What we have learned from history is that colonial masters used to malign local politicians on a regular basis. What colonials learned following the 1857 mutiny was that natives were incapable of taking over power using military force alone. However, a looming threat was rising in the horizon. Natives were getting organised under political parties like the Congress Party and were increasingly demanding autonomy. For the colonial masters, the only way to fight it back was prove that those natives were unworthy of self-rule. This, though not successful ultimately, may have lingered colonial rule and ensured drainage of resources for a longer period. Colonial masters definitely benefited from the malicious campaign against the native leaders.

As this was true of the British colonial era, things were the same during the Pakistani rule. Sher-e-Bangla had to declare the intention of retiring from politics under duress . HS Suhrawardy, was disqualified from politics by Ayub Shahi and sent to exile. Sheikh Mujibur Rahman faced the Agartala Conspiracy Case along with many other charges, including corruption.

Unfortunately, following the birth of independent and the sovereign state of Bangladesh the smear-campaign continued like many colonial era legacies. This time the beneficiaries changed, the civil-military bureaucracy, created by the colonial masters to facilitate their rule, got the larger share of the pie. They consolidated control over the politicians.

While the beneficiaries of the "malign politicians" campaign have changed from the foreigners to a group of locals, the losers remained unchanged at large. The losers are the common people at large, the nation as a whole.

In today's Bangladesh the young talents express their desire to be doctors, engineers, civil servants or army officers. They don't want to be a national leader, a politician. The problem lies here, unless we can motivate our young talents to take politics as a career, we will be wandering forever for a leader like Nehru, Mahathir, or Mandela.