By Aasha Mehreen Amin, The Daily Star, Bangladesh- The video a loved one sent me to cheer me up certainly did the trick. It was a very well edited documentary of the Ministry of Religious Affairs about a unique move to solve the problem of men using the walls of the city as public toilets. The film showed how despite explicit written prohibitions in Bangla regarding this on the walls, men of all ages and backgrounds did what they had to do. So the Ministry decided to try a novel method – they wrote the same message in Arabic, which most people consider more sacred than any other language, even if they don’t know what the words say. Miracle of miracles! As soon as they saw the Arabic script, those who had squatted without thinking, quickly got up and left. The film showed some men showing obvious remorse by holding their ears while others actually touched the wall and then their foreheads in reverence. The Minister said with confidence that he was quite certain that he had found the solution to this indiscriminate defiling of public places and soon he would make this a hundred percent success story.
Leave a Reply