The story of Dukhimon Begum is not an isolated case. There are countless Dukhimons living in the nooks and corners of the country -- they are perhaps the single majority of our citizens. According to knowledgeable observers, their numbers are increasing everyday.

Last year, on invitation of a non-government organization, I, along with Professors Muzaffer Ahmed of Dhaka University and Mohammad Masum of Jahangirnagr University, went to a village in Jamalpur. We spent a few hours with a group of women there. During our conversation we found that none of the women get to eat more than two meals a day. They normally cook rice in the afternoon and eat with chilli peppers or cooked leaves and vines. If there are any leftovers, they eat those next morning -- otherwise they starve. One of them said with much pain that she had to marry off her adolescent daughter to a blind because she could not afford to feed or protect the girl.

Dukhimon Begum and the women of Jamalpur are citizens of Bangladesh, owners of this country. The liberation struggle of 1971 was for them -- to free them from the exploitation of the Pakistanis, especially the 22 families of Pakistan. Millions willingly gave lives in that struggle. After independence, the politicians gave countless promises, and are still doing so, to improve their conditions. The policymakers also, to this end, formulated many plans based on the trickle down principles. They accepted many prescriptions of the donors. Alas, the conditions of Dhukhimon Begums have not improved much over the years! In some cases, their conditions manifestly worsened.

Unfortunately the intolerable misery and the abject poverty of the Dukhimon Begums have been sold by many and in countless ways since independence. In the last 32 years, hundreds of thousands of crores of taka have been brought from abroad to this country by the government and non-government organisations as loans and grants. Regrettably, much of these huge sums of money were looted by a few thousand individuals and they have become unbelievably rich over a very short span of time. The Dukhimons, unfortunately, did not even get the crumbs of the resources that were brought from the donors to alleviate their poverty. As a result, most of the "leaders" of our "poor" country have become millionaires many times over. Same is true for unscrupulous businessmen and many leaders of governmental and non-governmental organisations. Their misdeeds earned Bangladesh the dubious distinction of being the most corrupt country in the world and brought shame for the entire nation. Many of these individuals have also been showing off their riches in the most naked and obscene manner.

The evidence of mounting disparity of income and opportunities between the rich and the poor can be found in government statistics. According to Bangladesh Economic Report, 2003, the share of national income of the richest 5 per cent families of our country increased from 23.62 per cent in 1995-96 to 30.66 per cent in 2000. That is, during this short span of five years, the share of the national income of the richest 5 per cent families increased by nearly 30 per cent. During the same period, the share of the remaining 95 per cent families obviously declined from 76.38 per cent to 69.34 per cent. What is most startling is that the share of the income of the poorest 5 per cent Bangladeshi families declined from 0.88 per cent in 1995-96 to 0.67 per cent in 2000. In other words, during this five year period, their share of national income declined by nearly 24 per cent. With the growing disparity of income like this, the social stability of our nation could be under serious threat. Shame on the donors who are still continuing to impose the trickle down policy -- a policy which is primarily responsible this naked deprivation of the common people!

There is nothing wrong in becoming rich by earning money with honest means. But many of the rich in our country have amassed huge wealth through illegal and immoral means. Some cheated through under and over invoicing in their export-import transactions.

Some indulged in smuggling. Some grabbed public property by flexing muscles. Some illegally "bought" official patronage. Some took bribes or otherwise engaged in corruption. Still others "looted" banks. Some did all of the above. Consequently, nearly Tk. 60,000 crore of black money and about Tk. 25,000 of defaulted loans exist in our county. Few have courage to say anything against these bandits and defaulters. For they are now the most respected persons of our society and the Dukhimon Begums are on the receiving end of their "generosity." Unfortunately many of these people have been our "leaders" and policymakers in recent years.

Another reason for the growing disparity between the rich and poor in Bangladesh is the widespread system of graft and payoffs that prevail in our society. For example, the prices of essential services such as water, electricity and gas are required to be occasionally raised because of the prevailing incompetence, mismanagement and corruption of the relevant functionaries. Such increases unfortunately cause transfers of resources, in a legal manner, from the service recipients to the corrupt officials. In addition, less privileged persons have to pay twice for these services once as their official prices and the second time to cater to the illegal demands of the corrupt employees. Thus, the slum dwellers like Dukhimon Begum pay higher rates for electricity than the residents of posh neighbourhoods of Gulshan and Baridhara.

There is now an almost unanimous demand to establish good governance by eradicating corruption and hooliganism from the country. However, people rarely raise serious questions about economic governance, which is a major problem. In our country, many of the economic decisions are made in order to provide patronage to the vested interests. Many projects are unnecessary and are undertaken in the interests of the powerbrokers -- not for the wellbeing of the Dukhimons. Thus establishing transparency and accountability in the budget making in our country is a serious issue at this time. Our Honourable Finance Minister himself recently spoke strongly on this issue in his meeting with the Secretaries.

What is most disheartening is that the greed and needs of our rich seem insatiable. We can see the evidence of it from the recent decisions to raise the salaries and benefits of our Ministers and Members of Parliament. Many of our policymakers are rich -- owners of crores of taka. They also get many governmental benefits. Nevertheless, they voted, by one estimate, Tk. 150 crore worth of benefits for themselves in the last budget session of the Parliament, while the Dukhimon Begums are trying to kill themselves to free themselves off the intolerable pains of poverty. This cruel situation reminds us of the two famous lines of Rabindranath Tagore's Dui Bigha Jomi: "... Alas! In this world those who have much, they want still more..."

The goal of politics should be to serve the people. However, in our country it has, especially in the past decade, become the best means of serving naked self interest. The mainstream politics is now focused primarily on enriching those who are involved in it, rather than the wellbeing of the Dukhimons. It has unfortunately degenerated into a "business" people are using governmental authority to earn personal gains. Democracy has come to be mostly an election-centred exercise to promote the interests of the elected officials. However, democracy is not all about elections, it is primarily about what happens in between elections. Thus, if this trend of self-serving politics continues, our democracy is in danger of turning into a "leaseocracy." Even the donors, who have indirectly aided the process of criminalising our politics, are now sounding alarms The head of The World Bank Mission in Bangladesh, Mr. Frederick D. Temple, spoke last July, before his departure, of the need for "deep reforms" in our election process.

Shameful as it may seem, we have managed to create "two Bangladeshs" in the last 32 years one for a limited number of the rich and the powerful, and the other for the Dukhimon Begums. Even though they are the vast majority, Dukhimons are in weaker and relatively helpless situation. They have the right to vote, but no representation in the policymaking. There are also few champions of their causes -- it appears that the number of idealists in our society are declining. Thus, the question that haunts many of us now: what will happen to the Dukhimon Begums? Will they in the future get their due share of our national resources? Will they get a significant proportion of the $2 billion expected from the Brettenwoods institutions as a result of our preparation of the Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP)? Will the youths of today come forward to ensure that the Dukhimons are treated fairly by the society? Will they thereby play their due role to remove the shame of having "two Bangladeshs" exist side by side in the same land, under the same flag?

Badiul Alam Majumdar is Country Director, The Hunger Project-Bangladesh.