Drug addiction and trafficking: The menacing spread

WHILE Bangladesh observed the International Day against Drug Addiction and Illicit Trafficking on June 26, albeit in a low key, the spread of drug addiction and trafficking has reached menacing proportions. Reports in newspapers about kidnapping, assault, rape and killing of school and college going girls by misguided youths and addicts have captured attention.
In fact, the crimes are mostly fuelled by drug addiction and drug trafficking. When a gang member tries to leave the group, perhaps tired of the grisly nature of the trade, he incurs the wrath of his former accomplices and eventually meets a tragic end.
In a report published in a Bangla daily on June 2, it was revealed that drug peddlers in the village Fateh Mohammadpur in Ishwardi, Pabna brutally assaulted Shabana Parvin and ransacked her house she wanted to stop drug trade in the precinct. Drugs are available in every part of Bangladesh.
Almost awash in guns and plagued by addicts, some district towns are struggling to cope with the wave of violence. Reports published in the dailies reveal that drug peddling in the lanes and by-lanes of Kushtia town is very common sight. Most shockingly, despite the fact that drug trade continues unabated in about 20 points in the town, police and drug control department have succeeded in seizing only a few bottles of Phensydil.
While the law enforcement agency is trying to control the smuggling of Phensydil from factories located in India close to Bangladesh border, the country has been gripped by another scourge inside the country. People are alarmed to learn that an illegal energy drink is being sold at Tk.50 to Tk.150 taka per bottle in many places of the country. Most worrisome, school and college going children are the main customers of this harmful drink.
After analysis of the way the youngsters are becoming hooked to this trade and addiction, and their violent nature, one is led to believe that a teenager's behaviour is largely caused by the environment he grows up in.
In a large measure, it is the responsibility of the parents to step up restoration of the values that seem to be eroding fast. Many parents are not giving enough time and attention to raising their children in a proper way.
Precisely speaking, only when we realise that we are hurting these dependent members of the society through access to wealth and indulgence in bad habits and evil company that are not proper at that age, will we begin to deal realistically with this problem. The other cause of this drift to criminality or addiction, and ultimately to trafficking business, is the social inequity that exists because of joblessness and draining of the last resources the poorer section had to sustain a living.
Welfare reform could have been an answer and a hope for restoring the principles and moral fabric in such a hopeless situation, but till now no government has given enough thought to such a stupendous problem.
People have long demanded that the government come forward to ensure the children's safety and proper nurturing by involving parents in the educational process. The fact remains that parental rights must be evenly balanced with parental responsibility.
The major enemies of children today are missing fathers, illegal drugs, tobacco and alcohol abuse, and bad association blended with a culture that inspires anti-social and destructive habits in children. They disrupt the basic values and lead to success that is undesirable at this stage of their lives.
It is equally true that only government help and action cannot stem the tide. Anti- drug campaigns must be geared up with multi-pronged initiatives like poverty elimination, job creation, proper schooling of children and exemplary punishment to drug lords. We must recall that there was a time when all the basic socialisation forces were marshaled to teach children about right and wrong, self-discipline, and the means of achieving personal success.
Undoubtedly true, our teachers in schools in earlier days, who were overtly committed to their vocations, did a wonderful job in shaping the values in the young learners. The society and schools have drifted very far away from this approach. This erosion of values has put the nation in a quandary.
The war we must now wage for our children requires a good deal of sensibility, prudence and a look for the future. Undoubtedly, there is a component of morals and values attached to it. The sooner we can reach a consensus on what those morals and values are, the quicker we will be able to avert the disaster that confronts our kids.
In analysing the drug trade, which is booming, we see that it has become the nation's newest and most frightening job. Lured by the easy money that it can fetch the country's unemployed youth are gradually being drawn to this vile trade. The fact is that they have grown up in fatherless homes or impoverished surroundings, watching their mothers struggling hard to eke out a living.
With the unemployment rate for youth folks rising to 60%, little work is available for unskilled and uneducated youths. The handful of jobs that are available to these poorest groups are -- errand boys, grocery packers, and stone crushers for the construction works -- pay only minimum wages, which are hardly sufficient to keep them alive in these days of price spirals and economic crises. These youngsters turn to the most lucrative option they can find.
In rapidly growing numbers, they are becoming the new criminal recruits of the booming trade in drugs, with their patrons, the drug lords, remaining behind the scene. There are reports of teenagers getting addicted to and involved in trafficking of yaba tablets and other narcotics because of peer pressure.
In some cases, we have heard about the murder of youngsters as a consequence of group rivalry and feud over sharing of drug money. Precisely speaking, it is not these kids who are at fault. It is their parents who should be blamed. If the parents had devoted the same time, energy, and resources that they did to confront other crises, things would never have been so bad.

Md. Asadullah Khan is a former teacher of physics and Controller of Examinations, BUET.
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