Insanity on the street

Clashes occurring with the police, 20 persons were hurt. People were held ransom to their demonstrably misplaced angst and destructive swipe taking it out on public and private property.

One tendentious thing we have often brought up with horror has been the violent post-accident mayhem on the street. But now it seems another threshold has been crossed in terms of vandalism, this time using it as a medium to air complaints about utility services. The whole country is simmering with problems, big and small; and if those facing them were to hit the street, smash cars and block traffic, the thin fabric on which social balance rests would be torn asunder.

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The issue with such thoughtless behavioral eruption is that one of the smashed transport could have had one of the agitating student's close relative in it. Even the wrecked vehicle's owner might well have been his kith and kin. That's where such rabid demonstration of irresponsibility and lawlessness hurts, that's where the students must see their deeper social responsibility lying.

The students thought they had reasons to resort to what they did in the street in front of Dhaka Government College. They blamed the electricity authority for allegedly keeping the nearby market-places lighted while the residential students suffered long hours without electricity, at a time when HSC exams are on. They also complained of indifference on the part of the hostel or college authorities to their repeated entreaties to take the matter up with the utility services people. But why must their bid to draw the attention of relevant authorities to their hardship degenerate into hostility against those who had no hand in their predicament? That is the question they must ask themselves and find a conscientious answer to.