Fresh wave of killings

The crime pattern might have changed a bit with a shift from political and revenge killings to an assault on the business community, but that does not allay the fear that the lives of ordinary citizens are any safer. It seems mugging has degenerated, as some recent incidents suggest, into outright killing of its victims. Extortionists have become very active in many places. And crimes related to business conflicts are also increasing day by day.

The killing of an employee of a Taiwanese food company and the attack on the managing director of the Korean Export Processing Zone in Chittagong are the latest instances of what a toll criminality is taking. Even the nomenclatures ringing foreign have found place in the casualty list and the upshot of it all is that investment, both foreign and local, has been badly affected. A sense of insecurity is prevailing among the people involved in financial ventures. Likewise, the market is behaving erratically as the ubiquitous extortionists have introduced a toll collection system of their own. The corporate sector is also feeling the pinch of the all-pervasive lawlessness.

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Our eardrums have been pierced by high decibel claims about the special measures aimed at curbing crime. But where are the special effects? It is obvious that the criminals and murderers in the previous instances having gone scot-free, new plotters of murders felt emboldened to execute their crimes. Unless we can hand out conviction to the culprits, newer waves of crime will engulf us.

The entire business community has been crying hoarse to draw the attention of the government about their threat perception in the face of repeated murders. But their distress signal has not yet elicited any effective response from the government, at least the results do not prove otherwise. Pray, when will the government act?