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<%-- Page Title--%> Dhaka Diary <%-- End Page Title--%>

<%-- Volume Number --%> Vol 1 Num 126 <%-- End Volume Number --%>

October 10, 2003

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Problem for New Comers

Nowadays, life is very complicated. A person who comes from the village is quite susceptible to fall into the traps of the city dwellers. Those who come from the village have no idea about the different destinations and how to get from one place to the other. They also have very limited knowledge on the modes of transportation available. I once met this man who was fresh from the village. He asked a bus contractor if the bus was headed towards Mirpur 1. The bus contractor told him to get on the bus as he (the contractor) would give him the necessary directions to his destination. When the bus reached Asad Gate, the contractor asked the man for Tk.5 (which was more then the fare) and told him to disembark. He then told him to board another bus to his final destination. The powerless villager got down and was looking about helplessly. It is sad that there are so many people who are always out to cheat the poor and innocent.

Zillur Rahman
Green Road Govt. Staff Quarter,
Dhanmondi


A Serpentine Affair

It was another one of those sultry June afternoons when I was visiting a local shopping mall in Uttara. All of a sudden, I heard screams as I was approaching a corner of the market. People started to gather around the place where the screams were coming from, I saw the source of the commotion. Three young women, all of them belonging to some tribe of snake charmers--possibly of the nearby Turag river gypsy community, were openly threatening a group of shopkeepers with small but very much live snakes. The women were demanding some amount of money from the shopkeepers. Finally, security guards came into the scene and managed to force the snake charmers to leave the mall, creating both a scene of suspense and comedy.

The Citizen
Dhaka


Khulna Diary

The Frivolity of Traffic Police

It was a rainy day and I was coming home from College. When I came to Farighat Bus Stand, I noticed a taxi coming at great speed and as it passed a traffic policeman by the road, it sprinkled him with a shower of dirty water from a pothole. There was another traffic policeman standing beside him laughing while the victim was swearing at the driver and his fourteen generations. Whatever deplorable condition it was for that traffic policeman it made me laugh. Some policemen are victims. But strangely enough when I came near at Dakbangla, another incident caught my attention where two rickshaw pullers were engaged in a little scuffle. At once a traffic policeman rushed to the scene and pacified them with slaps. He further continued his assault with his stick vehemently and inhumanly. I was shocked. I know it's their duty to keep peace and order on the street but is it their duty to abuse power and engage themselves in such inhuman activities? This is a personal matter I know but this single incident taught me how the men in the saddle are ill-treating their power over the weak. However their frivolity gave me two impressions, both contradicting each other another within a minute and it was tough for me to balance my emotion so swiftly.

Shamim Ahmed
Roy Para, Khulna

   
 
         

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