Hartal : Politicians should find out what people think of it

After a long pause for some years, a major political party has called hartal signifying that there has been no change in the political culture. It was fancied in some quarters only months ago that Bangladesh made a transition from its destructive political culture and that such an extreme and economy hurting step like hartal would likely no more be called. These quarters discovered a new maturity in the political parties in their silent or unstated intention of not calling hartals. But these optimists are now required to eat their own words.
If a countrywide opinion poll is carried out impartially , it could be that the majority of the respondents in it would say 'no' to hartal. People in all walks of life are now acutely conscious that hartals do far more harm to them and the country compared to whatever things are stated by politicians to be benefits from such forced shutting down of all economic activities.
Our politicians do politics in the name of the people. Therefore, they should be obligated to know what people think of their progarnmes before announcing them.
Naureen Haque
Eskaton
Dhaka.