Re: [ALOCHONA] Re: "Change" is the most powerful word in the world

Dear Mr. Sazzadur Rahman,

 

I do appreciate your comments and I am fully agreed with whatever you have said.  The biggest problem among Bangladeshi or Bangladeshi origin people is most of them can not think outside the box and blinded by the party mantra.  Even someone tries to bring new things to the table,  they become busy to pull legs to bring down his/her good work or intention for Bangladesh.

 

One of my fellow Bangladesh told that I may have copied the word "CHANGE" from Obama.  I have replied him that I am supporting an organization named "Change Bangladesh Organization, USA" (www,changebangladesh.org) since 2006.  I do not think Obama talked about CHANGE in 2006 or invented word CHANGE, at least I do not recall. 

 

People did not pay attention my word CHANGE in 2006 since they did not give importance to it.  Now when Obama starts talking, now it becomes a powerful word in the world.  So, what I am trying to say is that there is nothing to take credit, but our fellow Bangladeshi or Bangladeshi origin never appreciate fellow Bangladeshi because of fear of losing their superiority over others.  My suggestion to them is give respect and credit where it belongs to even it is to your enemy.

 

I also believe that if you do not talk about CHANGE, CHANGE will not come from out of the blue to me or Bangladesh.  Even it may have little benefit now, but we should not discourage others to talk about CHANGE even in Bangladesh complexity and situation.

 

I also believe that there will be people always who will oppose my view and assertion but I should not stop until real change comes to Bangladesh.  How much CHANGE I can bring that's another part of the question but just talking and pushing for CHANGE does not hurt anyone of us.

 

I believe that people in Bangladesh can think outside of the box if real prescription is given.

 

God helps 150 million people in Bangladesh.

 

--M. M. Chowdhury (Mithu)

Shamim Chowdhury <veirsmill@yahoo.com> wrote:

Change is probably one of the most popular and powerful word since the creation of our universe. From nature to life everything changed or more correct word evolved for million years. The word change did not derived from change Bangladesh good book for the first time in human history. So no one should self impose undue tribute for him/herself for mere self satisfaction which can be explained in pure bangle phrase " BOGOL BAJANO".

Everyone I or you know wants change in their econo, socio or political life. Beggar wants to change his/her life to be a reach, reach wants to be more reach. Politicians want to be prime minister, businessmen want to be politician, and politician wants to be businessman and so on and so on.. NODIR  APARATA CHAIRA  NISHSHASH  KOHA  OPARETA  JOTO SHUK  AMAR  BISHASH.

Change is good but not always especially if you consider who is making the change as the most important factor. Who is leading the change is the essence of whether changes will benefit or will have a detrimental effect. Input dictates the output can be the common barometer to analyze the change.

Intention helps to design the change but alone that is not enough, whose intent on what purpose dictates the outcome again. With all those word crafting only one thing I wanted to establish, it is the person or persons which really matters when talking change.

Example, devil (Shoitan) wants change; he wants to change all your good deeds into bad deeds. He wants you to change the righteous path you follow to a path of sin. He wants to change your guts of standing against the oppression to flow with oppression. He wants to change your resilience against injustice to defeatism. He uses good words and tactically crafted moral to influence you to accept his wrong way as the best way. This is more visible with all military/civil dictators and their cronies who craft their logic with sweetness to deceive their people. These conmen's only work is misleading people with the word CHANGE for their own benefit.

Change is essential and at the same time inescapable. We have to follow the people who do not do dance with the word change. Who does not use the word CHANGE as chocolate wrapper to sell their dirty sweet inside for their self benefit? Most likely people who make change for the good are those who do good work without chanting the word CHANGE-CHANGE in every step of their life. It's not the slogan CHANGE makes the real change, it's the work which makes or breaks change. Change happened in the past and will happen in future for good or bad whether you like it or not, war is on to control the change by evil as well as angel.

Thanks

Shamim Chowdhury
--- In alochona@yahoogroups.com, "M. M. Chowdhury \(Mithu\)" <cgmpservices@...> wrote:
>
> Either it is "Change Bangladesh", change in people attitude, change from the cycle of corruption, change in political leaders, change from arrogance, change to coexist in Bangladesh, or change from party blindness to country blindness, every household in Bangladesh should adopt the word "Change" and start work on change for their better future.
>
> I am not talking about change from democracy to military Govt. I am talking about political, social and development change in Bangladesh. I have been talking about "Change" for long time and that's why I have supported the initiatives of "Change Bangladesh Organization, USA".
>
>
>
> --M. M. Chowdhury (Mithu)
> www.changebangladesh.org
>

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[ALOCHONA] Review: Book on Hindu Nationalism

        All religious fundamentalisms exhibit certain common traits. Mindful of those commonalities, of which the Chicago University's Fundamentalist Project had done a monumental work in the late 1990's under the tutelage of Professors Martin Marty and Scott Appleby, it is useful to know  local characteristics and practices of a particular kind of religious fanaticism. 
         This book seems like a good study. I like its premise of its attempted stance of being away from the media frenzy and emotionality.  I think I once attended a presentation by Subh Mathur at Columbia University while she was still a Graduate Student on poor Muslims being targeted in Rajasthan. I had admired her thoroughness.
           Just one quiick point of contrast between the Hindu fundamentalists and their Muslim counterparts: The primary target of everyday violence of Jehadi Islamists is the fellow Muslims of other sects. Look what is happening in Iraq! The wanton attacks on the Shias in Pakistan! Or the Genocide 1971 of Bangladesh!
                   
             Farida Majid
=========================================        
 
THE EVERYDAY LIFE OF HINDU NATIONALISM:
An Ethnographic Account

by Shubh Mathur

About the book:
This is an ethnographic account of the rise of
Hindu nationalism in the north Indian state of
Rajasthan during the period 1990-94. It looks at
the transformation of cultural meanings in
everyday life that make possible the political
success and the anti-minority violence of the
Hindu right. Media and academic accounts of the
Hindu right that present images of religious
frenzy and fanaticism are misleading because they
draw attention away from the world of the
everyday and the ordinary, from the homes,
workplaces, schools and communities where the
realities of Hindu nationalism are created and
maintained. This book takes seriously the claims
of RSS activists that theirs is a cultural
organization, and that its main task is
'character-building', in order to answer the
central question: How does one comprehend the
selves that are capable of the extraordinary
violence witnessed in India at the turn of the
millennium?

The patterns of anti-minority violence that
accompanies the rise of Hindu nationalism show
that it follows not a political or economic
logic, but a cultural one. The geographic and
demographic distribution of violence maps and
confirms cultural beliefs about the nation and
its enemies. Finally, this book argues that media
and academic discourses on Hindu nationalism
function to produce what has been called
'cultural anesthesia', diffusing and deflecting
questions about agency and accountability while
silencing the experience of the victims and
excluding the cultural idioms which provide them
means of comprehension and healing.

From the blurb:
Shubh Mathur's account of the resistible rise of
Hindu chauvinism in the north Indian state of
Rajasthan is at once a remarkable piece of
contemporary scholarship and a great human
document.
"This is a searingly honest piece of writing,
with an unashamedly partisan position, but
without compromising the demands of theoretical
rigor and empirical depth. Shubh Mathur's book
provides a fine-grained account of the tortured
response of India's Muslims to the emerging
shifts in a social order that has begun to view
them with increasing weariness, impatience and a
hectoring command to 'assimilate'."
Raza Mir

"It is an error to read fascism as an
abnormality; one should, in fact, seek the links
between fascism and 'normality'. Shubh Mathur's
work brilliantly shows how 'the cultural logic
and institutional power of Hindutva have become
deeply entrenched in everyday life itself'."
Sadanand Menon

About the author:
Shubh Mathur is an anthropologist whose work
focuses on minorities, violence, human rights,
gender and immigration. She received her
doctorate from the New School for Social
Research, New York. She is at
present Visiting Assistant Professor of
Anthropology at Franklin Pierce University.

1. Introduction: The Everyday Life of Hindu Nationalism
Two stories
Culture and violence: In the light of Gujarat
The ordering of difference
Writing an ethnography of fascism
Hindutva as symbolic capital

2. Mapping the Enemy
"The significant past"
Culture and difference in the nineteenth century
Conquest and conversion
Tolerance, Hindu and Muslim
"Muslim separatism"

3. Administrative and Discursive Hindus
A brief history of Hindu nationalism
Street-fighters and patriots
"A well-disciplined counter-revolutionary elite"
"National thrust to ancient customs"

4. Communities and Power
The scream of Reich
Banswara
Beawar
Seva Bharati: "Giving culture" to the urban poor
Mohalla Khatikan
RSS women
Postscript from Gujarat

5. Violence as Ritual
Stories
Suspect community
The judicial inquiry
Invisible violence
The other point of view

Includes appendices and bibliography

xvi, 224 pages Demy 5.5 x 8.5 in.

ISBN Hardcover 81-88789-43-7 Rs575.00
ISBN Paperback 81-88789-53-4 Rs275.00

---

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[ALOCHONA] Fwd: Petition for remove the image of our prophet Mohammad SAS published in Wikipedia

--- In khabor@yahoogroups.com, "Khairul Asad" <khairulpct@...> wrote:

*WIKIPEDIA site has published the fake image of our **prophet
Mohammad** SAS.
Please sign the petition below to have it removed. We need 10,000
signatures to get fake pictures of Prophet be removed
from WIKIPEDIA.Also please forward the link to all.
---------- *
*FOR THE REMOVAL PETITION TO BE SIGNED; PLEASE LOG ON; **
http://www.thepetitionsite.com/ 2/removal- of-the-pics- of-muhammad-
from-wikipedia

--- End forwarded message ---

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[ALOCHONA] Will There Be Elections in Bangladesh This Year?

Will There Be Elections in Bangladesh This Year?

FARID BAKHT

The caretaker government claims it will hold elections before end
2008. However, the generals and their advisers will be worried about
the outcome. All has not gone according to plan in the removal of
Sheikh Hasina and Khaleda Zia from the domestic political scene and
the management of the economy has been dismal.

THIRTY MILLION mobile phone subscribers in Bangladesh recently
received a text message from chief adviser Fakhruddin Ahmed with the
message, "Let us build a terrorist- and corruption-free country".
The caretaker government celebrated its first year in power on
January 11. If we are to take the government at its word, it will
oversee elections by December this year and then gracefully leave
the scene early in 2009. At this juncture, very few people feel
certain that this will turn out to be the case.

This is in contrast with the views of some western diplomats. After
a meeting with the foreign affairs adviser, the US charge d'affaires
recently said: "I am hopeful, I am confident and I am certain that
elections will be held by the end of 2008". The British equivalent
chimed in with similar comments. With growing disquiet over the
number of arbitrary arrests, allegations of torture and restrictions
on the media, the regime takes comfort from the unwavering support
of its "development partners".

After the generals installed ex-World Bank official, Fakhruddin
Ahmed, it became clear that they had a far wider agenda than merely
preparing the country for elections. They followed a twin-track
strategy: (i) emasculation of the main political parties; (ii)
support for the creation of a new political party.

The new political party was to be allowed to grow into a national
political force, offering a clean alternative to the discredited
Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and Awami League. In "free and
fair" elections, this new force would form a democratic government,
allowing the army to step away from the spotlight, while providing
the steel to ward off any challenge from armed political activists.

Fresh on the heels of winning the Nobel Prize, Muhammad Yunus, of
micro-banking fame, launched a new party, Nagorik Shakti, or
Citizens' Power. This group was allowed considerable freedom of
manoeuvre at a time when the other parties were banned from
political activities under the state of emergency. The main
political parties were on the defensive as its leaders were placed
under arrest, thus clearing the space for the emergence of a new
party. The new party failed miserably as the people refused to take
it seriously, despite adulatory media coverage and obvious western
support. Ever since, the army has been scrambling for other options.

After much hesitation, the government, of dubious constitutional
legitimacy, produced a "road map" to elections. Normally, a
caretaker government supervises the election over a period of 90
days. The current one felt it needed 18 months to clean up the voter
rolls and ensure that elections are held properly. With such a long
time scale, the regime backed itself into a corner as it had to
manage the country within this period.

Low Scores for Year One
Under the caretaker government, food prices have gone through the
roof. The statistics of the Trading Corporation of Bangladesh show
that prices for the majority of essential food items (rice, flour,
milk, cooking oil, sugar, lentil, red chillies, onions and potato)
have risen by anywhere between 26 per cent and 70 per cent under the
current regime. A common variety of coarse rice which costs less
than 9 takas (Tk) a kg a year ago is now selling for Tk 31 in the
capital. Flour has climbed from Tk 26 to Tk 41.

The garment industry continues to remain in turmoil. In January,
over a 100 workers were injured in clashes with police in Mirpur, in
Dhaka and several factories had to shut down temporarily. The
government blames this on a conspiracy. The investigating officer
told journalists: "we are trying to unearth the mystery behind the
sudden workers' unrest". The workers think there is no mystery. They
cannot survive on low wages in the face of spiraling prices.

Foreign investment has plummeted by over 80 per cent. No decisions
have been made regarding the proposals by the Tatas and Global Coal
Management (formerly Asia Energy). In total, proposals worth $ 10
billion are awaiting decisions. With prominent businessmen on the
run and a wait and see attitude among entrepreneurs, domestic
investment declined by 36 per cent in the first half of 2007. No new
power plants were brought on stream and the country embarrassingly
suffered two complete blackouts.

A clash between students and an army unit in Dhaka University
escalated into a national student revolt. Over 80,000 arrests were
made. As a consequence, Dhaka and Rajshahi university professors are
in jail. Students and lecturers are wearing black armbands, eerily
reminiscent of protests in 1970 against the Pakistani military.

For non-performance, three out of the 10 advisers were forced to
quit office in January, including the reviled Moinul Hossain (media
tycoon and erstwhile law adviser). The regime has surprised even its
enemies with its inability to steer the ship to calmer waters. The
unspoken contract was for better and more efficient government at
the expense of political rights, at least in the short run. That has
clearly not been the case.

What Is in Store in Year Two?
Much depends on the trials of Sheikh Hasina and Khaleda Zia. One
option is for a revival of the "minus two" formula where the two
leaders are encouraged to leave the country for exile, rather than
serve a jail term. Having failed in 2007, the chances are low this
year too. Both know that leaving the country would affect their
political fortunes and they also cannot trust their lieutenants.
Already, the BNP has split. One faction led by the ex-finance
minister, Saifur Rahman, is colluding with the regime.

By comparison, the Awami League is maintaining cohesion and
demanding early elections, which they threaten to boycott unless
Hasina is freed. While in court to face corruption charges, Hasina
made a defiant statement: "The Awami League must gear up for early
national polls as there is no alternative to elections to save the
country from dictatorship… It is time (that) the Awami League
launched a movement".

The generals still seem to want to divide and rule, or at least
ultimately call the shots from behind. Officially, the soldiers are
denying any such agenda. In a television interview earlier this
month, the army chief Moeen U Ahmed said that he had no "wish" to be
the country's president. "In this age, the world does not welcome
martial law… It is even possible to hold the voting well ahead of
December". The fact that he is regularly asked about his intentions
suggest that the public is not convinced.

The options boil down to four:
(i) Hold elections this winter: With a split BNP, and no sign of
either faction resurrecting the alliance with a so-far unscathed
Jamaat, the likelihood would be for an Awami League victory. Many
would then say: back to square one. Tagged to that would be a
reconfiguration of a broadly Islamic opposition, with all that
entails.

(ii) Form a national unity government: To sustain credibility, this
would necessitate the inclusion of the Awami League and BNP. While a
grand alliance may work in Germany, it is difficult to see how such
a group of bickering politicians could run the economy and provide
stability. This might work (for a time) if Khaleda Zia and Sheikh
Hasina were ejected, and the army were to hold the ring. Without the
participation of the two parties, no one would buy the concept and
it would become a broader version of the present interim
administration.

(iii) Fakhruddin Ahmed keeps the show rolling: Barring an incredible
turnaround in fortunes and performance, the chances of this
happening are almost zero. The public would expect an election to be
called or another form of administration. The status quo is unstable
and would fly in the face of all the commitments made.

(iv) Full military take-over: The military could only resort to this
if all else failed, and they are afraid of repercussions and witch-
hunts. Or there is some sort of enduring threat, such as an armed
insurrection. This could be on the lines of the Islamic (JMB)
bombing campaign of 2005-06. There is no sign of this for now, with
the leaders executed, the remnants have not regrouped. Media reports
occasionally indicate arrests and capture of bomb equipment. A
complete military coup is still unlikely and probably not the
preferred option.

The generals will be crossing their fingers and hoping that the
country will be lucky and avoid more natural disasters. They will
also hope that food prices decline. They are banking on a bumper
boro (winter) crop, to make up for the shortfall in the aman crop.
The chief adviser has directed that the Power Development Board
supply electricity for 250,000 electric pumps and diesel for 1.1
million diesel pumps, even at the expense of urban consumers. He,
along with the generals, finally realise that agriculture holds the
key.

Furthermore, they will have to secure business support, which means
back-peddling on the corruption drive against entrepreneurs.
Similarly, they will have to release the academics, to placate the
restive students.

Lessons from Thailand

The Bangkok cycle of military intervention is ahead of Dhaka's. In
the parlance of Bangladeshi politics, the Thai junta followed
a "minus one" policy – getting rid of Thaksin Shinawatra, when he
was prime minister. They have recently had an election, with the
result that Thaksin's party is on its way back to power. The
generals cannot be overjoyed with the outcome.

This will be going through the minds of the Bengali generals. So far
the "minus two" policy has not even got off the ground. The generals
have also gone further than the Thai junta in their hot pursuit of
politicians and businessmen. If elections are held this winter in
Bangladesh, who is to say which set of vengeful politicians will be
back at the helm?

http://www.epw.org.in/uploads/articles/11467.pdf

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