As an open supporter of the ruling Awami League and an ardent follower of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, it pains me to see the incidents involving students one after other. Truth hurts, but I want to face the truth and this piece is what I think why such incidents are taking place without any malice or any other reason.
Each time the students have been on the streets, either for reforms to quotas in government jobs or demanding safer roads, the two major political parties shouted their versions which, to me, were far from reality.
Awami League General Secretary and Road Transport Minister Obaidul Quader on Friday urged the students not to fall into any trap.
“After failing in the quota reform demos, opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and the fundamentalist forces are depending on the students and they want to instigate their movement,” he was quoted by the BSS news agency as telling newsmen after a joint meeting of the party at its Bangabandhu Avenue office in Dhaka.
Quader said the government has accepted all the nine demands of the agitating students.
“We are seeking cooperation from the heads of all the education institutions, member of the governing bodies and the guardians to bring back discipline on the roads,” he said, adding that “The government has accepted all the demands of the students to avoid any untoward situation and mitigate the people’s sufferings.”
He said a draft act will be finalised in the cabinet meeting on Monday and it will be placed in the next parliament session for enactment to ensure safety and discipline on roads.
The opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) on Friday alleged that bus owners and workers suspended their long-route bus services at the behest of ministers amid the student movement.
"The public transport services have been stopped at the directives of ministers to sidetrack the students' justified demands," UNB quoted party Senior Joint Secretary General Ruhul Kabir Rizvi.
Look at quota reformist students. There are two sides to the quota issue, while Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has set up a committee to find a solution without touching the facility given to freedom fighters and their families.
But until the students raised the issue, why our policy makers and bureaucrats did not take up the issue? Why the prime minister had to get involved in such small issue?
The issue has important implications for the future of Bangladesh—the brightest or the average will be our future bureaucrats. A weak or incompetent bureaucracy means manifold problems for the country taking away time for important issues. The quota committee should have presented its report by now or are they waiting to see another round of streets protests?
We have seen critical media reports on the banking system, chaos on the roads, the happenings in the finance and foreign ministries, and so on.
Now, we have children, out little angels, on the streets demanding safe roads. I stand by them as they are apolitical and their demand is not selfish, but for all of us in Bangladesh. Their action will save many lives in the future.
Talented or not, every life matters unlike what Shipping Minister Shajahan Khan feels. The photograph of his crude smile over the deaths of the two school children stoked the protests that have paralysed road transports.
Both the Awami League and the BNP should have put their heads together to solve issues of this kind, rather than politicising every issue the country faced. Please, patriotism first and then your hunger for power.
I have seen a practice in the media to avoid criticising the party, the paper or the journalist side with due to extreme partisanship. Maybe, sometimes I might have fell victim to that despite my efforts to serve my readers with the right kind of journalism.
What I could understand seeing the posts on the social media and the behaviour of these school and college students is an outburst—conscious or unconscious—or venting of their anger built over time against injustice and lawlessness after finding criminals getting away even after proved guilty.
The students were seen checking licenses and documents of drivers and vehicles, forcing a minister to leave his official car. They made traffic jammed roads to vehicles ply in a disciplined way.
The message from them is a matter of great shame for the police involved in managing road traffic and the home ministry which fails to enforce traffic laws, stop corruption in the police service, stop high-handedness of law breakers and bring all to justice and enact to enforce proper laws like making death sentence the highest for road accidents.
We did that with acid crimes at one point of time. If proven callous or untrained driver has caused the deaths, the law should be the death penalty and not few years in jail which is in fact few months before the offenders are out of jail on bails.
Stop fooling the people. The new generation has told the politicians they will not accept excuses and hollow words of assurances. They want actions.
We do not want anymore agitations of any kind, but to leave in peace with security to our lives. Politicians should make their turf of chaos which does not affect the general people who want visible evidence of what the politicians deliver.
Sheikh Hasina has delivered in many areas, which are visible and has been commended for her actions. These include the IT sector, the unimaginable self-funded Padma Bridge, roads and highways, Bangabandhu Satellite 1 and so on.
While Khaleda Zia or Tarique Rahman has nothing to tell except how to steal people’s money for launder them to foreign banks.
The policymakers and bureaucrats should do their job so that Bangladesh is not repeatedly faced with crisis of these kinds. They must give the true picture of events to the prime minister instead of saving their jobs or getting promoted by saying all is well, when in fact nothing is well.
Long live the angels from schools and colleges. Long live my beloved Bangladesh.

Nadeem Qadir is the Roving Editor at The Asian Age and a UN Dag Hammarskjöld fellow.