by rahnuma ahmed
I HAVE recently returned from Jhalokathi. I had gone there as part of a citizens’ group to lend support to seventeen year old Limon Hossain, shot and maimed by a RAB bullet. It was a case of mistaken identity but this simple truth is denied by the government, by the ruling party’s top-ranking leaders and high-ranking police and RAB officials, who viciously keep insisting that Limon is a ‘terrorist.’ All because the government’s elite anti-crime, anti-terror force, can do no wrong. Never, ever. A state of affairs that we, as citizens, contest.
After returning to Dhaka, I flipped through news reports of our visit. Many had characterised our group as being, one of ’eminent’ citizens. Very elitist. Others, of being composed of ‘human rights leaders and activists’, implying a total disregard for its political and ideological diversity since the group consisted of members, including I myself, keenly aware of the politics of human rights. Of, for instance, Nobel Peace Prize recipient Dr Yunus’ notion of credit as being a fundamental human right. Its absurdity, sharply pointed out by anthropologist Lamia Karim who asks, if credit is replaced with the word debt, how can debt, ?a relationship of power and inequality between the loan institution and the borrower? — be construed as a human right? Continue reading “Controversy over Dr Yunus, political issues ignored”