Beware of sycophants
Wednesday, 23 December 2009
Maswood Alam Khan
Justice Nazrul Islam Chowdhury the other day while speaking at a discussion meeting organized by "Odhikar" at one stage remarked: "While clerks prepare the laws, the illiterate Members of Parliament pass them with applause by thumping tables in the House". Wahey! Justice Chowdhury stirred up a real hornet's nest and all hell broke loose! All lawmakers had bristled with rage and jumped out of their skin.
Next day, the state minister for law Mr. Quamrul Islam threatened to complain to the Supreme Judicial Council against the judge for his making such a derogatory public comment against lawmakers and the parliament.
Only if the High Court judge Nazrul Islam Chowdhury were not so blatant in his remarks about the lawmakers he would perhaps have been safer now; only if he had said: "Prodigies prepare the laws, giants pass them!" Asked whether his threat against the judge could anyway amount to contempt of court, the state minister replied in the negative, saying that 'the parliament is the highest institution against which the judge or anyone else cannot speak. The High Court judge earns his living by interpreting the laws framed by the lawmakers in the parliament'.
The High Court judge said: "Being a sitting judge it was not wise for him to deliver speeches on political issues, but they were concerned about human rights.
We don't know how the alleged derogatory remark would be interpreted by the Supreme Judicial Council once the complaint is formally lodged. But it is sure Justice Chowdhury would lose his job if he is proven guilty.
Two words "clerks" and "illiterate" in the justice's remark were derogatory indeed. And it is foolhardy on anybody's part to assume that one now has unbridled freedom when there is still extrajudicial killing and when people are busy flattering the functionaries in power.
If one is given latitude of a little freedom to analyze the statement made by the High Court judge he or she may find some semblance of truth in the remark only if the derogatory words were replaced by two metaphoric words: "pen pushers" and "blind followers".
Is it not true that many laws in our country are framed and passed in accordance with fancies and caprices of those who are in power? Law, that protected the killers of Bangabandhu for example? Is it not true that the bureaucrats sitting in the secretariat are mere pen pushers busy penning down what their bosses dictate and the bosses busy saying "yes sir" to their bosses all the way up and up? Is it not true that all the members of the parliament are not as educated as Quamrul Islam, the state minister of law is? Is it not true that citizens, who are illiterate themselves, care not whether people they elect are literate or illiterate, full mad or half mad? Is it not true citizens who are so-called educated but intellectually dishonest are more venomous than the illiterate?
In an environment where his colleagues are quite circumspect in delivering their judgments Justice Nazrul Islam Chowdhury had to be more cautious about choosing his words of criticism, no matter it was a matter of human rights or a freedom of speech. Neither is it quite statesman-like for a leader to react angrily to a critic who attempts to nudge him with a cartoon on a newspaper or a statement in a public gathering or an episode in a drama. Freedom of expression after all is the essence of democracy.
One of the main culprits in our leadership crisis is our leaders' political intolerance. Our leaders are eager only to be flattered and have no tolerance for any critical view. Our leaders would fire an adviser who dares say what he thinks wrong that our leaders wrongly think right. So, in their attempts to mollify their godlike leader employees, devotees, advisers and sycophants breathlessly recite the phrase 'yes sir' or 'yes madam' the way a fanatic worshiper maddeningly murmurs esoteric words while begging favors from a deity. History is however replete with facts, tales, legends and sagas that it was always sycophants who were responsible for the disgraceful falls of kings, queens, presidents and prime ministers. Sycophants keep their masters disconnected from reality and keep them afloat in a cozy castle in the air.
Some reports and rumors that we learn from reading in newspapers suggest our elected leaders in power are being hoodwinked into believing that renaming establishments like bridges, roads, seaports and airports after the names of their choice may erase whatever legacies the members of the opposition parties had left behind when they were in power.
As reported or rumored, the government is contemplating to rename Zia International Airport, in short ZIA, a coincidental acronym connoting both the name of the airport and the nickname of the former president Ziaur Rahman after whose name the airport was named after his death. One senior bureaucrat, who was a freedom fighter, suggested in a TV talk show to rename Dhaka City as Bangabandhu City the way Saigon, the capital of Vietnam, was renamed as Ho Chi Min City. It will not be surprising if Bangladesh someday is renamed as Ziadesh only to be renamed again next time as Bangabandhudesh!
It must be advisers who broach suggestions that have to be passed by the prime minister. I wonder what intention drives the advisers for renaming the names of establishments like an international airport that may betray our meanness to the whole globe. I'm afraid, the intention is to defame our prime minister through flattery and it would be a tragedy if our prime minister fails to discern between an obvious flattery and a genuine suggestion.
Meanwhile, I would humbly suggest our leaders to reread the book "How to Win Friends & Influence People" where the author Dale Carnegie suggested: "Don't be afraid of enemies who attack you. Be afraid of the friends who flatter you."
Maswood Alam Khan is a writer at large.maswood@hotmail.com
Justice Nazrul Islam Chowdhury the other day while speaking at a discussion meeting organized by "Odhikar" at one stage remarked: "While clerks prepare the laws, the illiterate Members of Parliament pass them with applause by thumping tables in the House". Wahey! Justice Chowdhury stirred up a real hornet's nest and all hell broke loose! All lawmakers had bristled with rage and jumped out of their skin.
Next day, the state minister for law Mr. Quamrul Islam threatened to complain to the Supreme Judicial Council against the judge for his making such a derogatory public comment against lawmakers and the parliament.
Only if the High Court judge Nazrul Islam Chowdhury were not so blatant in his remarks about the lawmakers he would perhaps have been safer now; only if he had said: "Prodigies prepare the laws, giants pass them!" Asked whether his threat against the judge could anyway amount to contempt of court, the state minister replied in the negative, saying that 'the parliament is the highest institution against which the judge or anyone else cannot speak. The High Court judge earns his living by interpreting the laws framed by the lawmakers in the parliament'.
The High Court judge said: "Being a sitting judge it was not wise for him to deliver speeches on political issues, but they were concerned about human rights.
We don't know how the alleged derogatory remark would be interpreted by the Supreme Judicial Council once the complaint is formally lodged. But it is sure Justice Chowdhury would lose his job if he is proven guilty.
Two words "clerks" and "illiterate" in the justice's remark were derogatory indeed. And it is foolhardy on anybody's part to assume that one now has unbridled freedom when there is still extrajudicial killing and when people are busy flattering the functionaries in power.
If one is given latitude of a little freedom to analyze the statement made by the High Court judge he or she may find some semblance of truth in the remark only if the derogatory words were replaced by two metaphoric words: "pen pushers" and "blind followers".
Is it not true that many laws in our country are framed and passed in accordance with fancies and caprices of those who are in power? Law, that protected the killers of Bangabandhu for example? Is it not true that the bureaucrats sitting in the secretariat are mere pen pushers busy penning down what their bosses dictate and the bosses busy saying "yes sir" to their bosses all the way up and up? Is it not true that all the members of the parliament are not as educated as Quamrul Islam, the state minister of law is? Is it not true that citizens, who are illiterate themselves, care not whether people they elect are literate or illiterate, full mad or half mad? Is it not true citizens who are so-called educated but intellectually dishonest are more venomous than the illiterate?
In an environment where his colleagues are quite circumspect in delivering their judgments Justice Nazrul Islam Chowdhury had to be more cautious about choosing his words of criticism, no matter it was a matter of human rights or a freedom of speech. Neither is it quite statesman-like for a leader to react angrily to a critic who attempts to nudge him with a cartoon on a newspaper or a statement in a public gathering or an episode in a drama. Freedom of expression after all is the essence of democracy.
One of the main culprits in our leadership crisis is our leaders' political intolerance. Our leaders are eager only to be flattered and have no tolerance for any critical view. Our leaders would fire an adviser who dares say what he thinks wrong that our leaders wrongly think right. So, in their attempts to mollify their godlike leader employees, devotees, advisers and sycophants breathlessly recite the phrase 'yes sir' or 'yes madam' the way a fanatic worshiper maddeningly murmurs esoteric words while begging favors from a deity. History is however replete with facts, tales, legends and sagas that it was always sycophants who were responsible for the disgraceful falls of kings, queens, presidents and prime ministers. Sycophants keep their masters disconnected from reality and keep them afloat in a cozy castle in the air.
Some reports and rumors that we learn from reading in newspapers suggest our elected leaders in power are being hoodwinked into believing that renaming establishments like bridges, roads, seaports and airports after the names of their choice may erase whatever legacies the members of the opposition parties had left behind when they were in power.
As reported or rumored, the government is contemplating to rename Zia International Airport, in short ZIA, a coincidental acronym connoting both the name of the airport and the nickname of the former president Ziaur Rahman after whose name the airport was named after his death. One senior bureaucrat, who was a freedom fighter, suggested in a TV talk show to rename Dhaka City as Bangabandhu City the way Saigon, the capital of Vietnam, was renamed as Ho Chi Min City. It will not be surprising if Bangladesh someday is renamed as Ziadesh only to be renamed again next time as Bangabandhudesh!
It must be advisers who broach suggestions that have to be passed by the prime minister. I wonder what intention drives the advisers for renaming the names of establishments like an international airport that may betray our meanness to the whole globe. I'm afraid, the intention is to defame our prime minister through flattery and it would be a tragedy if our prime minister fails to discern between an obvious flattery and a genuine suggestion.
Meanwhile, I would humbly suggest our leaders to reread the book "How to Win Friends & Influence People" where the author Dale Carnegie suggested: "Don't be afraid of enemies who attack you. Be afraid of the friends who flatter you."
Maswood Alam Khan is a writer at large.maswood@hotmail.com