The Justice Conundrum

Since preparations of the tribunal began, the BAL government and many experts created a strong front for the tribunal, fighting off anyone who raised a hair of concern about its legitimacy. It was easy to fight off BNP on this, since they were caught holding Jamaat's hand since last election. Other critics weren't tolerated either, and were accused of being anti-liberation (if that's possible). We, the people, joined in on this, whether fully grasping it or not, but wholly out of desperation for closure. Everyone believed that this time, closure is coming.
With that one year left of BAL's term in power, the sentences have started to pour out of the courts. It has been nothing short of the rise of the greatest conundrum for the people from what I can see.

The big blow was dealt last with the sentence of the big one - Golam Azam. Yes, said the courts, he should be hanged! Yay, cheered the masses! But then, continued the court, since he is old and his health is not so good, we think he should be given a 90 year term in jail. Nay, came back the response from the masses, who just couldn't believe it.

Its a massive imbroglio and its pushing the citizens to mime the position we've been 'taught' (someone taught us, or we taught ourselves) to take - do not question the tribunal's validity (lest you want to lose what we've achieved, yes?), even if from one sentence to the next, things do not make sense to you, or if by next election, this becomes the factor behind your vote.

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Just Wasn't Fair, Damini! Biswajit!

The world isn't fair to a lot of people. That may mean a person dies of an unexpected car accident, an unexpected heart attack could claim the life of a seemingly well-functioning health nut, one could lose his life savings at the hands of a close friend and eloping wife, or it could mean you are beaten and stabbed to death from a political case of mistaken identity, or you are gang raped in a bus that is circling the city you call home, to die in its arms a few days later.

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QUBEE: Internet for the Underserved

I heard of Qubee a little before they setup a widely* available service or a proper consumer website through a friend who had been hired by them, and another one whose sister was in charge of finding people for testing out the services they were just installing at the time.

That is when I first came across the motto, a grand statement on a temporary website of Augere Holdings, the investors behind QUBEE: 

' ... a mission to provide "broadband for all" and seeks to bring broadband Internet services to underserved communities worldwide' (Though that website doesn't exist anymore, it is available on the Wikipedia page for Qubee and Augere).

I have been a customer since 2009, and today, I happened to see that they were in the news - "Augere's Ahuja, 7 others sued"! Seems like their local shareholder (30%) Teleport Bangladesh is the accuser. I am sure that'll get sorted out, but what I would like to get sorted out for the benefit of my knowledge is their mission statement above.

Who do they mean, when they say "underserved communities"? According to Wikipedia, this is their reach in terms of where they are doing business:

Augere has so far launched broadband internet services in Pakistan in July 2009 and in Bangladesh in October 2009 under the brand name Qubee. Augere is also expecting to launch services in Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda, and India in 2011 and is continuing to pursue spectrum across Africa, Asia and South East Asia.

So, am I the "underserved"? I think I could be if we put a spin on that phrase (which I see is usually used in relation to healthcare services). The spin is quite simple. Recently I had a run in with their support team (badly for the 1st time in 3 years to their credit) with what I perceived as something wrong with their tracking of my usage. It came to my notice since last February was the first time was the first time I was found in violation of their FUP or Fair Usage Policy ~ use till a 30GB limit, at which point they shut down the internet unless I pay them a month's worth of fees (do double payment for a single month). I tried to get their support team to register my concerns with their technical team, but was refused flatly on the logic that the traffic that was generated was from my MAC ID - so it could've only been from my house. I would even accept that point if I were to assume that their modems usually send over requests and receive responses even if my computer is turned off!

Khaotic however did manage to get a technical person to go to his house and witness such a phenomenon first-hand. With every kind of software turned off - like Windows Updates, anti-virus updates, other software updates, and keeping the processes and tasks in view, the tracker showed a download of 40MB.  The tech support person couldn't offer any explanation for that, but someone from the support team followed up the next day with some accusations first - "your windows was updating", and "your anti-virus was updating" and a few others, and then, secondly with a suggestion:"Re-install your operating system". It feels like the support team right there is having some fun with these complaints - rather than escalating the issue or getting to the bottom of it.

Meanwhile, I have heard good things so far about the government run BCUBE** and it seems like they have better prices for their services too. If there were an 'underserved community', wouldn't they want to go with the more economic offerings?

* Qubee is in Dhaka, Chittagong and Sylhet now, whereas their WiMax competitor Banglalion has also gone there and beyond to Rajshahi, Khulna, Rangpur, Barishal.

** The website is not good looking in compliance with the rest of the government websites, I guess.

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Women's Day

(Photo Credit: Istela Imam)

It maddens me when I meet some people in my country who by default undermines a woman's ability to do a certain job. It is unwarranted. So, when my father and I were waiting for my mother and sister to get registered as voters, we met someone like that. As it happened, male operators were taking care of the male voter wannabes (unsuitable? probably), and female operators were taking care of the female wannabe voters. As it also happened, my father and I were done in a jiffy, and had to wait quite a long time for my mom and sister to come out. I asked a male guard there why it was taking so long, and it was then when he made his remark about women. I told him he was wrong, and that there was no reason that it should take so long, just because the operators there were women. I thought I had made my point. Then again, I didn't know that our wait was to be a lot longer still.

I asked them when they were finally done "what took so long?". So, as it happened the operators were slower and did take longer! That made me realize, that a woman's ability is still not a question here. I think society's treatment of women also play a large role here. If girls grow up in an environment where nothing is expected of them, they will not grow to explore their potential, or be aware of it. The 'default undermining' is our society's view of women, and that largely affects the outcome of the women workforce. Its not uncommon to find women with engineering or medicine or other educational qualifications just doing nothing afterwards. The expectations sometimes are that they will be educated but not needed to work. The demand/supply of arranged marriages play a strong role in this situation, or simply rather loose hypocritical viewpoint of the educated parents.

Whatever, it may be, I know there are women out there who are offering so much to this society and the world at large, and I hope the future 'woman' chooses the right role model and gets to see that there is much they can do.

Lastly, a few links:
http://www.internationalwomensday.com/
Is Islam Really Stuck in the 12th Century on Women's Rights?

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