Pioneer of education
Once I asked a female student of a public university to say: Who was Begum Rokeya? She thought a while and said: I have heard the name of Rokeya but nothing more can I say. The student whom I asked is not alone but one among billions because thirst for knowledge has almost disappeared.
About Begum Rokeya in a condolence meeting on December 11 in 1932, just two days after her death, the then Governor of Bengal John Anderson said that Rokeya was the pioneer of higher education among the Muslim girls in this province (Bengal).
The lady with the lamp of education was born on December 9 in 1880 and died the same day in 1932.
She was a member of a very conservative Muslim family, where learning the Bengali and the English literature was taboo. But nothing could stop a journey if there are determination and patron. Rokeya got eldest brother Ibrahim Saber and her immediate elder sister Karimunnesa as patrons. Both had great influence on her life. Karimunnesa wanted to study Bengali, the language of the majority in Bengal. The family disliked this because many upper class Muslims of the time preferred Arabic and Persian as the media of education to own language, Bengali. Ibrahim taught English and Bengali to Rokeya and Karimunnesa; both sisters became authors.
Rokeya got married in 1896 when she was 16 years. Her husband Sakhawat Hossain, who was Deputy Magistrate under the British Government, patronized Rokeya’s thirst for knowledge and that is why he left Tk. 10,000 for her when he died. With that asset, she established a school with 5/6 students in 1909 on October 1 at Bhagalpur. But soon she moved to Calcutta. The name of the school was Sakawat Memorial School.
She established an institution named Anzuman Khawatine Islam for women’s rights. She wrote a number of books. These are Motichur (Vol 1 and 2), Padmarag, Abarodhbasini and Sultanar Dream.
We do not know the present condition of the school and the social organisation she established. In this connection, we shall request the ministry of Education to take up the issue with the Government of India in this regard.
Khurshida Haque
Dhaka
Over exposure to crime shows
Nowadays crime TV shows broadcast by almost all TV channels in our country are very popular. But have we ever thought that these TV serialisations of murders and physical torture can traumatise the viewers, particularly the children?
A recent study by Purdue University shows that viewers of crime shows can suffer from ‘mean world syndrome’, the belief that the world is more dangerous than it actually is. Media scholar George Gerbner associates this syndrome with paranoia about victimisation. So I request the authority of our TV channels to present these sensitive programs with more caution. News is important only when it serves public interest.
Ashek Sarker
Comilla
