With the much-orchestrateddialogue initiated by President Zillur Rahman coming to an end enlisting theparticipation of the main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), thepeople expected some quick outcome, which however has not come by.

The message was loud and clear. “Stop Tipaimukh Dam” or “We shall boycott your goods.”

In a bitter cold winter on Tuesday afternoon, hundreds of Bangladeshis from Three states (New York, New Jersey and Connecticut) at a human chain before the UN buildings protested against the Indian Government's move to build Tipaimukh Dam which would destroy biodiversity, ruin livelihoods of people and cause economic disaster to Bangladesh.

About three hundred expatriate Bangladeshis staged a demonstration before the United Nations Buildings in New York on 10 January Tuesday protesting the move to construct the proposed Tipaimukh Dam on Barak River at upstream of Bangladesh;s third biggest river, the Meghna.

If our political leaders can diagnose the diseases that have many times in the past obstructed the functioning of democracy, they would also learn to think they are equal members of the same breed ascending to the tentacles of power and sliding back to the opposition in turn, gracefully accepting people’s verdict. Of all diseases that they have to diagnose one is now openly talked about is the absence of consensus about the process of holding general elections.

The people of Bangladesh today celebrates four decades of independence amid festivities. A Victry Day ceremonial parade in Dhaka is marking the day along with a host of other programmes taken up by the government, different political and soci-cultural organisations to celebrate victory of the nine-month War of Independence on this day in 1971 leading to the emergence of Bangladesh as an independent and sovereign nation on the map of the globe.