A MAN lost his life October 26 after a bearing pad from Dhaka Metro Rail fell from an elevated pier, another headline, another tragedy, another moment when Bangladeshis are forced to ask themselves: Can we trust the systems built to carry us safely home?
This is not the first such incident. Almost exactly a year ago, a similar bearing pad displacement halted metro services for 11 hours, stranding hundreds of commuters from Agargaon to Motijheel. At the time, engineers insisted that the problem was 鈥榯echnical,鈥� not structural. They promised it would not happen again.
Yet here we are. A year later, a human life has been claimed by the very system that was meant to symbolise modernisation and progress, but which has instead become a mirror of institutional decay.
And before that, in 2023, five members of a family, including two children, were crushed to death in Uttara when a massive girder from the BRT project fell on their car. The newlyweds inside survived, but only to carry the memory of a horror caused not by fate, but by gross negligence.
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Pattern of institutional neglect
FROM girder collapses to bearing pad displacements, these are not random accidents. They reveal a systemic failure of accountability in our public institutions, a deep-rooted culture where 鈥榓djustments鈥� replace rules, and informal understandings override safety protocols.
The official response is always the same: a five-member investigation committee, a few days of media attention, and then silence, no transparent report, no resignations, no institutional learning.
Behind every 鈥榯echnical glitch鈥� is a chain of bureaucratic complacency, political patronage and corruption, a culture in which accountability is negotiable and safety secondary to speed and profit.
When a bearing pad falls from a metro line within a year of its inauguration, citizens do not see a technical issue, they see the collapse of trust.
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Political economy of negligence
INFRASTRUCTURE in Bangladesh is not just about development; it is deeply political. Mega projects like the metro rail, flyovers, or BRT lines are showcases of progress, symbols of power and performance for governments eager to claim development success.
Yet within these projects lies a shadow economy of informal exchanges: contractors tied to political networks, oversight boards compromised by influence, and safety audits that exist more on paper than in practice.
When negligence kills, no single actor is held accountable, because responsibility is diffused across an opaque web of institutions.
This is what political economists call the 鈥榩olitical settlement of corruption鈥�, a situation in which corruption is tolerated because it maintains elite stability. Reform becomes cosmetic and citizens grow numb to failure.
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Moral cost: citizen trust
EVERY institution relies on an invisible currency 鈥� trust.
Citizens step onto a metro believing that unseen professionals have ensured their safety. They drive under cranes assuming that someone, somewhere, checked the load limits.
But when oversight collapses, citizens lose faith not just in a project, but in the idea of the state itself.
They begin to believe that this is simply how things work in Bangladesh.
That fatalism, that quiet, learned tolerance of corruption, is the most dangerous informal institution of all. It allows the same tragedies to repeat, again and again, without mass outrage, without sustained reform. When citizens stop demanding accountability, governments stop fearing the consequences of failure.
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Whom should we ask?
WHICH government should we hold accountable? The truth is: all of them.
These failures did not begin yesterday and they will not end tomorrow. Corruption and institutional weakness in Bangladesh are structural, not partisan. Each successive government inherits and sustains a system where safety, transparency and public trust are treated as optional.
This is not a question of politics; it is a question of governance ethics.
Who ensures that the metro rail鈥檚 bearing pads are properly installed?
Who certifies the cranes lifting tons of concrete over busy roads?
Who inspects the safety measures for projects funded by billions of taxpayer taka?
And when something goes wrong, who answers to the families who never see their loved ones return?
Until these questions have real answers, citizen trust will remain broken and development will remain hollow.
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Rebuilding trust
TRUE progress requires more than concrete and steel. It demands institutional integrity.
Bangladesh must act urgently to strengthen oversight and accountability in public infrastructure projects. This requires the establishment of independent, legally empowered safety bodies to monitor all major projects, alongside mandatory public disclosure of investigation findings following every significant accident. Equally important is the protection of whistleblowers and engineers who report negligence, ensuring that those who speak out are not penalised.
Finally, a citizens鈥� oversight mechanism should be created to involve the public directly in monitoring urban megaprojects, fostering transparency and rebuilding trust in the institutions meant to safeguard their lives.
And above all, we, the citizens, must reject the culture of silent acceptance. Reform begins not when the government promises accountability, but when the public refuses to tolerate negligence as normal.
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Right to return home
EVERY commuter who steps out in the morning deserves to return home safely. That is not a privilege, it is a fundamental right. Until Bangladesh鈥檚 institutions uphold that right with seriousness and transparency, no metro rail, no bridge and no development milestone can truly claim to represent progress.
The bearing pad that fell in Dhaka this week was not just a piece of metal, it was a symbol of how far trust itself has fallen.
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Suborna Akther Laboni is a research associate at Dacca Institute of Research and Analytics.