Ramadan Message from On HIGH - 45
Friday, 28 August 2009
EVERY year at this time, it has become customary for the powers that be, HIGH-UP on the pecking order to give messages of solace at the advent of Ramadan. This year the usual pious platitudes duly appeared on the first pages. In my opinion the messages this year should have been something like this:
1. My dear naïve countrymen, thanks for your confidence in bringing me in once again by a landslide into Kahn's White Elephant stable. Alleviating poverty was one of the pledges and I am trying to do so. As a special Ramadan treat, the livelihood of 400,000 poor rickshaw pullers, their 20 lakh family members and those in rickshaw related activities and about 40-50 lakh Dhaka-bashis who use the rickshaws every day, to generate immense economic activities, has been put at risk by banning them on most Dhaka's roads. This is my innovative initiative at Poverty Alleviation. What better way to do this than to start eliminating all the poor by curbing their earnings and literally starving them to death. We will also save a lot of food but at least the roads will be clear for the 3.0-4.0 lakh Gas Guzzling Monstrosities, both ultra-modern and ancient, licensed (also unlicensed) to kill thousands every year (population control?).
2. I hear prices of almost everything have gone sky high, especially Ramadan food items. Since I do not shop myself (the State provides everything), our old organisation TeeCeeBee (previously known as Teaching Corruption in Bangladesh) was given charge to import and distribute, but they have done wrong by favouring some party-men. Nothing can be done here but to go to their back-doors for everything. Even the BeeDeeAar has joined the fun, jacked up prices and trying to make an 'honest living' after the earning losses sustained since February.
3. Law & Order was another pledge (accent on WAS). Murder, dacoity, robbery, kidnapping, smuggling, extortion, tender-napping etc., have all made remarkable progress, in some respects even more than in Queen Bee's time. But what to do? Law enforcers are under-manned, their first priority is giving protection to law-makers, bureaucrats, diplomats, and by law, the descendants of Our Father, Who Art in Heaven. Moreover, the descendants are beginning to sprout like mushrooms. The few remaining cops are too busy keeping the roads free for the innumerable (empty/half-empty) cars of the privileged class by puncturing the tyres of rickshaws and ejecting from them, the fasting, old, disabled, ill, infirm, women and children both in the sun and rain. More population control measures, you could say, because some will drop dead surely. Anyway with the high prices, they probably would not be able to buy much, so will not need a rickshaw to carry the load.
4. Electric generation acquisition is going on speedily and once we find an obscure Chinese or Laotian company who can comply with our "special requirements", tenders will be floated. Till then the privileged class need their air conditioners going full blast. We still have plenty of Water, although I believe most of it is polluted. But, my dear countrymen, do not worry, once Tipaimukh is a reality and shortages occur we will import as much as we need from Chad or Mongolia.
Sikander Ahmed,
F-4, H 2 & 4, Rd-1, Bl B,
Niketon, Gulshan-1,
Dhaka 1212.
e-mail: faireen1978@yahoo.com
1. My dear naïve countrymen, thanks for your confidence in bringing me in once again by a landslide into Kahn's White Elephant stable. Alleviating poverty was one of the pledges and I am trying to do so. As a special Ramadan treat, the livelihood of 400,000 poor rickshaw pullers, their 20 lakh family members and those in rickshaw related activities and about 40-50 lakh Dhaka-bashis who use the rickshaws every day, to generate immense economic activities, has been put at risk by banning them on most Dhaka's roads. This is my innovative initiative at Poverty Alleviation. What better way to do this than to start eliminating all the poor by curbing their earnings and literally starving them to death. We will also save a lot of food but at least the roads will be clear for the 3.0-4.0 lakh Gas Guzzling Monstrosities, both ultra-modern and ancient, licensed (also unlicensed) to kill thousands every year (population control?).
2. I hear prices of almost everything have gone sky high, especially Ramadan food items. Since I do not shop myself (the State provides everything), our old organisation TeeCeeBee (previously known as Teaching Corruption in Bangladesh) was given charge to import and distribute, but they have done wrong by favouring some party-men. Nothing can be done here but to go to their back-doors for everything. Even the BeeDeeAar has joined the fun, jacked up prices and trying to make an 'honest living' after the earning losses sustained since February.
3. Law & Order was another pledge (accent on WAS). Murder, dacoity, robbery, kidnapping, smuggling, extortion, tender-napping etc., have all made remarkable progress, in some respects even more than in Queen Bee's time. But what to do? Law enforcers are under-manned, their first priority is giving protection to law-makers, bureaucrats, diplomats, and by law, the descendants of Our Father, Who Art in Heaven. Moreover, the descendants are beginning to sprout like mushrooms. The few remaining cops are too busy keeping the roads free for the innumerable (empty/half-empty) cars of the privileged class by puncturing the tyres of rickshaws and ejecting from them, the fasting, old, disabled, ill, infirm, women and children both in the sun and rain. More population control measures, you could say, because some will drop dead surely. Anyway with the high prices, they probably would not be able to buy much, so will not need a rickshaw to carry the load.
4. Electric generation acquisition is going on speedily and once we find an obscure Chinese or Laotian company who can comply with our "special requirements", tenders will be floated. Till then the privileged class need their air conditioners going full blast. We still have plenty of Water, although I believe most of it is polluted. But, my dear countrymen, do not worry, once Tipaimukh is a reality and shortages occur we will import as much as we need from Chad or Mongolia.
Sikander Ahmed,
F-4, H 2 & 4, Rd-1, Bl B,
Niketon, Gulshan-1,
Dhaka 1212.
e-mail: faireen1978@yahoo.com