Mir Ashfaquzzaman Old habits die hard, so they say. Look at our government, political leaders and civil society stalwarts, you will know why. On December 20, the Indian television channel CNN-IBN ran a story titled ‘6-member team out to kill ex-Bangladesh PM Hasina’. The interim government of Fakhruddin Ahmed was quick to respond and decided to beef up security for the Awami League president, Sheikh Hasina. Three days letter, the Rapid Action Battalion recovered three improvised hand grenades from a village in Comilla an hour after the Bangladesh Nationalist Party chairperson, Khaleda Zia, addressed an election rally four kilometres away. The government was again quick to respond. They arrested two suspected operatives of the banned Islamist organisation Jamaatul Mujahideen Bangladesh. (A couple of days later, seven more members of Jamaatul Mujahideen were arrested in Gaibandha.) So far so good. But soon things started getting downhill. Hasina accused Khaleda of making attempts to ‘keep off the December 29 polls’. And the rambling and ranting began. The stalwarts of the so-called civilised threw in their two pence worth. The conspiracy theorists went on an overdrive. The interim government, almost predictably, fanned the fire, with one of its advisers trying to downplay the perceived threat on the lives of the two top leaders of the country. The police chief went one step further. ‘Threats were issued through leaflets and CDs…I do not think these have got any strong base… I do not find anything authentic in this regard,’ he said. Authentic or not, a threat on the life of one or the other prime minister is serious business and certainly not a topic for banality. Unfortunately, seriousness does seem missing and banality too strong to overlook. Like it or not, the two ladies have come to be the symbol of the country’s political process and have been its prime driving force for many years now. Sometimes, it seems from the uttering of the two former prime ministers that even they themselves do not appreciate that. Rivalry is not necessarily a bad thing but there is something pathological, as opposed to logical, about the rivalry between the two top leaders of the country. It has become an old habit of sort for them, an old habit that refuses to die but needs to die.