In a not-so-imaginary world

In a not-so-imaginary world (My First Article for ‘The Daily Sun’)

http://www.daily-sun.com/index.php?view=details&archiev=yes&arch_date=26-10-2010&type=daily_sun_news&pub_no=21&cat_id=1&menu_id=5&news_type_id=1&index=1

Print Edition:

Page 6 (Editorial Page, 26th October, 2010)

Once upon a time, in a land not far away, there was a country called X, where the people, although not very rich, were happy and content with their simple lives. They were hospitable, always ready to welcome guests and people from other countries and were known worldwide for their bravery and patriotism. They had a rich and diverse culture of different ethnicities living happily together in complete harmony. The country also had a history of thousands of years, culminating in the fight for language and a glorious freedom fight.

The people of the country although held united previously by strong feelings of nationalism and patriotism, now preferred to be labelled as followers of the two most dominant political parties A and B. To make things worse, A and B weren’t necessarily the best friends. They kept blaming each other for whatever that went wrong and actively despising each other seemed to be the only thing they were good at. Although, pioneers of the parties worked together during the country’s early days, this was no longer the case. The subsequent so-called ‘leaders’ of the parties believed in glorifying their own pioneers while demeaning the pioneers of the other party without much basis to facts. All this celebration of their pioneers however did not stop the new ‘leaders’ to move away from the principles their pioneers had set; rampant corruption, nepotism and mismanagement of government funds seemed to be the norm.

Soon enough, people from the A and B groups decided to divide every single thing the small country had. Every government organization soon started to have workers’ union groups, A or B. The same was true even for the country’s prestigious universities; students were forced into taking up one of the sides A or B. Teachers of those universities were no exception and were labelled as well. The students from A and B engaged in armed conflicts in regular intervals and were somehow protected from the law enforcement agencies by their superiors in the political parties. Some of the students, who had by now long forgotten their key purpose when entering the university (education, research and being a good human being in general), did not seem content being divided into A and B and they started making sub-groups C, D, E, F and so forth. And predictably enough, the sub-groups soon started to have armed struggles between them, and bright students with a lot of potentials fell prey to this and died in the process. Chaos, as it seemed, became the only norm.

The division process even went onto engulf the arts and culture. You either belonged to group A or B. Some of the most well-known patriotic songs, songs that inspired millions during the country’s Liberation War, were not even spared from this game of division. Because certain songs were liked by party A’s pioneer, they were a complete no-no for people from B and vice versa. If you were a patriotic citizen and liked one of those songs, you’d immediately be labelled as a member of party A or B, even if you actually weren’t.

The division game thus went on, the country X’s development, with all its potential, going backstage and further away from its people. It seemed like there was no one who could possibly guide the country back to track with a unified approach. To some people, all hope seemed to be lost, in the not-so-imaginary country X.

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