Tapping the potential of golden youth

Echoing the opening lines of A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens, we may as well say, youth is the best of time(s), youth is the worst of time(s) … Looking at youth positively and coming to its virtues, this particular age seems to have no parallel to the other phases of life.
Youth is also replete with negative forces. The age breeds defiance and it is also susceptible to temptations.  
Childhood is short. If anyone wants to keep his or her puerile innocence for long, he or she might grow into a moron. Adolescence has its multi-faceted inquisitiveness. It takes leave of normal humans as they step on the threshold of youth. Ironically, it is youth that shapes the rest of our age. Many stretch the span of youth as far as they can, even to the later stages of life. A lot of people remain youthful all through their middle and old ages.
Youth, indisputably, is the best of all stages in our life. It instills in humans the exuberance and valour that they will require in their later life. Positive youth is door to vast treasures of experience and achievements. It is the young conquerors, emperors and dreamers who have set up empires, explored distant lands and helped civilisations grow. In modern times, young leaders have put in the best of their zeal and efforts in building many nations. It is them who fought battles, led revolutions and sacrificed lives to free their lands from foreign subjugation; again it is also them who took the helm of new states or worked as confidants of senior statesmen.
However, there is a catch. If they are not properly guided and thrown into hostile circumstances, youths mostly go astray; whereas, it is them who work as a nation's backbone.
Against this backdrop, it is no wonder that Transparency International Bangladesh (TIB) will distinguish the youths from the country's population. In its Youth Integrity Survey 2015, the anti-graft body has recently found the morality of our youths to be high. In its observation, the TIB reports that 97 to 98 per cent of the respondents believe that persons of integrity never lie or resort to dubious ways to get things done. The study also adds 30 per cent of the youths feel that persons of integrity may deviate if that act benefits their families. A remarkable number of them have said more often youths are forced into indulging in corruption notwithstanding the fact that they have a clear concept of integrity. It was painful to learn that the youths under the study lamented the absence of institutions that would teach them honesty.
A total of 2,419 youths participated in the study - their age ranging between 15 and 30. Of them 67 per cent were males and 33 per cent females. The respondents included students, housewives and businesspeople. Fifty-eight per cent of them belonged to the rural areas, with 42 per cent coming from the urban regions.
There are potent reasons to pin hopes on a nation's youths. Bangladesh is no exception. Over the last one decade, young and energetic youths have been seen emerging by the hundreds in the country's economic sector. Apart from the cities, successful young entrepreneurs are now found engaged in previously untapped areas of entrepreneurship. The spectacle is more upbeat in villages than in the urban centres.
The TIB survey on youth integrity comes up with a stimulating picture, but it has also lacings of disappointment. As the study has revealed, a great number of youths have expressed their disillusionment with various government service providers. Many respondents have singled out bribe as a stumbling block in their career pursuits. Although irregularities are prevalent in all sectors, the respondents in the survey have disclosed that their trust in public services is lower than that in the private sector.
Venturing into newer areas of life is what we find as the universal nature of youth. That the youths, unless they are made corrupt, will commit themselves to integrity and high morality is in accordance with the way of the world. When the establishment and vested interests block their path, youths get puzzled. That's when the golden time of youth veers into the dark. No society or nation should hear the untimely dirges about derailed youth.
shihabskr@ymail.com