So get ready. Here comes an aged politician who had his son elected from one of his own constituencies. The son then allegedly committed many crimes under his watch and is said to have made questionable money. The politician has vowed not to run for public office again and recently renounced dynastic politics. Call it what you may, but it is a joke to me.

Wait till you meet others, those who served as ministers, mayors and minions. Lately they have started to speak up like speech-delayed children bursting with eloquence. They are criticizing the party, pointing fingers at leadership, asking for reforms and a whole shebang of other changes to change everything. They want to make the best of both worlds. Once they hunted with the hunter. Now they are running with the rabbit.

Those were good old days when people died for what they believed. Copernicus said that the world revolved around the sun because he was convinced it was the truth. Martin Luther, a Franciscan friar, nailed his 95 thesis to the door of Schlosskirche church, because he believed that the truth was revealed to him.

Truth has come in many ways in many waves. There was a time when kings were believed to be the vicars of God. There was a time when gladiators fought and died in Roman amphitheaters as spectator sport. There was a time when human beings were bought and sold as slaves.

And don't forget that it was not easy. Copernicus escaped persecution only by death, while Giordano Bruno was burned alive as a monster of impiety and Galileo was imprisoned and humiliated. Countless men and women have died for freedom; many have died for ideology and others for idealism. There was a time in the world when life was dispensable for the sake of dignity.

I know one would stumble here. After all what has truth got to do with dignity? Tell a lie so long as it can fly. Adolph Hitler said the Aryans were the superior race. The blacks were discriminated by the whites. In medieval Russia, human beings were treated as chattel, sold and exchanged for cattle.

Till today in India, the untouchables are struggling to find respect. Women have been exploited, children abused, poor oppressed, all of which happened because the powerful people took possession of truth and used it in favor of them.

Well that is one thing, which hasn't changed. George Bush claimed that Saddam had the weapons of mass destruction. For a while he had the truth at his disposal and he winged it as he wished. All lies, deceptions, betrayals, crimes and coercions are rooted in the eclipse of truth. Prometheus understood it and that is why he had stolen fire from Zeus to give it to men. Not without a price though. Chained on top of the Caucasus, an eagle came to eat his liver every day.

It proves the point. Man has always tried to hide truth, and mind it this is how he has ruled others. He has ruled not with might but by keeping them in the dark and used his might to snatch the light. Now you should be able to see the connection. Truth is dignity and dignity is truth, because when one is deprived, other is diminished.

This is where we need to figure it out. Those glib tongues who are itching to tell the truth, those who are showing courage to speak up, those who are asking for reforms in the party and want to abolish dynastic rule, why are they doing it now? Where were they wearing their conscience when many of them were seen walking behind their young leader like apes in an evolution line?

If they are trying to speak the truth, I am sure they have their reasons. And if anybody has been asking or forcing them to do so, they also have their reasons. But in the end this truth is likely to serve the purpose of those who are going to create apparent truth and hide the real one. Once that truth is created, another powerful group will take it and use it in their favor. In the end, a new ruling class is going to be born.

The irony of it is that while the label will change, the bottle will not. Those who once buttered one side of the bread will butter the other side of it. May be this is how they hope to avoid persecution and seek protection for their ill-gotten wealth.

May be some of them are even harboring secret political ambitions that they would return to power riding on its waves. See, we are back to square one! Nothing happens unless first there is a consideration of reward or safety.

This is precisely why we should beware of the turncoats unless we are convinced that they really want to regret what they renounce. How? They have to come forward and make confessions. They have to do self-criticism. And above all, they have to refund if they have made any money they were in public office.

There was a time in the world when we were not careful, and the turncoats of 1971 divided this nation. Now here is a time when we are faced with it again. If we play politics to cleanse politics, it will be dirty again. This is the time to do it right. Connect truth with dignity, unless we want our politics to produce self-seeking snitches for another thirty-six years.

Mohammad Badrul Ahsan is a banker.