The Most Unkindest Cut: What the Oishee Case in Bangladesh points up? Even a great genius like Shakespeare, in his extreme disapproval of ingratitude to fatherly figure, deigned to compromise with grammar. The dramatist used double superlative adjectives [the most unkindest] to bemoan the stabbing of Caesar by Brutus, whom Caesar loved as his son, and he expressed how ingratitude rather than anything else made the great Caesar fall! Shakespeare descanted on various facets of murder: the power-propelled murder in Macbeth instigated by witches, the lust-driven murder of Hamlet’s father by Gertrude abetted by Claudius, the jealousy-steered smothering of sweet Desdemona by foolish Othello pricked by Iago, and so on. Nowhere, however, does it seem to me Shakespeare’s expression is so poignant in “Et, tu Brut!” as anywhere else. THE DENOUEMENT The murder of parents at the hands of their loving daughter in Bangladesh paints an even more sordidly macabre picture. This is so revolting that I am at loss for words! So, even in a modest vein, I would rather couch that in Shakespeare’s terms. Why on earth was such wickedest act committed? Brutus stabbed Caesar because he thought he would do some good to the country. On the contrary, Oishee, young daughter of a policeman, stabbed to death her parents because she wanted to continue unfettered the dissolute lifestyle along the money-splattered primrose path to which she was ushered in by the same doting parents! ETIOLOGY: CRIMPED URGES, SOPORIFIC, AND STABS Her dad made a lot of illegal income –usually what all policemen do in Bangladesh by taking bribes, extorting money from innocent people, torturing people into giving up huge sums, etc. –to live a God-forsaken life and to pander to lavish lifestyle of his wayward daughter. Oishee, when at the height of wanton and licentious lifestyle asked by now-realizing parents to rein in her orgies, decided to lace coffee with high-dose soporific, coax them into drinking that, put them to sleep, and repeatedly stabed them to death. What a daughter! It, however, should not be misconstrued that children in Bangladesh are like that. Far from it. Even King Lear’s ungrateful daughters, angels compared with Oishee, would turn in their graves. Why Oishee did it was that she thrived on ill-gotten money –maybe time was ripe because many innocent lives had complained to God for various types of injustice meted out to them by Oishee’s dad garbed as an implacable monster in uniform. The sprouting of this kind of reprobate lifestyle with the attended lamentable consequences is a recent phenomenon. EPILOGUE In the context of the U.S., Kennedy said in “Profiles of Courage” things should come “not profligately from the top, but sincerely from the bottom.” In the context of Bangladesh, I disagree. For Bangladesh, it is high time there was a complete overhaul through the warp and woof of the whole socio-political fabric.
Posted on: Sat, 24 Aug 2013 21:02:40 +0000
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