Clinical All Clear Operation

Its really good to see companies like Banglalink taking initiatives to keep the beaches of Coxsbazar clean and environment friendly. The company has surely identified the potential the largest unbroken sea beach in the world holds. Too bad that those who were supposed to promote it to foreign tourists and make it more tourist friendly, Bangladesh Parjatan Corporation, could do very little about it so far. So what makes Banglalink do what they are doing in the sandy beaches down south? They are supposed to be the 2nd largest mobile telecom operator in Bangladesh, does cleaning beaches fall under their business processes or is it some sort of CSR...or a way to keep the media interested about them? Never mind what the reasons are, that might require yet another post, but the spirit is worthy of praise. In the same way, I was thinking if companies like Unilever Bangladesh could do something innovative in terms of cleaning...cleaning the roads and cleaning the minds of the city dwellers to some extent. Clinic All Clear shampoo is supposed to be the best (according to Unilever) to get rid off dandruffs, If their product is being used by us to keep our heads and hair clean of unwanted dandruffs...I wonder if Unilever could do something clinical to keep the roads in Dhaka clean and/or show the ordinary city dwellers some good practices of living in a city.

For example, a group of Unilever staff could hit the roads of Dhaka on a certain day, or say for a whole week, wearing fancy t-shirts and caps, and be busy picking up garbages from the streets, cigarette butts, kolar chilkas etc....whoever collects the most amount of garbage (in terms of weight), wins a special Clinic City All Clear award. How about that? If you notice, we in Dhaka are very used to doing ourselves and watching others doing the following. The list is not exhaustive, as there is an whole array of weird ways of making the city dirty.

-Spitting from a passing vehicle, or while walking (sometimes its remarkable to see the amount of Niagara falls people carry in their mouth and how far they can throw their load)

-throwing packets, polythene bags, cigarette butts left and right.

-Attending to nature's call in exposed and public locations.

-talking in mobile phone while driving

-Happy honking even if it might be visible that the traffic is not moving the next two miles...

and the list might continue, you might add a few more...and you might also argue that basic etiquettes are taught at home, or at school..what a corporate like Unilever got to do with this and why should they do this? Well...to an extent you are right...but what makes me fumble for an answer is that many of those above antics are performed by people who are supposed to be of good families, possessing good educational degrees and holding high salary jobs...then what explains their behaviour when they do it? Also..you might argue that like in many other countries, there should be heavy fines for those who throw garbage and litter on the street or if talk on mobile phone while driving...but in Bangladesh, laws have always been there, but there had been no enforcement of it...so what do you do in such a case? I sometimes wonder we should have won many gold medals in Olympics beating Michael Phelphs, as Bangladesh is one of the countries where everything is done free style, when I am on the road, I am the road King, every tree is my toilet, every street is my spitbin and dustbin, as thats how things are here...and thats what everybody else does..so why should I be different...so what can be done in such a situation?

White collar employees of Unilever might be thinking that why the hell should they leave their cosy comfort of air conditioned office mansion in Gulshan and walk out in the sun to do the job of a clean sweeper. Well, its true that it might not be part of their job profile, but if they consider themselves more fortunate to be leading a global company like Unilever, its only natural that they will have some obligations to the people and city and the villages...to whom and in which they have been selling their soaps and shampoos. Agreed that you have been doing a lot in the name of CSR...

but also think beyond cleaning dandruff from the hair of Bangladeshi consumers, could you be a bit more innovative in cleaning up the city which you are doing business in and the minds of city dwellers whom you are selling your products to? After all, you taught us to brush our teeth with Close Up, you taught us to shampoo our hair with Clinic All Clear and you promised us that rubbing Lux will make my wife prettier, then why not teach us a few best practices of living in a city, how to keep the city clean and environment friendly, so on and so forth. Korben na?