Young man, keep writing!
Once again, the Class 9 schoolboy from Chittagong, Shafeen Mahmood, is challenging your readers, sir, on a moral issue.
At the heart of democracy must be the conviction that there is no hierarchy with the people who really matter at the top and, for instance, the garbage collectors at the bottom. Moreover, it is pointless to discuss changes in organisation and expensive projects and avoid what can bring about the necessary changes of heart.
It seems to be easier to build clinics and train midwives, than to train boys so that they grow into men who consider their wife 'worth' the expense of using them and care about the risks of their dying in childbirth. It is easier to lecture people about early marriage, than to work among the chattering classes of a whole area who insist on it because the boys and men are beginning to 'eye up' a young girl and no one can face the cost of disciplining them. It is easier to repeat the rules and regulations about reporting offences to the police, than to see to it that there are policemen in the local station who take those who do so seriously and do not abuse them.
In a Garo village, a naughty Muslim built his house somewhere illegaly and did not tie up his cow or his goat which then ate the entire vegetable garden that a poor widow and her youngest daughter depended on who could not afford to build the sort of fence that would have kept them out. There was both a Christian and Muslim leader of their congregations in that village and when I asked my informant why these two men could not have sorted out this problem, I was told this was not possible. I demanded, “Why not?”
Every noble effort to improve the quality of life and fight poverty is useless if there is moral feebleness - and it is good to know that at least one representative of the younger generation is keeping his finger on this sore point. Keep writing, young sir!
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