Why Army Officers have to be in charge of the Border Guards?
If an Army officer chooses to move, he or she should be known as officer of the Guards, not an officer of the Army.
Like us, many of the nation probably came to know about the fact that BDR never had its own officers. If police can have their own officer, if Navy can have their own officers, if BAF can have their own officers, why can't BDR could have their own officers? We don't see any justification for preventing this paramilitary force to recruit, train and retain their own officers. We have not seen any logical explanation or discussion on this topic.
Currently, there is an effort to come up with new reform ideas to inject new life to this force, this is particularly important in the backdrop of the mutiny incident that happened last February. However, any reform is likely to result in any significant improvement unless this fundamental question that raised here is addressed. So, Mr. Faruk Khan, the central person in this effort, would you share your thoughts on this issue?
Also, while you guys are doing this, why don't you also look at the coast guard? What is the relationship between coast guard and Bangladesh Navy? Is it the same situation over there, too? Are Navy officers, too, always in charge of Coast Guard? If yes, why?
Let us finish this article with some thoughts on the name.
It makes sense to have some coordination between Border Guard and Coast Guard. May be these two forces have a common command strucutre. Bangladesh Guards could be the name for the combined force which would have to components - Bangladesh Border Guard and Bangladesh Coast Guard. It also makes sense to have close coordination between the two since they are dealing with the same problem, same objective which is to protect the international boundary of Bangladesh during peace times.
The policy makers, the ministers, the opposition leaders, the parliamentary committee on defence matters, the prime minister - all the policy makers should look at the common sense that we have talked about in this article. None of you should be driven by fear or something else, but you should only be driven by what is good for the country. Bless you all.
To the newly elected MPs, for God's sake, use your head to think about policy and discuss about them instead of focusing on how much interference you can make in other peoples' territory.
If you thought some of the ideas are worth of your reading time, please forward it to others. If you have an ear to the columnists in regular traditional media, please forward it to them. If you have an ear to the journalists and news editors of the electronic media, discuss it with them. Hope they would look at the suggestions and give due diligence.
Thanks for your time,
Innovation Line
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Note: This is a freelance column, published mainly in different internet based forums. This column is open for contribution by the members of new generation, sometimes referred to as Gen 71. If you identify yourself as someone from that age-group and want to contribute to this column, please feel free to contact. Thanks to the group moderator for publishing the article as Creative Commons contents.
After election of December 2008, we have been silent - we are observing what Hasina government does with the trial of war criminals. We would stay silent until we really make up our mind about the intention of war criminal trial by AL government. But this article is one of the few exceptions which needed immediate attention.
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