Editor's Pick

Holding up development

10 October 2006, 18:00 PM
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Moin Eusof, On e-mail
What has the world gained in the last 35 years? It gained more knowledge about space, wireless communications, life saving technologies, life-easing technologies; in short, more knowledge about science and technology! It's just sad that our country could never contribute to that matter anyhow. Some people may say that "this official" at the NASA is a Bangladeshi, I would say there is nothing to be proud of, since that man is not working for our country anyway, and being a Bangladeshi or American does not make a difference at all. The problem lies within our nation, a nation ill governed by smart politicians who work for their own benefits. What our politicians could never understand or are avoiding is the fact that the foundation of a healthy and wealthy nation is education. Of course, the title smart was not meant to be humorous, but comes from the fact that they are actually able to make a fool out of more than 150 million people of our country.

In the last two decades, more than 50 private universities grew up like mushrooms in different parts of the capital. More surprisingly, each and every one of them was accredited.

It is somehow difficult to understand the concept of a university under a small roof, without any kind of extra curricular activities, and lacking qualified faculties. Universities offering education in the field of science and technology do not even have proper laboratory facilities to train the students practically for future references. Yet, we "MUST" understand that private universities in Bangladesh are non-profit organisations. However, state owned universities had fairly displayed their potential by providing proper facilities, but still are a dream for many students for their highly competitive admission policies. We have to understand that more than 90 percent of the population cannot afford private education. I am not trying to say that the universities should not take in students in accordance with their results, but not every student can be good in maths, and that does not mean he does not or cannot study science.

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The government should run colleges under the universities' supervision with a ranking system, with high to low-level competitiveness to ensure education for everyone. Preparatory courses under their supervision can provide a second chance for millions. Moreover, the government should not encourage private universities to build up facilities for their students, but order them to do so. Primary education in Bangladesh is very cheap and almost everyone can afford it, still we see children roaming around on the streets begging or trying to sell flowers or candies during school time. However, it's only because we have never put the law of "compulsory primary education" to practice.

We call our country "The most beautiful green place on earth", but did we ever encourage the world to come and see the beauty we own? For many years we have been fighting domestic terrorism, which is probably not at all significant when compared to corruption within the government. There is no thin line between the two problems, the line is perhaps really wide and corruption cannot be easily dealt with but terrorism can be.

The day the nation will actually start to see some development is the day when we will choose right leaders for our country.
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