Reflection

Lucid Dream- Students' Politics

Shuvashish Roy

JANUARY 2009. The election was over. It was the most free and fair election in the history. The new government has been elected. The university had reopened and I had started my journey back to my campus, my hall life resumed. It was midnight in my hall and suddenly I heard loud noises, noise of lamentation and breaking of glasses, and to my surprise I heard guns firing. It was nothing but the show down of power in politics. It happened after every election. The fight began between student wings of government and opposition team. However, I tried to get a safe place when a bullet struck my head- I was another non-political victim of political vengeance.

I regained my consciousness in the hospital and the doctor told me that I was safe, that my injury was not serious. Coming out of the hospital I bought The Daily Star and to my surprise I noticed the news:

“Both the government and the opposition party reached consensus and passed a bill called Student politics act where it is stated that:

* Student politics will be limited to education purpose only.

* Former student cannot hold position in students' committee.
* Any student engaged in illegal movement will be permanently banned from politics.
* Student politics can never hamper the pace of education system and its curriculum.
* Political meetings and processions during class time are prohibited.
* A neutral committee will monitor seat placement in hall.

As a general student, I was really happy after reading the news. I went back to campus and saw everything normal. I also noticed two leaders of different political party chatting and smiling. It was the environment everyone expected. But out of nowhere I saw a chaotic procession and from there a bullet hit my head!

I was once again in hospital. I got my consciousness back and I saw doctor telling me: “You were already dead in the first situation and we put you in lucid dream- a scientific system that make you virtually live in your hidden expectation. But a problem has been encountered and the dream becomes nightmare. Anyway we are reloading your system…”

Encourage more and more foreign and local investments, this will create numerous job opportunities. We need investments in automobiles, software, education and tourism.

Eliminate all the loopholes, hindrances, unnecessary complications from manpower export bureau.

Immediately stop/ban all kinds of political activities from all the public universities, however students and teachers may have the rights to do politics outside the campus.

Expectations from the Opposition party:
Support and cooperate with the Government for all of it's good doings and criticize for their wrong doings. The Opposition must realize that they are an equal partner to build the stable democracy, the democracy that is not just by word but to be realized through proper practice.

For the last thirty-seven years, as the nation has observed, only the capital city got maximum focus. But, our expectation from the new government is to make sure an overall development of all the Zillas, Upozillas and Unions take place to minimize migration to the capital city. Improvement of the communication system is a necessary job to be done. It will ensure the sustainable development of the country. Besides the transportation system, the rest of the country needs to be benefited from educational and technological advancements.

Another field to work in for the government is the 'population'. The government must take strict steps to control it. Finally, we urge the upcoming government to provide us with the proper history of our nation. We need to know the roles played by our brave freedom fighters, past foreign consulates, Razakars and other bodies who were directly and indirectly involved in our liberation war and later parts. We won't tolerate any more disputes regarding the declarer of liberation war is or how bad the Razakars were. What we need is a proper documentation of our whole nation that will help us to realize on our own
what actually did happen in our past.

Student of North South University

Decades ago the habit of reading was pervasive. Literate people showed real interest in collecting and reading books. They felt proud of possessing books, as many do nowadays in their CD/DVD collections. Visiting library was an important aspect of lifestyle. Students used to read fiction and poetry outside their prescribed syllabus. There was social movement for encouraging reading. Almost every locality had club which among other things kept books for its members. There were separate libraries and reading circles as well. Competition was there among organisations in enriching collection of books both in quality and quantity and among the members in reading them in first hand. It was a healthy competition, which spawned a golden era of reading. That reading culture is lost, now, however.

The bustle of business is identified as one of the main reasons for waning reading habit. Life has been so busy that people can hardly manage time for reading. The pressure of livelihood has mounted tremendously, thrusting people in earning bread, affecting their thirst for knowledge. There is the rat race of income generation, where there is no place of reading. Even people cannot find enough time for reading newspaper. They just skim through the headlines, avoiding details. They can hardly attend to anything with profound concentration due to time constraint. They are always in a hurry to finish their assignments in vocation. It is really a hard time, witnessing a famine of reading.

Proliferation of information technology has also contributed to the change of reading habit. Computer technology in particular has opened up new vistas of recreation. Now people can float away in the wave of internet, their eyes glued to the monitor screen. They can stay day and night in the virtual world, moving from one website to another, simply with mouse clicks. Children and adolescents take computer games as great fun. They sometimes get addicted to it, forgetting their school/college/university lessons. Some watch movies while some enjoy music in computer with the facility of ROM drive. This new mode of entertainment has replaced the old VCR system, making way for burnt disc business instead of tape and cassette.

After hectic day of work, when people come back home, they seek light entertainment. Television is there to wash away their tiredness and boredom. Television demands a passive mind rather than active for the watchers. Reading, on the other hand, needs active involvement of the readers -- it needs brain work. Television programmes easily stir visual and aural senses, providing ready pleasure, for which it is far more popular than printed paper. Nowadays television is further enjoyable with numerous satellite channels offering numerous programmes. The viewers can surf the channels to find out their choice according to their taste and get engrossed in it until they retire to bed.

There is probably no correlation between the rate of literacy and reading habit. The habit of reading has decreased though literacy has increased dramatically. We can question whether the new generation will be dumb without sufficient reading of books. Are they going to be intellectually crippled or bankrupt? No, the children of the new age will be clever, ever more, with the blessings of advanced science and technology, I suppose. Their intellectual pursuit will be met in a different way. They will master new skills to meet the challenges of the day, concentrating more on technological accomplishments. They will be good at computing and other machine-based tasks.

It is not entirely true that the youths of the day are not reading at all. Many may avoid entertainment literature but they still read specialised literature of various disciplines. They explore serious publications of every academic subject in science, humanities and business, which have gone through complex ramifications. They penetrate the accumulation of technicalities with enhanced power of brain. They are well advanced in all affairs. Special knowledge of the previous generation has turned into common sense of the new generation. So I am optimistic that despite decline of reading habit, it will not get in the way of progress of knowledge.

The writer is Assistant Professor and Head, Department of English, Daffodil International University.