STATE Minister for Home Affairs Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal said the government would compensate the loss of vehicles if affected during the Bangladesh Nationality Party (BNP) sponsored ongoing blockade. He made the announcement on Friday following an order given on Thursday evening to normalise the vehicular movement in the long-routes under police protection.
“Vehicles need to be brought out on the streets during the blockade. Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has announced to compensate (owners) if any vehicles face loss during the blockade”, said Kamal. The State Minister on Friday afternoon had a meeting with the transport owners at Gabtoli in the capital with a view to normalising the vehicular movement across the country.
“Every type of vehicles including bus and truck are under this purview”, the State Minister quoted the Premier. The LGRD Minister further told that helicopter surveillance would begin soon in order to keep the vehicular movement normal across the country.
While the idea seems good in theory it will be difficult to establish in practice — even if the average loss is roughly around Tk 40,000 per vehicle (a nominal number) there are over 2 million vehicles of all types operating in the country — one can easily see that even a destruction ratio of 10 percent will ensure that the government has to pay around 800 crore takas from its funds — this is a huge number which the government can only get by taxes — so it is the people who will eventually be paying for the sins of the parties — the government does not have wealth or income which derives from itself.
Even assuming that vehicle costs are properly compensated it will be impossible to compensate a family for the loss of one of their members — no such number exists which can adequately economically compensate a family for the loss of one of their own. So such types of compensation have no real meaning.
It would be far better for the government to instead concentrate on ensuring security by ending the political impasse with the opposition instead of going tough on them — such an action will only infuriate the young turks of the opposition party who will be emboldened to go tough on the government as well — resulting in further sufferings to the common people. This policy of mutual hatred will result in a Nash equilibrium situation — the situation will be adverse to both parties and no one will come out the winner.
But the ultimate losers are the people — farmers whose crops are getting spoilt, people who are dying who cant access Dhaka from outside, salarymen who face the most horrendous of hassles getting to work — the cries of the people must be heard.
