An educator's appraisal
As a public servant working in a public university, I take umbrage at the sharp disdain and negativity displayed by a faculty member of North-South University in her OP-ED piece, titled "Wasteland", published prominently framed on the top right corner of page 7 of The Daily Star on Tuesday, April 14, 2015.
Given the reality of the corruption, mismanagement, logistical and transportation chaos regarding waste retrieval in this teeming megalopolis, the esteemed educator's frustration with the City Corporation's negligence and presumed apathy is understandable. Editorial decision to singularly highlight this piece is also understandable. With Dhaka City mayoral elections on the horizon, we hope the most capable man or woman will rid us, as Ms. Mahapatro writes, of "streets [that] fester with the stench of our collective waste , these open, free-flowing urinals…."
I repeat, my umbrage is with the cumulative tenor of the essay, which refracts vision and voice into a defeatist "whimper" of surrender. Ms Mahapatro certainly knows her Modernist literature, and has chosen to present herself wearing the iconic Dadaist Edvard Munch face. I wish to point out that we are not "buried in the past". Nor are we a "dirty, dirty nation". We are a proud nation of tough, resilient people with passion and poetry in our hearts. We are makers of art and artifacts, with shining eyes, elastic minds, and nimble skills. We are growers of silk and sustaining crops; we are fisher-folk and weavers and potters and goldsmiths. We are singers and dancers and musicians and wordsmiths all—celebrating this vibrant, dynamic City.
It is true that our politicians have been the nation's bane, keeping the masses ill-fed, un-housed, and illiterate for decades. The task before us is huge, but we have made substantial progress in raising the female literacy rate, in maternal and child care, and in public health and hygiene. And, yes, my City is suffocating with a population hundred-times more than it can afford to shelter. Sadly, despite the most logical and rational solution, which is to decentralise governance from the capital City, the political leaders have still not seen the clear benefits of decentralisation. Development and modernisation of the urban infrastructure, in Jessore, Dinajpur, Rangpur, Khulna, Bogra, Kushtia, Pabna, and in other smaller towns, will stop the continuous flow of humanity to the centre.
Yet, unlike Ms Mahapatro, I do not see my city as she sees it: "a city without sense or senses". Unlike the Western graduate, I do not have the privilege of the clean cocoon of a distant affluent private University. Nor do I cross the threshold of expatriate clubs and societies. I choose not to avert my eyes or hold my nose at the Fleurs du mal. Like so many of my ilk, I choose involvement, not detachment. I choose to wage battle with nihilism; I choose to fully commit my being to the people of my city and my nation. I choose to get my hands dirty to clear the garbage of the mind and body. I choose to lift the skirt of my sari a centimetre over my ankle as I walk the mud and sludge to my domain among the rich and the poor.
I have a living, throbbing relationship with this city, as ugly and as godly as any relationship on earth. I wish to cement this relationship (allow me to misquote T.S. Eliot) not 'with a whimper' of alienation, but 'with a bang' of delight.
The writer is faculty member at University of Dhaka, Bangladesh.