Security comes first
The finance minister has said that Tk 16,484 crore will be allotted to the defence in the National Budget for the fiscal 2014-15. Defending the decision, he said that the allocation in the defence had been increased in view of the changing strategy in the South Asia.
The size of the budget will be Tk 250 lakh crore compared with Tk 42,000 crore in 2003-04. In that fiscal year, allocation for the defence was Tk 4,000 crore only.
The critics in our country may question the necessity of increasing allocation in the defence, shutting their eyes to the killing of the Bangladeshi citizens along the Indo-Bangladesh and the Myanmar-Bangladesh borders. The Indian Border Security Force kills Bangladeshi nationals almost every day but dares not killing the Pakistani nationals fearing equal retaliation. What the Myanmar Border Guard Police committed on Saturday killing Bangladeshi BGB personnel, it was impossible for them against the Chinese citizens. This means the more a country is militarily powerful, the more its citizens are secure. So, we support the government’s decision of increasing the defence allocation.
As there is no permanent friend and no permanent foe in national and international politics, almost every country in the world has been giving utmost importance to the defence since the end of the World War II. According to the newspaper reports, The US government has allocated 600 billion dollars to the defence while the Chinese government allotted 122 billion dollar. In geopolitics, security comes first.
P. Rozario
Dhaka
