.”

While there were many women in my mother’s day that held careers and had children later in life, it was a rarity, and certainly those who were unmarried or childless after a certain point were pitied for being “spinsters.” Nowadays, women feel they have earned the right to do whatever they feel is best for them. And many feel that having children is not conducive to other aspects of their lives. My cousin and his wife, both in their early 40s, agreed to put their careers first and when asked why they have no children, both husband and wife proudly announce that they chose not to have any.

Similarly, I have a friend who, when asked if she has any “issues,” says: “Yes, I have many. But none of them are children.” I am lucky to have had a child late in life and, if I’m luckier still, I may have more. But I feel luckiest to have had the choice to do exactly what I feel is best for me, without anyone dictating to me what it means to be either a woman or a mother. n

It is a little odd to see both the expecting mothers and their doctors favouring C-sections for the sake of safe birth, as natural birth was perfectly safe not too long ago

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POST-RIPOSTE

Media Censorship

Banning newspapers and TV channels I

f freedom of expression was an old man, he would be a very grouchy old man indeed. Everyone and their uncle have something to say about Mr Freedom of Expression, and it’s not always very nice. We abuse him, ridicule him, question his utility and, of course, even try to wipe him out of existence. Unfortunately, for grumpy, sometimes all the commotion is warranted. Take the recent brouhaha about banning Diganata and Islamic TV under the pretext of “incitement.”

The timing, of course, was unfortunate: right before the Shapla Chottor riots, the ban had conspiracy theorists up in arms. Even the rationale for the ban was not entirely justified: both the channels had recently been in their best behaviour, and I haven’t seen any kind of “incitement” from either suspects, aside from the usual reading

Democracy at its worst Fahim Razzaq

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the riot act to all sinners.

But with great power comes great responsibility, and if that doesn’t get your Spidey senses tingling, consider this: every single television and newspaper channel is owned by business magnates in Bangladesh.

And big businesses and the truth don’t always mix.

The truth is, we, the consumers, see media outlets as purveyors of truth and justice, and our expectations have something to do with government and television channels clashing from time to time. But, just like we censure businesses for hoodwinking the public from time to time, why should we not hold media outlets to the same standards? If rules, regulations, and laws are great for garment factory owners, they should also be great for newspaper magnates. n

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f a true democracy is to prevail, then the unhindered functionality of its founding pillars needs to be ensured. In other words, the judiciary (Supreme Court or law enforcement agencies), the legislature (parliament), the executive (government) and the media need to be given room to operate freely and without bias.

That is not the case in Bangladesh, though. And how could it be, when something as big as banning the media and violation of civil rights and the freedom of expression is almost an

Necessary in recent times Faruq Hasan

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everyday occurrence?

Today, if Bangladesh really was a fair and just democracy, then Mahbub Alam Rodin wouldn’t have been arrested on May 30, 2010 for uploading satirical images. Facebook wouldn’t have been banned the very same day!

Not to mention, today we wouldn’t have witnessed the ban of Diganta TV, Islamic TV and Amar Desh.

The point is this: democracy cannot prevail when the media – whose democratic function is to keep a check on the other governing

bodies – is silenced at the whims of political figures of great influence.

It doesn’t matter how strongly we feel about religious fundamentalists, war criminals or saving face from the international political sphere. We simply cannot allow our democratic freedoms and civil rights be trashed as and when the government deems fit. n

TOP 10

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Summer Destinations

Vacationing away 10

Panchagarh

Panchagarh is where you can get closest to the Himalayas without crossing the borders. On a clear day, you can see the outline of Kangchenjunga on the horizon. Then there is the teagardens in Tetulia. Perfect summer getaway, wouldn’t you say?

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The Sundarbans

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Lawachara National Park

Another summer escape can be found in Rangamati, with its deep valleys and winding ways around the mountains. The vastness of Kaptai Lake is both intimidating and enticing, and then there is the Hanging Bridge.

One of the prides of our country, the Sundarbans is the largest mangrove forest in the world. If you’re unsure about visiting the Unesco World Heritage Site considering the level of humidity, it will be worth it, as the forest is the liveliest during this time of the year.

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Breathtakingly beautiful, the nature reserve in Sylhet was declared a national park in 1996, protecting the tropical and subtropical forests in the region. Plan your trip during the monsoon – that’s when Lawachara truly shows its colours.

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Boga Lake

If you’re a fan of trekking and camping, Boga Lake in Bandarban is the ideal choice for a spectacular vacation. Located near Keokradong, Boga Lake is at its best during the monsoon, but sunny days are a good time for a visit too.

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Shusong Durgapur of Birisiri

Every one that I know who has been to Shusong Durgapur is in awe of this place, enchanted by its photogenic beauty. With the ceramic mountains, blue waters of the lake in the mountain valley, Shomeshwari

Sumaiya Shams is senior staff sub-editor at Weekend Tribune.

When she isn’t busy with grammar corrections, she tries to write. You can reach her on Twitter: @sumaiya_s Hasan Miurshed

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Rangamati

Summer is here, and many of us are planning an escape from the hustle and bustle of city life. If you’re having trouble in deciding on your summer destinations, look closer. Bangladesh has amazing nook and crannies where you can unwind, relax and recharge. Sumaiya Shams suggests 10 such places

River, Kongshow River and a thriving locality, it’s simply mesmerising – a heaven for campers.

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Kuakata

Summer on a beach is the very definition of a dream vacation.

Locally known as Sagar Konya (Daughter of the Sea), Kuakata offers 30km of dark, marbled sand for a beach. You can enjoy both sunrise and sunset there.

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Cox’s Bazar

Another beautiful summer destination, Cox’s Bazar is typically more popular

summer-and-beach combination.

Since it’s the off season, all the luxurious facilities come in half the regular price. The sea, the sand, the open sky – what more could you want for a vacation?

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Nilgiri Hill Resort

Located 2,400 feet above sea level in Bandarban, Nilgiri Hill Resort has an air of serenity that is divine. The vast expanse of green valleys and the clouds floating all around you is so soothing, you’d want to settle there and never come back.

Which is why Nilgiri comes second on this list.

Nazimgarh Resorts Nazimgarh Resorts is an ultimate combination of nature and luxury.

Located in Jaintapur, Sylhet, the resort comes with all sorts of packages to suit all sorts of travellers . Its special attraction is the Wilderness – rooms surrounded by forest and lake. The resort even won a certificate of excellence from the UK-based travel guide TripAdvisor. For its modern and versatile facilities, it easily takes the first place on this list. n

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THOUGHT PLOT Ikhtisad Ahmed is a writer and an erstwhile lawyer.

He is bound by absurdity, and exists, therefore he is

Thatcher’s Legacy

Thatcherism on foreign shores Ikhtisad Ahmed explores the influences of Iron Lady’s policies on Bangladesh

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Thatcher famously told Australian foreign minister Bob Carr: “I like Sydney, but you can’t allow the [Asian] migrants … to take over.” Carr’s response to her “unabashedly racist” views: “I was so astonished, I don’t think I could think of an appropriate reply. I think we moved on to other subjects pretty quickly.”

argaret Thatcher’s true legacy was perfectly summed up by the actions following her passing: openly and unabashedly celebratory parties because “the Witch [was] dead” were quelled by the deployment of the police force under special orders. Her political legacy in Britain, unfortunately, is infecting it with the imposition of staunch and detrimental right-wing politics. The left became centre right when reborn as “New Labour,” the right moved the goalposts further along the spectrum towards extremism, and the balance was lost.

In order to better grasp the effect of Thatcher’s Premiership on the politics of Bangladesh and other countries, an understanding of Thatcherism is required. It is similar to Republican policies of the time in the US, in that, in simple terms, it represented an inflexible belief in free markets and small states. At the time, right-wing politics was dictated by exponents of Austrian economist Friedrich Hayek’s brand of capitalism and American economist Milton Friedman’s theories that included monetarism. An argument can be made that the spread of such policies across the world at the time were attributable to the US, the beacon of capitalism, and not Thatcher, especially since the Cold War meant an active promulgation of the American Way to snuff out the then USSR’s left-leaning principles. However, as a former colony and present-day member of the Commonwealth, Bangladesh has never isolated itself from the UK, instead being influenced by it quite heavily in all aspects of life.

President Ziaur Rahman had just started his third year in office when Thatcher had been elected.

In addition to moving away from socialist principles, his reign, like hers, was marked by the ruthless crushing of attempted uprisings. This shift in policy continued when President HM Ershad took office on December 11, 1983. Thatcher had started her second term earlier that year, recovering from a popularity rating as low as 25%, largely because of the Falklands War. She, like her Bangladeshi counterparts,

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22 December 1984: Margaret Thatcher with Ronald Reagan at Camp David White House Photographic Office/Wikimedia Commons

Nov 1988: Partly destructed Berlin Wall with border police, view from west, Brandenburg Gate in the background Stefan Richter/Wikimedia Commons

Did you know?

Thatcher became a member of parliament in 1959, after losing in the elections of 1950, 1951 and 1955. She became Tory leader in 1974 and served as the opposition leader from 1975 to 1979, before serving as prime minister from 1979 to 1990.

Margaret Thatcher despised government handouts, yet her funeral cost the taxpayers £10m (Tk1.18bn) during the stewardship of a Conservative-led government.

The Housing Act 1980 was Thatcher’s only piece of primary legislation. All other major legislation she enacted in her 11 years in office either amended or dismantled existing legislation, or was quickly repealed or changed following her tenure.

The precedence for female prime ministers was, in fact, set in the Indian Subcontinent.

Sirimavo Bandaranaike was the first, serving as prime minister of Sri Lanka from July 21, 1960, and Indira Gandhi was the second, becoming the prime minister of India on January 24, 1966.

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Thatcher’s brand of capitalism has spread to shores beyond the UK, reaping huge financial rewards.

Stefan Richter/Wikimedia Commons

The Clothing Tag On A Boy’s Shirt Which Is Made In Bangladesh Mike Blake/ REUTERS

had taken over a country based on welfare principles propagated by an inherently socialist system. It has to be noted that the forceful and rigid privatisation of state-owned industries can have devastating longterm effects, including destabilising the country in the medium- and longrun, and establishing a huge rise in inequality as an ever-present. Once started, a spread of such practices does not know any limits, as the only economic solution to self-perpetuated problems becomes more privatisation and less equality. Like the aforesaid presidents, Thatcher took it upon herself to dismantle the system to expand her own influence and hold on to power. Unlike her, Bangladeshi politicians had never had their own Falklands to arrest the downward spiral.

Her tenure with a mandate for economic improvement was marked by mass unemployment and civil unrest that was suppressed by increasing the authority of law-enforcement mechanisms. The gap between rich and poor increased by more than a third, and the proportion of children living in relative poverty more than doubled. The damage has never been undone, with many effects of inequality having long lag periods. For example, studying the rise in violence in the UK, Danny Dorling noted: “Those who perpetrated the social violence that was done to the lives of young men [in the 1980s] are the prime suspects for most of the murders in Britain.” Incidentally, riots for the first time since Thatcher’s government, an increase in strikes and an economy edging towards an unprecedented triple-dip recession in a country that is unhappy are amongst the unsavoury events that are of note during the term of the present government led by neo-Thatcherites. Furthermore, discrimination and policies arising out of it, and politicians and political parties advocating it, are rife in the present-day UK. The beginnings of these can be traced back to Thatcher and are rooted in her principles. She also got her geographical bearings wrong, pulling closer to the US and away from Europe. A particularly distasteful incident that marred Tony Blair’s reign was the Iraq War and the nature in which it came about – a result of the strong, unchecked USUK ties. Today, while the US and the rest of Europe are moving towards the centre-left and left for answers to the world’s problems, the UK is indulging in self-immolation by moving to the right. David Cameron is following in Thatcher’s footsteps by leading an inflexible government that is creating more problems in the name of finding

solutions.

Bangladesh has not followed the examples of Scandinavian countries, amongst its largest foreign aid-givers.

The theory of the welfare state is still alive and well in a part of the world where literacy is nearly 100% in every single country due to exceptional public education provided cost-free, healthcare is of an excellent quality and free, and the standard of living is amongst the highest in the world despite rates of taxation being amongst the highest as well. Socialist policies worked so well that when centre-right parties took over, they kept the well-oiled machine running, rather than erroneously making wholesale changes in the name of policies. Instead, Bangladesh went down the route of Thatcher during the same time. Brutal suppression of criticism and opposition didn’t prevent the populace from expressing their frustration, which took shape in the form of one head of government being assassinated. Another was dethroned by the concerted efforts of his opponents to paralyse the country and the economy, only to expound altered, inflexible and extreme versions of his policies and practices when they subsequently came to power. In spite of a growing middle class, the everpresent inequality in Bangladesh has risen persistently since. The economy has grown, but development figures indicate stagnation and regression.

Discrimination cloaked in nationalism has been a mainstay. The nationalism that came with Thatcherite rightwing politics also saw the relationship between Bangladesh and its closest neighbours cool, similar to Thatcher’s fight with Europe. Worse yet, heads of governments in Bangladesh have followed her early years in establishing themselves as cult-leaders beyond reproach.

Margaret Thatcher’s singlemindedness resulted in shaping present-day British politics, irreversibly it seems and certainly to its detriment.

Whether this will be the damaging legacy of the Bangladeshi leaders who prescribed to her warped view of the world is yet to be seen. Gone are the days when sensible conservatism was defined by wise liberals such as Lincoln and Churchill. The world should be aware that Bush Junior and Thatcher have replaced them. Comfort can be found in the fact that the former has disappeared from public life entirely since the end of his ill-fated presidency and the latter was ousted by her own party while she was in office. The rejection of tyrants would be a legacy worth following, a more apt form of Thatcherism. n

Geoffrey Howe on Thatcher: “If you look at anything Margaret Thatcher wrote or the speeches she made before she became leader of the party, there’s nothing outstanding or distinctive about them.

She really only made an impact on us in the party when she was, to our surprise, elected leader … And all of us [were] surprised to find ourselves forming a quasiElizabethan court around her.”

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6o of connotations

Omar F Ahmed is a culinary artiste and a social scientist.

He spends his time challenging social norms and whipping up delicious deserts for his friends

Omar F Ahmed

How to deal with disastrous situations in Bangladesh DISCLAIMER: This article tends to speak the truth about what happens during these tragic events, and how conditions may be worsened due to certain issues. It is not meant to offend anyone, but to simply inform every one of the dangers of taking certain measures, and how we can take more appropriate measures

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nstead of starting this article with some philosophical phrases, words of wisdom or descriptive narration, I want to get straight to the point, as the current state of the matter at hand asks for us to be direct.

People – whoever was trying to make a difference by trying to help the Savar victims by going to the collapsed site, please understand this: the area was already filled, to the nearest metre, with regular local citizens, reporters, cameramen, doctors and nurses. All of us didn’t have to go there to help them! By doing so, we most likely caused more suffocation in the area, and it was already congested and stuffy. The amenity mostly required by the victims, still stuck and alive, was air – the more people went there and tried to help, the more they caused the air (oxygen) around the area to depreciate and obviously, more people = more dust being lifted into the air.

A rush of volunteers is not necessarily the most effective way to save lives.

Coordination is sometimes more important than speed I understand how it must feel to see and hear about something like what happened in Savar, and how much pain we feel when we know that our very own country folk, our brothers and sisters, are suffering to that extent. We all want to extend our arms towards them and tell them that we are here for them. We all want to be around them to tell them that they will be fine, that they have gone through something unimaginably traumatic, and that someday, it will all be better.

But the truth is, these traumatic experiences don’t just get easier to deal

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with if we all huddle around them and ask them if they need or want help.

That makes it worse. If there are skilled medical teams, firemen, the police force and their family members already there, trying their utmost to get those poor souls to breathe another heave of fresh air and live another day, we should step back and help them in alternative ways, instead of joining a crew which is already large.

In this case, we know that the main thing for each of us to do is raise funds for our deceased brothers and sisters’ families, and for those fortunate to have barely survived. Be it with a certain organisation or a small group of friends and family, we should try our utmost to raise enough funds to make a substantial contribution to them. We owe them this. We need to donate as much blood as we can to our nearest hospitals, medical stations or blood banks, which have been set up in a lot of places in accordance to the incidents to collect more blood donations.

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ow, as it happens, blood types A+ and B+ have already been donated to all these medical institutions in hefty amounts (as we have been informed), as these blood types are the most common in our country. So, it would be extremely helpful for the victims of the incident and the medical institutions if the rarer blood types (O+, O-, A-, B-, AB+, AB-) made more donations now, compared to the two common blood types. We have to understand this: since the medical institutions are already packed to the rafters with blood donors, by going there to donate the blood types of which they have plenty and sufficient amounts, we would just be creating a hindrance.

Let’s not just focus on the disaster

Let’s spend a moment to think about all the unsung heroes who worked behind the scenes to save lives - the people who donated money, helped transport relatives of the missing, and wrote real-time accounts of what was going on in Savar that happened now and be oblivious about everything else that happens around us. Now that the people have risen to such heights, we are all more than capable of taking matters into our own hands when it comes to disasters. Not just Savar, but every single incident that happens in this country – we call “ours.” Yes, over 1000 families now have a hole in their existences and their hearts. What can be more unfortunate? But I can tell you, an accident might have occurred somewhere else that very day, which didn’t attract media attention but had very similar detrimental consequences. What will happen to the families of those victims? Will they not receive the same help from us, just because they haven’t been broadcasted?

Let us all take a deep breath and calmly think of our duties as fellow citizens, fellow brothers, fellow sisters, and fellow human beings. Let us not rush to doing what may eventually cause more devastation, but think and take the safer and more helpful route towards assisting in these crises. Let us not lose hope and falter, but hope and pray that we can come out of this strong, and every incident, stronger and more united than before.

Sincerely, a concerned citizen who couldn’t make a difference by going to Savar or donate his A+ blood. n

PHOTO STORY

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RAIN

Rain A photo story by SYED LATIF HOSSAIN Bangladeshis have an emotional connection with rain that most outsiders have a hard time to fathom. Our love for a good downpour and dark, cloudfilled sky is reflected in our poetry, music and even our Facebook statuses. As we officially enter the rainy season, enjoy a few of our pictures that try to encapsulate the beauty of brishti. n

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PHOTO STORY

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RAIN

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PHOTO STORY

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RAIN

REALPOLITIK

17

BNP-Jamaat Relationship

A dodgy friendship

Ikhtisad Ahmed is a writer and an erstwhile lawyer.

He is bound by absurdity, and exists, therefore he is

Ikhtisad Ahmed examines the coalition between the two parties

M

ohamed Morsi, formerly of the Muslim Brotherhood and currently the president of Egypt, said in an interview with CNN: “There is no such thing called an Islamic democracy. There is democracy only.” It’s not a view widely held by Islamist politicians because of the inherent potency of the religion.

Bangladesh was introduced to this by the founder of Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), the current opposition party.

Jamaat-e-Islami was founded in 1941 in what was then British India.

After initially opposing the partition, it moved to Pakistan following the inevitability. The party has since remained committed to its goal of an Islamic state ruled by sharia law. It vehemently opposed an independent Bangladesh, invoking religion as an argument against it. Following independence, Jamaat was banned and its leaders banished.

This ban was reversed in 1978

by President Ziaur Rahman. He also allowed Ghulam Azam, at the time not a Bangladeshi citizen, to return to Bangladesh as the leader of Jamaat despite his anti-Bangladesh lobbying even after 1971. Thus, the party resumed its political activities.

As the head of state, Zia carved out an Islamic identity for Bangladesh.

The Constitution was amended in 1977 to reflect this. The shift towards Islamisation brought him popular support. At the time in its infancy, Jamaat started to capitalise on this.

BNP, established as the right-wing political party, would naturally always be drawn to religion in politics.

The marriage of convenience between BNP and Jamaat was reaffirmed in 1991. The 18 seats that the latter won were crucial in giving the former the majority in parliament.

The coalition saw Jamaat leaders

A little more on Jamaat n

Jamaat-e-Islami was founded on the principle of Iqaamat-e-Deen (the establishment of Islamic way of life in all aspects of life), and decreed secularism and democracy as haram (forbidden by Islam). It also stated that it would achieve its objectives through constructive and peaceful methods n

Mahabubul Alam/DhakaTribune

benefit from cabinet positions. This was also the year in which Ghulam Azam was officially elected as the Amir of Jamaat. BNP chose to ignore the outrage this caused, and he was granted Bangladeshi citizenship in 1994.

The tide turned momentarily in 1996, when Jamaat boycotted the February election along with the other parties, thus allowing Awami League to ascend to power after the successful June election. However, this proved not to be dissolution of its

marriage to BNP, but a temporary rift that was set right in 2001. BNP and Jamaat resumed their alliance ahead of the general election that year.

They formed government together for a second time, and have remained inseparable since.

BNP has actively and unabashedly rehabilitated Jamaat in Bangladeshi politics, pulling the two parties together at every opportunity, rather than pulling away from it. The strength it derived, and continues to derive, from Jamaat’s student-wing,

Islami Chhatra Shibir, has been very useful in its struggles against the throngs of Awami League student forces. Perhaps this increases Jamaat’s allure and makes its already easily digestible opposition to an independent Bangladesh completely forgotten. It helps that there is no deterrent, that the indifferent populace has never questioned either this or the flagrant misinterpretation and abuse of religion for political gain fervently enough. n

Jamaat’s rise and coalition with BNP 1941: Jamaat-e-Islami is formed on August 26. Abul A’la Maududi is its first Amir 1948: Jamaat-e-Islami Hind is formed in India in April, after Jamaat opted for Pakistan as its base of operations

1971: Jamaat strongly opposes an independent Bangladesh. It is subsequently banned after the end of the Liberation War 1977: President Ziaur Rahman replaces secularism by issuing a proclamation order to insert Islamic principles into the Constitution, including the

addition of the words “Bismillah-HirRahman-Ar-Rahim” to the Preamble 1978 Ghulam Azam is allowed to return to Bangladesh by President Ziaur Rahman. The party is revived. The Jamaate-Islami Bangladesh party is officially allowed to start its activities

1991: BNP wins 140 seats in the general election, 10 short of the majority. It forms a coalition with Jamaat, winner of 18 seats 1992: Jahanara Imam instigates the Gonoadalot movement in March. She is charged with treason

1996: Alongside the opposition, Jamaat boycotts the election in February that sees BNP return to power 1996: Awami League wins the election in June that Jamaat and BNP contest separately.

Jamaat wins three seats, BNP 116

2001: The BNP-led alliance, which includes Jamaat, wins the election.

Jamaat wins 17 seats 2008: The Awami League-led alliance wins the election held on December 29. BNP’s fourparty alliance becomes the main opposition.

Jamaat, who wins only two seats, remains part of this

While there has never been any attempt to suppress Islam or its practice in independent Bangladesh, the Jamaat-e-Islami Bangladesh narrative, increasingly endorsed and enforced by BNP, suggests otherwise, often resorting to violence to make its point n

Ghulam Azam, the father of the Purbo Pakistan Punoruddhar Committee (East Pakistan Revival Committee) after independence, was a Pakistani national living in Bangladesh without a valid visa between 1978 and 1994. He was the unofficial Amir of Jamaat-e-Islami Bangladesh for the majority of that time, being officially elected in 1991 and serving until 2000. He was succeeded by Motiur Rahman Nizami, one of the chief organisers of Shibir

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18

DIGITAL BANGLADESH Chris Riley Bigstock

Faisal Mahmud is a staff reporter at Weekend Tribune who specialises in writing IT and telecom articles with depth and analysis. He is also in charge of the weekly Tech page for the newspaper

Selling through social media Faisal Mahmud talks with the former head of marketing at Apple Inc

Profile of Chris Riley Started worked as a strategist and researcher in advertising design and marketing in 1983 n

Led the worldwide strategic planning department of Wieden+Kennedy from 1991-2002 n

Left W+K to run his own strategic planning consulting practices, Studioriley, between 2002 and 2005, working out of Portland, Munich, Helsinki and Singapore

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hris Riley was a part of the team at Apple Inc that came up with the brilliant promotional quip: “If you don’t have an iPhone, you don’t have an iPhone.”

During his recent visit in Bangladesh, Riley attended a seminar organised at the University of Liberal Arts Bangladesh (ULAB), where the first thing he said was: “If you don’t have a phone, you don’t exist.”

“I didn’t exaggerate by saying that,” he said later. “Think about it; to most people, you are some numbers using which they can reach you any time.”

Riley, a former head of strategic planning in Apple Inc’s Graphic Design and Marketing Communication Group, is considered to be one of the world’s

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Between 2005 and 2010, he was head of strategic planning at Apple Inc’s Graphic Design and Marketing Communication group

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leading strategic thinkers on branding and communications. He is also a great enthusiast of the emerging technologies and renowned for his effort to promote these technologies worldwide.

“The world is changing,” Riley said.

“More than 5.4 billion people are using mobile phones around the world.

Global online population is now 2.4 billion and 1.2 billion of them are using internet through their phones,” he said, adding that more than 98% of the world’s urban population is using mobile.

“So yes, you need to have a phone to let the world know that you exist,” Riley said, “Look at Bangladesh, your own country. Over 80 million people

here are mobile subscribers, as far as I know.”

According to Riley, in the last six or seven years, huge markets for mobile phones have developed in Asia and Africa, two largest continents in the world. “As a result, handset manufacturers and telecom operators find it cost effective to sell their product at a low price,” he said.

A global expert in marketing, Riley further talked about the great expansion of mobile phone usage that has become possible worldwide – not only because of the advances made in the mobile technologies, but also due to effective marketing strategies.

Riley believes that the art of selling a product greatly depends on the seller’s ability to know people, build their trust, and sell them what they need. “Marketing to a larger demographic is where things get trickier,” he said.

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efore joining Apple, Riley was the head of strategic planning at Wieden+Kennedy for over a decade.

They are an advertising agency best known for their work with Nike.

He spoke about Nike’s “Just Do It” campaign, in which Nike told the stories of underachievers who later became global superstars.

“But advertising tech products, like mobile handsets, is quite different.

Only storytelling will not bag the customers, as they will do rigorous research before they buy the product.

So you need to have a really good

product and then promote its good parts prominently. This is both a simple and complex task,” he said.

There are no real laws of advertising, or so Riley said. “You have to figure out what the problem is and solve that problem. I completely realised that when I joined Apple,” he added.

Riley also talked about how large corporations around the world have turned towards social media in order to reach their targeted customers.

“Print media changed the world, radio changed the world, television changed the world, and now social media is changing the world. The big difference between these past evolutions and this one is the flatness of this media,” he said.

Social media is being used by many as a platform with a broader, possibly infinite, and narrative range. This is both good and bad news, since true and false information travel equally fast through social media, as Riley commented.

“But you know the myth: even bad advertising is good advertising, and there is only one thing worse than being talked about – that is not being talked about,” he said.

As Riley put it, nations were born in the age of print media, and regions were created in the age of TV. “But social media is both universal and specific. It connects on a global level but reflects ultra local perspectives. And this surely is the best way to reach your customers these days, both locally and, to a greater extent, globally,” he said. n

INTERVIEW

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Manizey Ibrahim

Legally regal Tamoha Binte Siddiqui talks with the young barrister

Tamoha Binte Siddiqui is a staff correspondent for Weekend Tribune, because weekends are the highlights of her life. True story!

Fahim Razzaq/DhakaTribune

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rom the very first hello, Manizey Ibrahim’s energy is palpable.

While she gracefully shows us to her office, I’m already impressed by her friendly yet confident nature.

She agreed to sit with me right after a day-long series of draining classes, yet Manizey is as upbeat and sprightly as a morning bird. “I’m a bit of a workaholic,” she says, “My day starts at 7:30am, and I’m on a roll till 10pm.”

Manizey jokes that her friends call her a “Junk Queen” due to her love of junk food. However, by the end of the interview, it’s easy to see that Manizey is a budding queen in her own right when it comes to the world of law.

What drew you towards a career in law?

There was no such inspiration from the very start. I was always drawn towards becoming a doctor, to be honest.

However, during my A-levels, I realised that medical science wasn’t really my cup of tea. Then my father suggested law, probably because I grew up amid lawyers. There are a number of lawyers in my family, including my grandfather Justice Mohammed Ibrahim and my uncle the late Barrister Syed Ishtiaq Ahmed. So, since an early age, I attended seminars and was exposed to talks and discussions in this field.

Therefore, when I joined LCLS as a

student in 2004, I loved it as it opened up avenues for me.

Tell us a little about your teaching experience at LCLS. Well, I initially had no plans to pursue the academic field; I was drawn towards the challenging area of the courts. But due to a suggestion by one of my teachers, I decided to give teaching a shot. When I started, I realised that this was an area where one could actually be heard. Here, you not only get the chance to control and command, but also help shape a new line of barristers.

Do you have any future plans to practice law?

I want to. Even my family wants me to.

I mean, my family is proud of the fact that I’ve created a separate identity for myself, instead of just remaining soand-so’s grand-daughter or niece. But they still want me to go out there and practice law. Maybe I will in the future, when I’m ready.

What advice would you give to the aspiring lawyers in Bangladesh?

One word – Focus! If one is determined, one can achieve anything. My agenda in life has always been to live life queen size and dream big, and make others believe so as well. I believe that

More on Manizey Ibrahim’s academic career in order to live life on a grand scale, one has to help others. For example, when I went abroad to sit the bar exam, I felt a little lost and underequipped. Therefore, after I came back, I opened up an Advocacy Squad where students preparing to go for their bar exam can get training. This helps build their confidence, making the process a little less daunting. Also, we’ve opened a pro bono clinic, where last-year students or second-year students give legal advice in different dwelling areas on a number of issues.

Does it disappoint you when you see the state of law and order in Bangladesh?

Definitely, especially in matters where humanity itself is breeched. I’d like to focus on issues such as rape and harassment. Though there are laws in existence against these crimes, there’s no strict enforcement. I believe an awakening jolt is needed from the government to deal with these issues more effectively.

Passed the bar from City Law School in London

Faculty member at London College of Legal Studies (LCLS)

How do you think the legal system will evolve in Bangladesh, say, in 10 years?

I think the system is already changing now that the judiciary is separate.

Also, there is a higher level of elitism and sophistication in this field now as each passing year we’re getting fresh advocates and barristers. Law is known as a profession of aristocracy, which was missing in many cases in Bangladesh in the past. Due to many institutions like LCLS, which are giving out international degrees, the scenario is changing now. n

Founder of the Advocacy Squad that helps train students preparing to give the bar exam

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20

What’s the Problem

Obey the law, save a life Sheikh Mohammed Irfan discusses the dreadful situation of road accidents in Bangladesh Sheikh Mohammed Irfan is a pragmatist, bringing spotlight to the persistent problems in Bangladesh

Chance takers are accident makers, so for the sake of your and others’ safety, do practise caution.

Time never holds more value than life

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ccording to statistics, over 4,000 people die every year due to road accidents in Bangladesh.

Our country has one of the highest death rates due to road accidents in the world, with 85 people dying for every 10,000 registered vehicles.

What’s more alarming is the amount of neglect we assign to our public safety.

Do we, as a society, not care about our safety? Or is the government failing repeatedly to provide us with the safe roads we demand and deserve? There are no black or white answers to these questions, and to understand why we are in such a terrible situation, we must dig deeper into how we function as a people.

In Bangladesh, we have established plans, roads and laws, but have failed to implement and maintain any of them. Plans are ideological concepts on paper, while reality is a whole different story. Roads are falling apart and new roads are being built with no consideration for pedestrians, no track marking, functioning streetlights or traction control. To make matters worse, we are ruled by an ailing law system, under which drivers drive with fake or no licence, or even legitimate

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Bigstock

licence issued through bribery. The law enforcers are just another brick in the wall who work more on tearing laws apart than enforcing them.

Unfortunately, people seem to find no fault in this trend and simply accept it as part of the Bangladeshi system. Such mindsets are perilous to society, because we as a nation have a responsibility to exercise our basic rights. The more we compromise our rights, the less we are valued, and the easier it is to count us as just another statistic in a road accident.

Taking a passive approach and complaining about the problem will not save people’s lives. We must ask ourselves how we can stop this problem. There is, in fact, a lot we can do to improve the situation we are in.

For starters, we can begin to follow traffic laws and become upstanding, responsible citizens of our society. It’s a dreadful fact that jaywalking is such a common practice throughout the country, although people are aware how reckless it is. We complain that there are no walkways and bridges for pedestrians to cross highways, but we know for a fact that this is not the case. There are numerous walkways

and bridges throughout Dhaka alone which are only used by street rats for sight-seeing. The majority of people are too lazy to climb stairs or go out of their way to take the correct route, and would rather put their lives at risk by crossing in the middle of the road. Can the problem be blamed completely on the government, then?

Or is it who are paving the way for such circumstances?

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s for drivers, Bangladesh is home to some of the most reckless drivers in the world. We pay absolutely no regard to traffic laws and simply drive at our personal whims. If we feel like speeding, we speed; if we feel like shifting lanes every three seconds, we do; if we feel like driving on the opposite side of the highway, no one can stop us! We honk our horns constantly but never bother to use our blinkers, we thrust our cars in front of others but never wait for a car to pass, and we park wherever we find convenient but swear at others who do the same. The amount of traffic violations drivers are responsible for would have them behind bars in any other country, yet here they drive

freely and continue to be a danger to public safety. It’s no wonder that the death rate is so high in this country because of road accidents. It’s obvious that by simply following traffic laws, we can save a lot of lives.

Accidents are grave and preventable situations, and by taking precautions we can decrease the amount of accidents that occur every year. In Bangladesh, about 33% of the beds in primary and secondary level hospitals are occupied by patients with injuries related to road accidents.

These accidents account for Tk750bn each year, which is 1.5% of our GDP. With 31.5% of people living under the poverty line, does Bangladesh really have the luxury of wasting such a huge amount of money on negligence?

Definitely not. By adhering to traffic laws and demanding punishment of those in violation of the law, we can work together to decrease the number of these deaths and injuries.

This will not only save lives directly through avoidance of accidents, but also indirectly by making money once spent on negligence now available for the poor. n

STRANGER IN A STRANGE LAND

21

Denial

Deny, deny, deny!

Bassema Karaki observes how many in Bangladesh take criticism harshly

Bassema Karaki is a LebaneseAmerican married to a Bangladeshi. She shares how strange, crazy, and humorous life in Bangladesh can appear to an outsider looking in

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Tanmoy/Dhaka Tribune

s it just me, or do most Bangladeshis not respond well to criticism? Not that they are unable to pinpoint problems in others, but it seems to me most of them have difficulty admitting their own problems, let alone resolving them. Perhaps it stems from the sense of national pride people are brought up with here, or maybe it’s a defence mechanism for people to protect what they love. It may even be against Bangali culture to provide constructive criticism. Whatever the case may be, it never fails to astonish me how prompt people here are to deny their problems with their heads held high.

My husband’s cousin is seven and 30kg overweight. His mother is the perfect illustration of the defiant attitude I constantly encounter here.

Also obese, she ensures that her son eats six times a day, mostly fried and unhealthy foods. When I took the time to explain the risks of obesity to her and provided her with a plan on how to improve her son’s lifestyle, she was barely listening. According to her, her son never ate, but walked and did exercise all the time. She would hear nothing of a diet plan and became offended when I warned that her and her son’s health would deteriorate if they didn’t lose weight. It was worse than talking to a brick wall, and eventually I had no choice but to give up trying.

Another example would be a couple of weeks ago, when my husband and I were at a famous Chinese restaurant enjoying dinner ¬– enjoying, that is, until we found a dead bug in our noodles! We called the waiter over and showed him the bug, but to my complete shock, rather than apologising in recompense, the waiter claimed the bug had flown into our noodles while we ate! With nothing but its shrivelled legs distinguishable, the bug had obviously been fried to death in the kitchen, yet the waiter insisted it was not their mistake. After speaking with the restaurant manager, we were even more offended as he held the same attitude and finally told us we could replace the dish “if we did not like it.” Perhaps our accusation offended them, but I hope they at least attempted to improve their hygiene standards afterwards.

This presumption of innocence and rejection of criticism is so prevalent in

Bangladesh that it can even be found in the attitude of the country’s leaders.

Recently, I watched a CNN interview of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina on the Savar building collapse. Her response to Christine Amanpour’s questions probably shocked the international community as much as they did me.

“Anywhere in the world, any accident can take place. You cannot predict anything,” she said in all serenity. Was the prime minister really referring to the collapse of a building with huge cracks in its walls as unpredictable?

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hether it was about Sohel Rana being a leader of the Jubo League, or international journalists not being allowed into the country, the prime minister rejected most statements made by Amanpour, telling her she had the wrong information.

The interview ended with the prime minister huffing haughtily that if it were true that CNN reporters were not being allowed into the country, then

CNN should not publish her interview.

I could only laugh in disbelief while thinking CNN had better get its facts straight.

On a similar note, I had the pleasure of watching a debate on Al Jazeera between HT Imam (adviser to the prime minister) and Ajmal Masroor (a Bangladeshi-born broadcaster and politician) on the recent Hefazat-eIslami protest. I was shocked to learn through Masroor that according to the Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International reports, the government was not only accused of the abduction of over a thousand people, but was also made directly responsible for the extrajudicial killing of opposition members and the habitual use of live ammunition to kill protestors. In response to these serious accusations, Imam could only take a stance similar to that of his advisee: “You are committing, I think, a mistake … what was being referred to as abduction and kidnapping – this is totally wrong

... I insist that there have been no extrajudicial killings.” Apparently, the Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch too needed to get their facts straight.

Whether it’s by a simple salesman or the prime minister herself, criticism is not taken positively in Bangladesh.

Unfortunately, I had to learn that lesson the hard way. I just hope I don’t sink into a similar pattern of denying my own problems. n

Some Bangladeshis take the presumption of innocence to a whole new level by transforming the principle “innocent until proven guilty” into “innocent no matter the case!”

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22 Dina Sobhan is a freelance writer and cautions readers not to take her “advice” here too seriously!

TOUGH LOVE 1

I am 37-year-old marketing executive at a renowned company and rapidly climbing the corporate ladder. My problem is that our female CEO continuously makes passes at me. At first, it was flattering but she has become more aggressive lately and insists on meeting me after work. She even suggested that we take a trip together! I am terrified to mix business with pleasure, so how do I tell her to cool it without losing my job?

DINA SOBHAN I wonder if your boss has been watching old Demi Moore/Michael Douglas films … Disclosure, anyone?

Actually, while your dilemma does seem a tad comical, it is probably not all that uncommon these days.

This society is rapidly giving rise to successful women, who may take advantage of the shift in gender paradigms to cash in on their newfound power and sexuality. Often, this power may be used for evil.

While you are definitely in a tricky situation, you should not give in to her demands, however tempting, because

when things go sour – which they invariably will – you will no doubt be the scapegoat, fall guy and/or victim.

And regardless of how far we’ve progressed as a society, no one will ever believe your story. I recommend you find yourself a wife or girlfriend, preferably a big, angry-looking woman, whose mere appearance will be so intimidating that your boss will back off immediately. However, if you really want to beat her at her own game, quit your job, move in with her and let her support you while you lay on the couch all day, eating her food and playing PS3. n

Tanmoy/Dhaka Tribune

2

I have a cat called Mr Tibbles.

He is the most amazing cat in the world. The problem is, my boyfriend hates him and thinks I’m obsessed with Mr Tibbles. I do bring him everywhere we go, and he is a little portly because I love treating him to snacks and goodies, but surely my boyfriend should be more accommodating, right? He should accept me for who I am, pets and all. How do I explain to him that Mr Tibbles is an integral part of who I am?

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Dear crazy cat lady, I hate it to break it you, but your kind don’t have much chance for success in romance with the non-feline variety. Your boyfriend must be a patient man if he allows you to carry your fat cat around in your oversized Fauxtega and feed him off your plate, and to think that he needs to be more accommodating is straight up cuckoo. While cats are lovely creatures, their place is at home, curled up at the foot of the bed, not carried around like the “kebab-me-

haddi” in a love triangle. You need to get with the programme and realise double quick that your present boyfriend will soon be your ex if you don’t start treating him like the man in your life and your cat like the pet, not vice versa.

PS Mr Tibbles is a ridiculous name for a cat. Yours would be better off being called Motu, Potol or Aloo. n

23

BACKBENCHERS’ CLUB

Across 1 5 6 8 10 11

Sweetener for apprenticed knight? (5) Movie legend spotted in Havant (3) I am in a nutshell after one Northern race (5) Alien in car, nothing old-looking (5) For example, nil self-esteem (3) Reminder altogether about big end (5)

Down 1 2 3 4 7 8 9

Mistake for Cinders’ footwear? (7) Wrong gun for antelope (3) Whittington’s enemy found in crate (7) It holds a ring, a noble honour (7) That is around a hundred diamonds (3) The man in front (3) A little bit of citadel (3)

Solution for last week’s crossword

Tanmoy/Dhaka Tribune

W E E K E N D TR IBUN E FR I DAY, M AY 1 7, 20 1 3

24 Fazle Rabbi is a staff correspondent for Weekend Tribune.

While his one hand is busy with pen, the other one keeps on clicking photographs

DAY IN THE LIFE OF

A Photographer

Let’s talk photography

Fazle Rabbi summarises what it’s like to walk in the steps of Chanchal Kamal

Courtesy

E

ven 15 years back, most of the commercial advertisements in print media we saw were either hand-painted or drawn. Those days are long gone; today there’s demand for a lot more than what existed before.

Hand-made posters and billboards have been replaced by hi-res dynamic photographs. And all these crystal clear sharp images is the result of a bunch of commercial photographers’ effort.

Chanchal Kamal is a promising photographer who believes that his hard work will pay off someday and he’ll be named among the best photographers in Bangladesh.

Tell us about yourself.

I’m a commercial photographer, but I would rather like to term it as “light painter.”

Why photography?

This is something that brings me peace. I took my first photograph when I was in Class VI. It started off as simply a hobby of mine, but soon I realised that photography is my passion, which eventually became my profession

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in 2009. I completed a photography course from Pathshala South Asian Media Academy in 2011. I’m so used to taking photos that going without it, even for a few days, makes me feel suffocated.

How do you define a photograph?

A photograph tells a story. Here you show your viewers what they need to be shown. Again, a photograph is also an illusion of pixels; when it comes to me, each pixel of my image is important to constitute my story.

How does the journey of a professional photographer begin?

With hard work, determination and practice. Photographers always start with their quest of beauty hidden in ordinary things. In addition, they need a camera and proper skills to execute the job. Photographers always have to think about their next photograph and the way they are going to frame their thoughts.

Patience is also required to be a pro photographer. One needs to keep up with the upcoming technology. In my case, my wife’s inspiration has to do a

lot with what I am today.

What have you done so far?

So far, I’ve worked with numerous boutique shops, exclusively covered some corporate events, and taken photos for CD covers. I have also done a lot of fashion shoots. In fact, I am looking forward to establishing a career in fashion photography. I have my personal studio and a photography company named CK Photography.

I’ve been consistently working with leading models and fashion designers.

Last, but not the least, I work as an official photographer for Cafe Salt Grill and Pink by R&G. What is your process of working an assignment?

A photograph achieves its final look only after having gone through a number of layers of work. When I am hired for any shoot, the first thing I do is assess my subject and the target audience. Then I generate my concept according to my client’s need. The next step is to arrange a meeting with the art director, the client and the models.

There we come to an agreement on job

responsibilities and payment. Then we come up with the final idea and clarify the mission and vision for the job. The rest flashes by in a blur – we go to the location, get the shoot done and then go to post-production. When I am satisfied enough with the outcome, the pictures are delivered to the client.

What inspires you to go to work every day?

A quote by my favourite photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson: “To photograph is to hold one’s breath, when all faculties converge to capture fleeting reality. It’s at that precise moment that mastering an image becomes a great physical and intellectual joy.”

What else do you want to do as a photographer?

I want to take photos at the most beautiful locations around the globe.

I’ve always tried to create naturalistic photos. Water attracts me the most as a subject. Hopefully, I’ll get to do a shoot on water. I also plan to give a shot at wedding photography. n

THE WAY DHAKA WAS

Sadarghat 1963

Bangladesh Old Photo Archive

Sadarghat has, was, and always will be a very busy area of the city, and I wouldn’t expect anything less from one of the world’s largest river ports. In 1975, when I was still a high school student, I used to regularly traverse the port on my way to school in St Gregory’s. It was a twohour journey both ways, mostly because we didn’t have regular boats plying across the shores. That has changed drastically as there are vessels every half an hour, taking you wherever you want to go. We even have “water buses” now, and just like on the Dhaka roads, they too break down every other day!

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SADARGHAT

Nabil Ahmed, engineer, Motijheel

Today

Syed Latif Hossain/Dhaka Tribune

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CULTURE VULTURE

Alakesh Ghosh

Yusuf Banna is a staff writer at Weekend Tribune. He would be happier if he could be a poet, 24x7. He also dreams of being a painter and is envious of those who can paint

Yusuf Banna/DhakaTribune

Reinventing oneself Yusuf Banna writes about the artist’s comeback after a hiatus Alakesh likes drawing famous people. He’s partial to Rabindranath Tagore and Kazi Nazrul Islam, but he has also painted political leaders like Gandhi and Bangabandhu, and the greatest bards of Bengal

“I

started my career drawing sketches with a pencil, and I wish for its end with a pencil. That is my inner hope, but I leave it to fate,” Alakesh Ghosh said in his latest exhibition at Dhaka Art Center in April, standing in front of his newest artworks. There was a hint of melancholy in his tone – maybe the artist was thinking about his own death? His artworks, however, were completely opposite – colourful and vibrant, they marked the arrival of a new Alakesh after five long years.

There was a good number of portraits of known and unknown faces, drawn using different dry media.

Depending on the expression of his subjects, Alakesh used from pencil to pastel to charcoal. Pointing towards the self-portrait, which he made with a pencil on a roughly torn page of his exercise book, he said: ”My intention was to explore the potential of pencil as the most basic art medium.”

Alakesh defines himself as a poet, whose visions are presented with

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tones and lines on a canvas, instead of words on a paper.

Born and brought up in the country side, Alakesh has a deep adoration for nature. The village, the river, the faces of people bearing signs of struggle – all his childhood memories are still vivid in his mind. These memories overwhelm him when he’s painting; it becomes so intense that he can’t help translating them on canvas. His memories are his eternal muse, taking him closer to divinity.

Alakesh paints what he sees. Being a loyal translator, he explored the beauty of and uniqueness of each of the six Bangla seasons, and has been doing so for the last four decades.

That helped him make his mark in the contemporary art scene in Bangladesh.

Water colour has always been his most prominent area of expertise.

Water colour paintings are always a visual treat for the art lovers, and Alakesh’s recent artworks do the medium justice in his own quirky style.

His favourite subject is riverscape and

river-based locality, evident in the panoramic, cavalcade compositions of many of his artworks. The reflection of lucid eye on the water body, colourful sails of the floating boats, boatyard where the boats are arranged like flower petals, people crossing a dying river – these are simply fascinating subjects to look at. There was a painting of the old, desolate Panam Nagar, a rickshaw in a narrow alley between the time-forsaken buildings on a rainy day, which has been done using wet-on-wet technique of watercolour. It demonstrated Alakesh’s imploring restlessness as an artist trying to exceed himself every time.

The exhibition had no title. Besides his signature work, what is worth mentioning is the huge amount of drawings on different subjects done in different media. Birds still or in motion, cats in rural settings, bull carts crossing a canal, ox clam, bamboo clumps and other usual scenes in rural Bangladesh were portrayed in a pleasant way with watercolour, pen and ink or charcoal.

His artworks comprise paintings on the street processions during the Language Movement and the Liberation War too. With a few figures drawn in expressionistic manner, a line or a hue with relevant colour background, Alakesh brought the vibe of ’52 and ’71 alive on his canvas.

Alakesh is one of the pioneer artists in Bangladesh still doing plein air painting (painting in the open air) and encourages others to do so too.

While speaking at the inauguration ceremony of the exhibition, eminent artist Rafiqunnabi praised Alakesh’s natural ability in watercolour, admitting that it is a difficult medium to work with as there is no room for error.

Even though there was a flash of a new Alakesh in the 160 paintings displayed, his signature style and subjects were still very much present.

His dexterity and versatility is definitely worth the mention and praise. n

OBITUARY

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Andrew Simpson

He died doing something he loved Ibtisam Ahmed writes about the Olympic gold medallist

Andrew Simpson’s achievements 2001 Wins silver medal at the 2001 Finn European Championships after acting as training partner during the 2000 Sydney Olympics 2005 After a few more medals, takes a break from Olympic sailing and joins the America’s Cup challenger 2007 Wins bronze in the Star class with Iain Percy at the World Championships

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asting images from the 2012 London Olympics were of athletes bringing pride and joy to their home countries. Team GB, representing the host nation, helped inspire a new generation not just with the exploits of well-known world beaters like Jessica Ennis, Mo Farah, Victoria Pendleton and Bradley Wiggins, but with new heroes like Luke Campbell and Nicola Adams. Andrew Simpson was something in between, having won medals and accolades earlier in his career but never quite reaching cult status until 2012. Sadly, less than a year after helping Britain reach their most impressive Olympics haul ever, Simpson died on May 9.

Born in Chertsey, Surrey on December 17, 1976, Andrew Bart Simpson grew up in Dorset. He learned to sail at the age of four while visiting his grandparents, a love that would go on to define his life. Simpson was educated at Pangbourne College and was known for being a keen footballer.

But it was sailing where his true talents

Pascal Lauener/ REUTERS

lay. He grew up as part of the golden generation of British sailing, with both four-time Olympic gold medallist Ben Ainslee and two-time gold medallist Iain Percy being particularly close childhood friends. Percy would serve as best man at Simpson’s wedding years later.

While still at school, he was spotted by the former UK national racing coach Jim Saltonstall. His sailing debut came in the Laser class, a single-handed dinghy, but he moved on to the heavier Finn class. He missed out on a chance to qualify for the 2000 Olympics in Sydney, but still travelled to Australia to act as a training partner and provide moral support for his teammates. It was a move that showed his true dedication to the sport. Lottery funding, the single biggest source of training and equipment money for British sports, had not been introduced back then. Simpson’s offer to help with training was therefore a burden on his personal finances, but he did not care.

A year later, his commitment to the

sport was rewarded with a silver medal at the Finn European Championships and followed that with a bronze at the World Championships in 2003.

When Ben Ainslee made the switch from the Laser class to the Finn, it was Simpson who helped train him – again, using his own money – for the 2004 Olympics in Athens. Meanwhile, Percy’s partnership with another sailor in the Star class ended and he looked to Simpson for help. The two hit it off immediately, claiming bronze in the 2007 Star World Championships. A year later in Beijing, the two achieved their greatest victory, winning the gold medal in the Star class. Despite being outshone by Ainslee in the media, Simpson was nonetheless honoured with an MBE from the Queen during the 2009 New Year’s Honours List.

S

impson had further success with Percy, winning Star gold in the 2009 European Championships and the 2010 World Championships. The pair also sailed together on the big-

boat circuit as members of Team Origin in the 2010 British America’s Cup. Despite falling just short of a gold medal in their home Olympics in 2012, Simpson and Percy’s silver medal was part of the great British sporting summer, and he finally achieved the same level of popularity as his more decorated team-mates among the general public.

Having achieved Olympic, World Championship and European Championship success, Simpson set his sights on winning the America’s Cup, the oldest active trophy in all international sports. He joined the Artemis Racing crew in February 2013 after Percy became the team’s sailing director. It was during training for the America’s Cup that Simpson died at the age of 36, after the boat he was practising on tragically capsized. He leaves behind a wife, Leah, and two young sons. n

2008 Wins his biggest title, gold at the Beijing Olympics in the Star class with Percy 2012 After more success over the years, wins silver at the London Olympics, again with Percy, and becomes a national hero

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LAST WORD Faruq Hasan

Faruq Hasan is the Magazine Editor of Weekend Tribune and the resident devil’s advocate

Strangling the goose, crushing the golden egg

Accountability will come when everyone is given the same preference

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o you own a garments factory?

Is it located in a shady building in the outskirts of Dhaka with no fire exits, cracks across the floors, and super heavy machinery strewn all over as if you just finished playing with your favourite toys? Do you employ large number of women and pay them a pittance, low enough for the Pope to label you a slave driver?

And my personal favourite: do you love quoting Marie Antoinette whenever the huddled masses grumble and make a beeline for your factory?

Smarmy attempts at sarcasm aside, if the answers to several of the above questions are yes, then congratulations, you now top the bogeyman chart in Bangladesh (you might have to hog the spotlight with the resident atheists, but that’s a story for another day). Any national-level disaster is now solely your fault.

Any attempt to gainsay the notion, and the Savar tragedy is hurled at you faster than you can blurt out that capitalism rocks. You were clearly

Capital, like unfettered labour, will always find its way to its most efficient use. It’s up to the government to channel the rewards gained by garment factories unto other sectors warned about the impending doom that awaited Rana Plaza, and yet you chose to put profits before humanity.

And this isn’t the first time. The ghosts of Spectra, the blaze in Old Dhaka and the factories closing down in Savar because of unpaid wages have not yet been exorcised from the conscience

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of the proletariat Bangladeshi. But will crucifying the face of Bangladeshi capitalism necessarily champion the rights of the wronged? I don’t think so.

Last year, Bangladeshi garments contributed 80% of the country’s exports. Like a bodybuilder who’s been focusing only on bulging biceps, it’s emaciated the rest of national economy. Instead of serving as an inspiration to other business models, the garment industry is a magnet that seeks out labour, but more importantly, capital from other sectors that need it just as much.

This, of course, makes economic sense: capital seeks out the highest rate of returns, wherever it may lie.

The role of the government, however, would be to mimic the success of the garment industry and spread the winnings around. But it has failed to do that miserably.

The government imposes a steep tariff (much higher compared to either India or Pakistan, for example) on imported fabric or machinery that many non-garment factories also need. However, if you are a garment producer, the same high rates no longer apply. In short, you officially don’t have to work on a level playing field.

Similarly, wages in the garment sector may be low compared to global norms, but much higher within the country. Add to that the fact that most of the labour hired by garment factory owners constitutes women, who are otherwise massively underemployed nationally – you get a feeling that other “non-garment” forces are at stake in making the garment sector the goose that lays the golden egg. For almost all poor women, the garment

industry has been a saviour, not a curse.

Generalising that all garment factory owners are the devil reincarnate is far from the truth. Most are businessmen

The Savar tragedy was a man-made debacle. But let’s not jump the gun and crucify the garment industry as the sole culprit trying to play with the cards they have been dealt with.

So, now the question arises: how do you make garment factories more accountable to labour? How do you make them eschew shady deals with greedy landowners with dubious fourstoreyed buildings that miraculously grow five more floors overnight, and cosy up with politicians who have a special interest in the profits that garment factories make? Simple: stop giving garment factory owners preferential treatment.

Like a “special” segment of the population used to receiving an extra helping hand, garment industries have to be weaned off years of affirmative action that they have gotten used to.

Of course, there will be protests and lamentations, but the goal should be to treat the garment sector as a selfsustained business that lives and dies by its own sword.

Tragedies like Savar and Spectra are definitely man-made, but they are not necessarily garment-factory made.

Empowering the disenfranchised is and should be an objective for all, but not at the cost of disrobing the potent. n