"Sudden Terror" is a breathtakingly emotional film on the hijacking of a school bus full of 'special' children. Imagine yourself as a hostage held in a bus on the busy road between Shahbagh and Katabon. The real-life stage enactment of Sudden Terror on a Dhaka street! The incident had all the makings of that film. In this case the passengers were the public, mostly returning home after office and instead of the woman driver in the film played by Maria Conchita, there was a rugged man with a boyish helper in place of an aged aide suffering from diabetes.
In the film a lunatic gets on board the school bus and threatens Maria of detonating the explosives in his bag unless she does exactly what he asks of her. In the Shahbagh case there were well-dressed young men who took control of the bus before most passengers, except perhaps the few near the door (the bus had one) could realise what was going to happen. There was traffic jam, hustle and bustle and most people have grown disinterested in such things. Office returnees after the day's work were even more reluctant to take any interest in the exchanges between those tormentors and the two bus operators. They rather were urging the driver to move on and hurry up.
The bus did move on but only up to Katabon and now the gang made known their intent clear: "Get down within a minute …" The rest remained unsaid. By this time, the bus was heading towards Nilkhet. Mercifully, the gang had no intention of taking the passengers hostage but they had a score to settle perhaps with the bus operators or the bus company.
The passengers were coerced to disembark midway from a public bus on Sunday evening last. At Katabon there was no traffic sergeant whom to complain against this forcible seizure of a bus by youths who replied to a question that they were students. Their average age suggests they were university students. Whether they were students of Dhaka University is not known but one guess is they could be.
All the grumbling passengers forced to alight there, however, concluded that nothing better could be expected from such youths even if they were students of that premier university.
Full of suspense, the film, "Sudden Terror" revolves around the intensity of the driver's motherly instinct that helps her keep her nerves in the face of the lunatic's outrageous demands and negotiation. In this case, there were several lunatics who had no respect for the passengers' rights to return home without any such abnormal interference. One wonders if one of the gang members' father or mother was travelling on board the bus, how the son did feel or react!
Simple sanity has taken leave of the majority of those people who find themselves somewhat privileged. Those who have access to powerful quarters consider all others, particularly the weaker, their bonded subjects. This explains why children and women are grossly subjected to physical and sexual violence. The predatory instinct has of late assumed a monstrous form. A number of children lost their lives at the hands of their megalomaniac torturers. A study has found that of the rising incidence of rape, a majority of the victims are between the age 13 and 18.
How power gets into people's heads is best illustrated by a lawmaker from Cox's Bazar. Here is a man who can do no wrong but others have to be at his beck and call. He has physically assaulted a number of government officials in his constituency. The latest victim was an engineer. Lunacy is not limited to this lawmaker alone, another in a southern district once made similar news for similar uncivilised acts.
Democracy's strong point is its check and balance between rights and responsibilities. No such balance is there in this country. All because legal provisions are only on paper to be applied selectively. That law is neutral and no one can violate it without facing charges and punishment remains only in the law book.
Enjoying one's liberty cannot be at the cost of many others'. But this is what is happening in this country. Unless the tone is set at the top echelon of society, law loses both its substance and spirit and chaos reigns supreme. If university students fail to appreciate the inalienable rights of bus passengers to return home without the kind of interference they made, what happens at lower level of society is any body's guess.
Education that teaches to pursue a career only without humanitarian considerations, empathy and humility is a dangerous thing. And it is the educated and privileged class that is to blame for the social rot. Education has been too academic leaving no spare times for students to participate in sports and cultural programmes. Culturally developed mind is immune from horrendous crimes. The Bangalee nation has a rich vein of culture which needs to be cultivated from all corners of society. This alone can save the present generation from the unrelenting invasive moral and social degeneration. Society must regain its poise in order to establish justice, fellow feeling and compassion for the weak.
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