Failed society
Ahmed Waris, Mohammadpur, Dhaka
BRTC's recent decision to bar mobile phone service providers from offering 'no charge periods' is not short of total immaturity. Free airtime as part of a package is nothing new, being offered in many other countries around the world. However, nowhere else has such an issue been turned into a circus as is the case here. Those who think that free airtime corrupts the youth should throw out their TVs and computers, stop watching movies, listening to music or using the Internet, avoid the print media to large extents and seal their eyes and ears when they step outside. Everything beneficial can be abused for wrong ends. A kitchen knife used to kill someone does not in any way impose a liability on the knife maker. Similarly, mobile operators are not responsible for moral corruption when they offer free airtime. It is the parents' duty to teach their children about morals, ethics and responsibilities and events will occur all the time that will test everyone. To say that the events are responsible for character degradation is to shirk personal responsibility and take refuge in feeble excuses. Personally, I'm more worried about Bangladesh degrading into a 'failed society', characterised by moral depravity and irresponsibility, more than it being declared a 'failed nation’. To elaborate, a failed nation can once again rise on the shoulders of responsible and morally upright citizenry, but a failed society will only drive a nation to the grave and leave it there through its own irresponsibility.
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