Daily Lessons from Life 12 July 2010 - Bangladesh police bust extortion town

"Bangladesh police bust extortion town Mon, Jul 12, 2010 AFP

DHAKA - Bangladesh's elite security forces said Monday they had made a major breakthrough in the fight against extortion with a raid on town where nearly every resident was involved in racketeering.

A series of raids on Lundhi, 90 kilometres (60 miles) south of the capital Dhaka and home to 2,000 people, led to 11 arrests, including two ringleaders of gangs using mobile phones to extort money.


'We believe 80 percent of extortion-related threats made over mobile phones in Bangladesh originate from this village,' Rapid Action Battalion officer Colonel Mamum Mahmud told AFP."

It is a cultural thing right? Nearly everyone of the 2000 residents of this village engaged in extortion! Wow! This is exemplification of an entrenched culture where everyone is doing what almost everyone else is doing for a living!!

Lessons for me are:

1. human are social animal and will do anything to be part of the group, especially those without a very strong commitment to integrity and doing the right things'

2. technology itself is neutral while its usage by human for good and evil made technology a culprit to blame for socially unacceptable actions on the young and old;

3. to change an entrenched culture and lifestyle habit will be most challenging. It must starts with understanding: 'Why people in this small village engaged in mobile phone extortion?' When, and if, we get to the root causes, we can begin to try to solve the puzzle. No one, I believed, want to live a life of criminality!

May the village survive this bust by turning over a new leaf - with resolve and luck!