The Nurul Islam case: How long before justice?

Mridul Chowdhury

Published by the Daily Star on 19 September 2009.

WE, in Bangladesh, are used to waiting. We have been waiting to find out the perpetrators of the BDR massacre, who were really behind the August 21 grenade attack, or who killed one of the most brilliant sons of our soil, Shah AMS Kibria. Our waiting does not stop at that — even for cases for which we know who the perpetrators were, we wait for them to be brought to justice. Some of the self-declared murderers of Bangabandhu and his family are still at large. So are the “war criminals” who attempted to eradicate the intellectual backbone of the nation in 1971, only to be riding cars bearing our national flag in less than a generation, as no less than ministers. We live in this ’strange’ country where one can emotionally survive this uncertain and excruciating wait only if one knows how to wait, wait and wait only to see the reason for the wait becoming a distant memory at one point.

Saifur Rahman’s legacy

Jyoti Rahman
Published by the Daily Star on 13 September 2009.

BETWEEN 1972 and 1990, real (that is, inflation adjusted) per capita income in Bangladesh grew by an annual average of 1.1%. Since 1990, per capita income has grown by 3.4% a year. As a result, the proportion of people living below the poverty line — defined as daily calorie intake of 2122K — fell from 47.5% in 1992 to 40.4% in 2005. Over the same time, the proportion of undernourished people fell from 36% to 27%. In 1990, 26% of Bangladeshis had access to improved sanitation facilities, and only 4% of households had a television set; the proportions rose to 36% and 48% respectively by 2006.

It is clear that something happened in Bangladesh in the early 1990s, and we are better off for it. It is not an exaggeration to say that Saifur Rahman was at the centre of what happened. When one abstracts from the day-to-day politics of sound bites, 24-hour news cycles, and arguments about specific policies, it becomes clear that Saifur Rahman got some big things right that made the statistics cited above possible.

Microcredit 2.0

Mridul Chowdhury and Jyoti Rahman

Published by Forum on 7 September 2009.

Case distortions and social order

Syeed Ahamed

Published in the Daily Star on 4 Sep 2009.

GRADUALLY we are getting used to the initial covering up and subsequent disclosure of criminal cases. Under one government, we learn how an apparent killing or a bomb blast is either just an accident or deep-rooted political conspiracy. And then after the change of government, we learn how the criminal cases were distorted during the previous regime to cover up the truth. From “media created” Bangla bhai to the attack on Humayun Azad, or from the Ramna bombing of 2001 to 21st August 2004 grenade attacks — it’s the same story.