It is a tendency among the officers to behave like political activists. This is just to get benefits from sycophancy. Since 1975, the governments have preferred sycophants, however inefficient, to operate as their activists.

The modern Bangladeshi OSDs under BNP-Jamaat regime, assigned as such on political consideration (especially those with a Liberation War background) have a tough time of it. They have, like me, no extra money that has to be paid as commission for a better posting, and by definition, are out of favour with the regime. They can only sit idle, not knowing what to do or whom to approach.

Today, a civil servant works under tremendous pressure, whether in the field, attached departments, corporations, or in the secretariat. When he refuses to toe the line, or resists partisan pressure, or due to his background, he is often subjected to harassment or punitive actions. Some civil servants succumb to pressure, or often volunteer in hope of personal gains, while many more suffer for their commitments to rule of law, impartiality, and conscience.

The result is a growing frustration among civil servants who are alienated for being fair and non-partisan. They go unsung and un-honoured. The syndrome is unleashed in its ugliest form when a new government assumes power. It has become the trend that, along with the new political party centers, a new set of civil servants enter the corridor of power. They are the confidantes of political elements with whom they have been maintaining surreptitious contacts. In the incubatory days of a nascent government they wield tremendous influence, and use this fluid situation to settle their personal scores with fellow colleagues.

The result is retirement, supersession, posting as OSD, even bogus corruption/criminal charges. In the first few months the situation reaches such a pass that an officer would hurriedly scan the daily newspaper before going to office in the morning, only to be sure that he was still in the job. Those were indeed nerve-wracking months for many civil servants. As time rolled on, symptoms of politicisation became more pronounced in matters of promotion and transfer.

Hundreds were made OSD, and the set criteria for promotion was flouted. There are instances of officers making meteoric jumps from the level of deputy secretary to take charge of a ministry in less than two years, whereas officers with requisite qualification working as joint secretary for more than 12 years are superseded, and made to work under their juniors.

Forced retirement, contractual appointment, promotion and posting on political grounds during the last four years seem to have demoralised even the police administration. The government has sacked some 1,000 police officers for reasons other than corruption. The print media had said that victimization, on political grounds, in the department began immediately after the BNP-led four party alliance assumed power in 2001.

During my OSD-ship, I had a peculiar experience of the unbecoming attitude of some junior officers at the level of deputy secretary (DS) while visiting a senior minister who is also a key office bearer of the ruling party.

The private secretary to the minister said: "Sir, you might have forgotten that we are here only because we have to act for the present government. We were thirteen deputy secretaries who got mobile telephones for sending daily report to 'that house.'"

Till that day I did not know the meaning of "that house" -- Hawa Bhaban. It may be recalled that the names of these officers were disclosed in a news item in the daily Janakantha on October 28. It is a revealing story. Everybody should be aware of these gentlemen, and how some civil servants have become a part of the espionage system of a political party.

Perhaps it was because I was the only freedom fighter Hindu officer in Bangabhaban, but I was made OSD in November 2001.

The Bangladesh nation-state gave me honour, identity, and the power of persistence and perseverance to bear the humiliation as a freedom fighter Hindu at the fag end of service.

My memories are filled with humiliations in the post-October 2001 period. I retired from service in September 2001, after I had witnessed the passing of three and a half decades in which 23 presidents (including 2 chief martial law administrators), 7 vice-presidents, 13 prime ministers, 3 chief advisers to caretaker government and 31 advisors, and 425 ministers including advisors to martial law regimes, and state and deputy ministers, served the successive governments of Bangladesh since April 10, 1971.

I can confidently say that the year 2001 was an eventful year of humiliation and abuse, with a political strategy of vilifying the freedom fighter officers, particularly the minorities, in the government services.

The initial few weeks' time of the new government was marred by violence against the minority community -- particularly the Hindus -- by ruling party activists. The home minister and the foreign minister, however, contested the claims and termed the reports baseless or exaggerated.

Be that as it may, there is no scope for the government to remain complacent with the plea that the matter has been exaggerated, nor should any quarter overplay or magnify the issue with a view to discrediting Bangladesh, where communal harmony has been the best, excepting occupational rapture, under the given geo-political and economic situation. No civilized society could embark upon such unjust acts.

What are the faults of these innocent Hindus? Nothing, excepting exercising their democratic rights. Since the Hindus and other minorities here are weak, scattered, not organized, vulnerable, it is easy to attack them, loot them, rape the women, kill them, and then forget these crimes easily.

The legacy of defiling freedom fighters is now becoming a fashion with a section of the bureaucracy.

Leaving the ministry after meeting with the minister on that occasion, I looked outside the corridor at the sun that was setting in the west, and the darkness that was approaching swiftly, and said to myself, "Who governs the government? Whither Bangladesh, my dreamland?"

Rabindranath Trivedi is a retired Additional Secretary and former Press Secretary to the President of Bangladesh.