Thursday, January 26, 2006
Wind of Change in South Asia:
(Cross posted at Adda’s Bangla Blog)
We live in the world of rapid change. Things are changing faster than what we imagine. I remember, when we were young we used to tune news on the radio; we used to listen and think. All the news sources were unidirectional to the listeners. Now, suddenly everything is getting changed. We are no longer listening or watching; now we are speaking out loudly, forcefully, and courageously. We are witnessing the unimaginable rise of information revolution where we can write independently in the virtual world. We are blogging to express our own ideas, share our joys and pains with the rest of the world.
The most amazing thing happened in Bangladesh on December 16, 2005 when Somewhere in, a Norwegian company in Bangladesh, inaugurated blogging platform in Bangla. It named Badh Bhangar Awaz as it implies the sound of breaking off the dam to unlock the free expression of motions, emotions, interactions in Bangla blogs. Their site has already received over a hundred thousand hits within a month. All the would-be and real thinkers, writers, critics, singers are now flocking at the Bangla site to express themselves.
When people are looking for enlightment, this is the beginning of a new era where bloggers express themselves to bring out the most unseen and the most hidden treasures of unexpressed minds in the obscure corner of South Asia. The beginning of the Desicritics is another victory for all of us where all the South Asian people will join the rest of the world to tell their side of stories. It is really the beginning of the end of the digital divide. Indeed, Noble Laureate poet Rabindranath Tagore imagined that real awakening of human minds in a fearless undivided world that we still have a long way to reach when he says,
“Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high;
Where knowledge is free;
Where the world has no been broken into fragments by narrow domestic walls;
Where words come out from the depth of truth...
Into the heaven of freedom, my Father,
let my country awake.”
We live in the world of rapid change. Things are changing faster than what we imagine. I remember, when we were young we used to tune news on the radio; we used to listen and think. All the news sources were unidirectional to the listeners. Now, suddenly everything is getting changed. We are no longer listening or watching; now we are speaking out loudly, forcefully, and courageously. We are witnessing the unimaginable rise of information revolution where we can write independently in the virtual world. We are blogging to express our own ideas, share our joys and pains with the rest of the world.
The most amazing thing happened in Bangladesh on December 16, 2005 when Somewhere in, a Norwegian company in Bangladesh, inaugurated blogging platform in Bangla. It named Badh Bhangar Awaz as it implies the sound of breaking off the dam to unlock the free expression of motions, emotions, interactions in Bangla blogs. Their site has already received over a hundred thousand hits within a month. All the would-be and real thinkers, writers, critics, singers are now flocking at the Bangla site to express themselves.
When people are looking for enlightment, this is the beginning of a new era where bloggers express themselves to bring out the most unseen and the most hidden treasures of unexpressed minds in the obscure corner of South Asia. The beginning of the Desicritics is another victory for all of us where all the South Asian people will join the rest of the world to tell their side of stories. It is really the beginning of the end of the digital divide. Indeed, Noble Laureate poet Rabindranath Tagore imagined that real awakening of human minds in a fearless undivided world that we still have a long way to reach when he says,
“Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high;
Where knowledge is free;
Where the world has no been broken into fragments by narrow domestic walls;
Where words come out from the depth of truth...
Into the heaven of freedom, my Father,
let my country awake.”
