Please do not make Class VIII students guinea pigs

       The education ministry recently announced its decision to hold the first-ever junior school certificate examinations, starting from November 4. It also announced the schedule for the examinations, according to which Bangla and Engish exams will be held in two days.We all know each subject has two papers of 100 marks each.In secondary school certificate and higher secondary certificate examinations, too, candidates take Bangla I and II on one day and English I and II on another.Is it not putting too much pressure on Class VIII students?

       Everyone agrees that our students are generally weak in English but the education ministry does not seem to have paid any heed to it . It has also ignored the routine of the Dhaka education board, according to which each paper can be held in a day.
       Some 15 lakh students are going to take the junior school certificate examinations .The education ministry has made a lot of changes in its decision with regard to the examinations since April. It seems the ministry has made students of Class VIII some sort of guinea pigs in its experimentations.

       Regrettably still, no one has yet raised any objection to the schedule for the junior school certificate examinations, although bundles of letter get published in different newspapers on different issues every day.

Non - stop population bloom in Bangladesh

    The Malthusian theory , a well - known theory of population studies , states that whenever human beings obtain more than mere subsistence, their number goes up until everybody is back at the level of subsistence. World population grew at a very high rate since the early 1950s because of higher level of  agricultural productivity during the green revolution period. The population continues to increase as the world is not in a position to return to its initial level of subsistence.Overpopulation is now a problem in many countres in the world and the population control has become a serious issue.
    Among many factors influencing population growth, dependency on children during crisis periods is considered as vital . Taking children is considered as a mode of insurance because parents expect to get financial and non-financial support from their children at their late age.Taking many children is comparable with modern portfolio theory which suggests diversification and options to manage risk from many activities, Under limited financial market without national health insurance and pension schemes, it is diffcult to motivate people to prefer fewer children and to make trade-off between children and alternative insurance. However, economic incentive has much to do because it can drive people to work hard , to produce quality products, to study , to invest, and to save.

Take about real issues

      Intolerable traffic jam, load shedding , gas crisis cripple our city life. These issues nowadays are the main focus of almost all Bengali and English-language dailies every day.A severe problem prevails in the Chittagong port. Awami League activists the other assaulted the officials at the deputy commissioner's office in Pabna and forced cancellation of a recruitment examination.The Bangladesh chhatra league activists are reporetedly doing the same throughout the country. A ruling party leader and his relatives destroyed a house in open daylight and grabbed the land.
     Traffic jam, load shedding , gas crisis intensify day by day.The government has not taken any effective measures to solve these problems but hammer on some issues that are hardly related to the well being of the people.

Constitutional mandate

      Syed Ali's opinion on the matter is a personal observation.If the members of parliament deem it necessary,they should pass appropriate laws governing the norms and procedure laws governing the norms and procedure vis-s-vis presidential clemency for convicts.Was not any view on the matter expressed their views and sincere advice on the matter , particularly related to exhausting of all legal channels.
      His opinion, or advice , to the president ,to 'judiciously' use his authority , is rather impolite .I am sure he could have written to the member of parliament of his constituency or to the president directly , if he felt so strongly about the issue, rather than putting it in the print media as a direct criticism of the president; which it amounts to!
      Also ,giving a hypothetical example is also not the way to go about it.It would have been better be to deal with the matter as it is since he seems to be well aware about it.Citing such examples,seems more like giving advice publicly , and that too, to the president.It seems rather impolite . After all is said and done, he is the head of state.

Restriction on import of day-old chick

      A number of hatchery owners have been charging Tk 70 for a day old chick since last year whereas, if business ethics is followed,the price of a chick should not be more than Tk 20.This has pushed up the price of  egg and chicken exorbitantly . As a consequence ,thousands of short and medium poultry farms could not make sustainable profit and a good number also faced closure.
     In the recent past that when the government decided to allow the import of chick ,hatchery owners convened a press conference and misled the public that Indian chicks would bring bird flu and destroy thousands of poultry farms in the country .In fact,they are jeopardising the poultey farms by charging irrationally high prices.They managed to persuade the government decision-makers to impose a ban and other restrictions on import of day old chick,egg and chicken .This is a conspiracy to monopolise the poultry business.

Traffic in Dhaka

     The traffic jams in Dhaka have become unbelievable nowadays.The country's capital is a big mess.There is na sign of the authorities' willingness to discharge its responsibility. Available roads and the number of vehicles are totally disproportionate.The ever-increasing number of vehicles on the road makes life more miserable for the citizens of the overcrowded city.Millions of work hours are list on the road.How can the  people of Dhaka get out of this painful situation? There is no simple solution.
      I think the government should encourage more public transportation and discourage private vehicles.Like all other big cities,the morning rush hour goes on from 7:00 am to 10.00 am.In these three hours the left lane of all main roads should be reserved for public buses only.All other buses and private vehicles should use the other lanes .It can be the same evening rush hours.
      People should be encouraged to take public buses and leave behind their vehicles at home.Public buses should follow a strict schedule with discipline.During the rush hours,every two minutes or five minutes (depends from where) there should be frequent bus services so that passengers can travel comfortably instead of owners and their employees by treating them fairly in a public-private partnership.

In praise of a teacher

    Just when I was beginning to think that Bangladesh was becoming bankrupt of all morals,common decency,and self-respect ,it was most refreshing and inspiring to read the letter from former schoolteacher Shakul Ali (New Age,September 17.)
    For 30 years Mr Ali had been part of the system that unapologetically inflicts pain and suffering on innocent and vulnerable children.He wrote that on very rare occasions he was one of the "torturers" (my description not his) for which he deeply regrets.Much to his honour,dignity and pride,he spent most of his school carrer trying to convince his colleagues that corporal punishment is wrong.
   No doubt Mr Ali is one of the rare breed of teachers, whom some of us were lucky to have teaching us,who've brought great honour , glory and respect to the profession and whom most of us admire long after we've left school.

Keeping Hope alive

    I was watching CNN's medical coverage on September 5.CNN's medical correspondent Dr Sanjay Gupta is touring to chronicle Pakistan's flood affected areas.He is on a motorboat with his producer and a cameraman.The floods in the north-western province of Pakistan have devastated the area.Six million people have erected makeshift tents and trying very hard to get through this difficult time with their families.Children are suffering the most .They are getting sick in increasing numbers.In the documentary Dr Gupta stops at some of the tents with his medical bag to check on the children .He gives them whatever he is carrying with him.One child, about two years old, is suffering from dehydration.

Extortion on highway and police

         Extortion on the highway on the eve of any festival seems to have become a routine,the extortionists spare no vehicles, be it a bus or a truck or a car.According to a report front - paged in New Age on September 8, transport owners and employees alleged that they were forced to pay money to extortionists at different spots on the highways on a regular basis, and the traffic and highway police also take their share.Little wonder then that all the directives issued by the inspector general of police have had little or no impact on police officials down the line.It seems that they hear or see no evil while participating in the evil!

Obama to challenge Republican foes economy

The US president,Barack Obama,Wednesday threw down the gauntlet to Republicans on the economy,as the lagging recovery and crippling unemployment threaten Democrats with a mid-team election meltdown.
  Obama was travelling to Cleveland,Ohio in a personal challenge to Republican House of Representatives leader John Boehner, who used a recent visit to the city to demand the president sack his top economic aides.
  In what USA Today newspaper bills as the 'battle of Cleveland,' Obama was highlighting a multi-billion-dollar package of tax breaks for businesses and spending on transport infrastructure meant to spur jobs growth and woo voters.
     His plan,which faces an uncertain fate in Congress with lawmakers fixated on their own political skins ahead of the November
     2 polls , appears to be a bid by Obama strategists to ease their boss's political weakness on the economy.
    'We are in a very political period,people are going to be making choices,'said a senior Obama administration.
    'It is propitious we will be in Cleveland , where Mr Boehner was a couple of weeks ago,unveiling what he said was .

economic vision.

     Boehner, a conservative Ohio Republican with a colourful turn of 
phrase, is eyeing the speaker, s chair with his  party tipped to grab
control of the House from Democrats.

Good governance and Digital Bangladesh

      Digital Socciety focuses on a tecnology based society where information must vailable to all classes of people . It is obviously a forward thinking one  especially for a poverty ridder and developing country like Bangladesh . Each and every sector of a society should be  interconnected through I Connecting people and ensuring good governance is core prerequisite to digital Bangladesh . Good governance  includes different indicators like accountability of the government , transparency of the government , effective parliament ,effective  democratic system , freedom of print and mass media , indicators can be possible when society gets adaptation with ICT.Information should be exposed to mass people that can only ensure true communication.Connecting people depends on access of information.

     It is truly our dream to see digital Bangladesh by the year 2021.To me education is the most requirement of digital Bangladesh .In Bangladesh education rate is definitely low than other developed countries.Our government has taken different policies in order to provide light of education to every sphere of people in our society.

Councils and self-accountable politicians

    Political analysts,politically-oriented people.peace loving people,civil society members of Bangladesg have long been waiting for a peaceful and welfare society where the politics would be driven by the values and ethices and human right aiming at not only establishing a democratic state,rather establishing a welfare state.
    Nature of a society or any group or any party as a whole largely depends on the nature of smallest unit of the society or any group or any party,i.e.man in the case of society,member on case of the group and party workers in the case of the party,and on the nature of 'cementing materials' through which the society,group or the party get joined together .The more the 'cementing materials' would be perfect the more peaceful the society would be and the nature of the 'cementing materials'depends on the culture the people of the particular society or group practice.

    Though democracy is considered  as the beat from of government,political analysts,economists and social scientists have strongly criticised the efficiency of democracy.They base this on their premise of the irrational voter,Their argument is that voters are highly uninformed about many political issues on which they are fairly knowledgeable.

Democracy of families

     It sounds funny when someone says that is no Bangladesh without Hasina and there will be no Bangladesh without her familly.It is the extreme from of flattery.

     The struggle of the Bengali nation for Independence and democracy is not something new.Our Independence and our democracy is the result of a dynamic process and the same daynamic process will guide us in future also.When someone gives credit to some family,we should not forget the contribution,struggle and guidance the nation received from other great leaders like Hossain Shaheed Suhrawardy,Maulana Bhashani, Manik Miah and others.We struggled for pure democracy,not the type of democratic monarchy as some quarters are advocating.Hasina should come out of the illusion created by flatterers and should not try to become a burden on the nation.She should not also try to put the burden of her family members,who are all foreign nationals,on the nation's shoulder.I believe that will be in the best interest for her and the Awami League.

Conspirancy or disparity

       Imagine that you are a garment factory worker who makes living on a day to day basis.You live in a slum raising children who often get sick due to malnutrition and poor hygiene.You leave home,in the dark,before sunrise and come back,in the dark,after sunset.Sick or healthy,you work 15/16 hours a day and are not fairly paod.The prices of essentials have gone through the roof over the last few years,while your wage has stayed where it was four years ago.You and your children are eating less every day.You cannot afford a doctor anymore.

       You see more and more high -rise buildings and pricy cars,shining with all the glories  of their owners.The glares of summer sunlight reflecting from those shiny buildings,cars and shiny faces of their owners blind you.You are locked inside the factory from dawn-to-dusk because your employer does not trust you.When fire catches up in any such factories dozens like you are are burnt alive.You know you may be the next , You come home at night to find no electricity or water,Your night is a nightmare.

Wastage of public money

         In the past I noticed the great work your newspaper did in bringing to light some issues and problems.Due to that exposure several things have been fixed and researched .For example, wastage of public money by government officials for purchasing expensive foreign cars,etc.
         May be you can do the same for the huge wastage of resources when roads are purposefully built in Bangladesh during the monsoon season.

        I have heard from several sources that roads are purposefully built during the monsoon season so that they don't last long and so those contracting and government agencies can keep getting more money from the donor agencies or whatever sources.I have noticed that during the winter months there is no construction work on any rpads,at least in Dhaka . But as the rain starts fixing and building of roads,at least in Dhaka.But as the rain starts fixing and building of roads starts in full swing .I have also heard that the main ingredient that is used to keep roads strong and last are not used here in Bangladesh.These allegations need to be investigated.

Drop a drop

      I do not lament those who want everything refind in Bangladesh.Because that is how it has to be. Aim for the vast space and that will take you to the moon,the mars and beyond.It is all about your contribution to the social evolution.Drop a drop in the ocean and that will make the ocean bigger by a drop.I do not want to say that scale of police brutality in the poor countries is always scary and Bangladesh is any exception.I do not want to say either that I blame the police alone for these atrocities they commit because the culture in which they work and operate does not let them do anything better .We have to start from a point , any point,to reach the destination.You cannot give by saying that there are too many point to start from.I will never say that Bangladeshi politicians are mostly illiterate.Literacy does not come with certificates.It comes from your interaction with environments and four walls of formal education is just another sort of envitonments.Education is a lifelong process, a continuous process and that is why the term continuing education is catching up this centaury.If you take me for an example , I will say that I enrolled myself, Like many other,in the lifelong learing course,the lifelong learning process,It is not the literacy that our politicians lack,they lack self-confidence.

Fight of global recession

         Economic recessions take place from time to time under the modern economic concept.History shows that the United States suffered its first recession  back un the years between 1797 and 1800.It was called the panic of 1797 ; this is termed as the travel of European recession to the America dur to the deflating effects of the Bank of England which disrupted commercial real estate markets in the US.
         Recession is generally identified as the reduction of a country's GDP for at least two quarters. In another way, a 1.5 per cent rise in unemployment within 12 months is defined as a recessionary stage.

         The collapse of the dot -com bubbke,the September 11 th attacks, and accounting scandals creates a relatively mind recession in the US economy in early 2000s and it continues six months up to 2001 . After six years of bubble dot com, the US economy again faces recession in December 2007 and it becomes unbearable in September,2008. The collapse of the housing marker led to bank collapses in the US and Europe, causing the amount of available credit to be sharply curtailed, resulting in a massive  liquidity crises.The prevailing recession leads private consumption to fall for the first time in nearly 20 years.

Pakistan's cheating inCricket

           Good things happen when the soules express them Similarly,when cheating tendency is deep-rooted in a society-all forms of evil express on a constant basis.(As feared by many) after the long history of association with match-fixing, doping , murder probe (2007 World Cup), injury feigning, tantrum-throwing, ball - biting, ball altering, betting, pitch damaging, religious exhibition during games, regional infighting, organised crimes, corruptions and British police against visiting Pakistan Test cricket team in England. Secretly filmed footage exposed one British -Pakistani bookmaker Majeed--who has 'manage' Pakistani cricket players over two years-accepting $150,000 (Bangladeshi Taka 16 crore) from a undercover journalist for guaranteeing 'no balls'. The allegations are relarted to 'no ball' delivered by Mohammad Amir and Mohammed Asif. ICC (International Cricket Council) and Scotland Yard are now investing the matter.No players or team officials have been arrested yet.

Make Electricity available

    Electeic power supply,after food and potable water is the critical need , vital for the country in all spheres of activity in industry,trade and national development.Irrigation, a vital need for food production, is critically linked to it and cannot be ignored by the government in any way.It should be on the top of development agenda.There can be no two opinions about the fact that,gross national product in all sectors will go down.

    We cannot afford to sit over the matter of generating more electric power any longer.Even if we have to take short cuts,and necessarily go for direct negotiation with any power plant makers and suppliers;in spite and despite all useless screams from the opposition politicians.

Mainstream America is not Islamophobic

         From the moment New York City's Landmarks Commission ruled that a building can be torn to clear the way to build a Muslim cultural centre and a mosque in lower Manhattan-everyone has some say about it.Two most used words in context to this ongoing debate are"Bigots"and 'Islamophobia. These are mpt the words of the common masses.Most Americans do not like bickering about religion.I taught in three different Parochial schools in Washington DC to know enough about how educated Americans of all religius  background feel.They want people to live in peace side by side,irrespective of their religion.It is those people who use offensive words to describe another religion-are nothing but ihnorant.Media also plays a pivotal part as to how those views are publicised .American media is often anti-Islam.It is also the failure of each leadership in American politics who failed to practice religious tolerance.Let this debate about the mosque that is yet to go up in New York-be a learning lesson.I pray that Imam Faisal Abdul Rauf and his wife Daisy Khan can carry out their plan of building that mosque in lower Manhattan.As a Sufi Muslim Rauf can teach America about tolerance-not violence.

India's economy outpacing the world

         I am writing with reference to Op-ED: 'Farce and facts for Obama,' by Saeed Naqvi, distinguished fellow of the Observer Research Foundation
         In his analysis,Saeed Naqvi misses one fact that stands out prominently today: India's economy is outpacing the world.India's economy grew at the fastest pace in two and half years.making it  the second fastest growing economy in the world.Gross domestic product rose 8.8 per cent in the second quarter of this year.This is happening at a time of the global recession and even the chinere economy needed a massive stimulus to keep it going .In contrast ,the Indian continues to grow without any massive stimulus because unlike China,which is cependent on exports,Indea's growth is centred on the domestic consumption.

The wheel of fortune

          It is the late 1990s and a phenomenon known as the 'internet' has been touted to reshape the way man operates and lead to ever-increasing productivity. The IT bubble is rapidly expanding in the United State; companies possessing a dot.com suffix floating on the stock market by the minute and share prices doubling and tiipling within hours of floatation.Making a quick off the stock market has never been easier.
          Somewhere in the background , Alan Greenspan the Chairman of the Federal Reserve of the United State,the Central Bank of  America murmurs against 'irrational exuberance' from investors.Then Long Term Capital Management (a US hedge fund) suffers losses of $4.6 billion in less than four mounths, the now famous Enron fraud reverberates through the system and numerous companies file for bankruptcy,haveing burnt through all their venture capital,never having made a profit in their short stint as they had no credidle business plan.

          That shameful episode resulted in $8 trillion of wealth being completely wiped out and the fortunes of millions of investors,big and small ending in tatters.A lesson learned the hard way that if assets,particulerly within the   artificial economy surpass their value ( in accordance with economic fundamentals) and overexposure to the capital market in a state of euphoria brought about almost entirely by speculation becomes the norm,the bursting of the bubble is quick and quite painful.

Kashmir is too protracted, too gory a story

         There is a story mainly pulled off by the Indian media establishment that their army and central reserve police force protect Kashmiris.But a few of the Kashmiris,as it is known by now,feel protected by them.People in India call them security forces and belive they save Kashmiris from terrorists but it is from them that Khahmiris want to be saved, as the stories come out nowadays . Kashmiris want these forces off their land. The only feelings Kashmiris have for them are of fear,hatrad and revenge.In the past two months or so, 64'boys' died ; latest, a 13-year old boy died in a hospital after he was brutally beaten up by the security forces in Kashmir . Most of them have a been youth who were either throwing stones or playing in their neighbourhoods. It is learnt that thousands of them went defying curfew to attend the funeral of a 17-year old 12th grader whose death begun the current spell of  youth protest in Kashmir. The boy was learnt to be thrown in a pond after killing, as two other boys saw that happening,but official story described he drowned.

GOLDA FARMING AT STAKE

         Hundreds of millions of foreign currency will be lost due to the infiltration of Indian so-called prawn fry:known as guest PL(post Larvae ). Everyday,a few million smuggled Indian PL are being sold to the golda farmers in Bagerhat,Shatkhira and Khulna region in the name of matural PL supposedly caught in the coastal rivers of Bangladesh.In reality, there is very little catch of golda fry from the rivers this year for number reasons.

          These smuggled PLs brought in the night from Shatkhira border, nursed for one day in the so-called 'Matir hatcheries',100s of which can be seen in the adjacent highway from Shatkhira town towards Kaligonj are later put  in the open pot and bucket and bucket and taken to the nearby markets to be sold to the farmers as river PL or natural PL.

ABOLISH FATWA

             A so - called parellel jurisprudence by the name of Fatwa is unique in Islam.It's not essential if a country is governed by the modern laws or not but an illiterate mullah can challenge the sovereign laws by proclaiming a religious edict which is popularly known as Fatwa and there is no law to prosecute that mullah.This practice not only violates the established norms of law but it creates an uncivilised precedence practiced in the middle ages. Governments in the Muslim nations are afraid to take corrective actions against the practice of Gatwa out of fear based on ignorance and illiteracy.It's a shame that a modern government succumbs to such deliberate efforts by the Islamic fundamentalists which undermines the authority of the gocernment with impunity .In the modern times,this practice of Fatwa is an attempt to impose a  system on the society based on medieval considerations.If the aim of law is to eliminate crimes this cant be done by beheading or cutting limbs and hands.This requires universal education,even handed social justice and equal distribution of wealth.

SMART GRID

           This is in reference to a report which is of interest for power sector in Bangladesh.It should provoke the planners in power sector(particularly the power ministry).
            But will they even go through it and try to understand its impact;possibly not ,as they are too busy pulling and pushing files and filling note sheets! The prospect of interconnecting renewable power source with the distribution grid,and its automated two way interaction provides the key to tap on to alternative energy sources. We should keep up with Smart Grid development and applications being done to increase power availability as a very relevant near future propect.

            Smart Grid operation is closely interlinked to high speed internet monitoring and operation.It can tap on to consumer's power sources in parallel with the transmission and distribution networks based on regional power shortage or surplus.