The arrest of Ragib Ahsan, a man with a religious education and a stint as an Imam has shocked many for his criminal activities. He has looted hundreds of crowers mostly from the ordinary poor and the middle class through the usual MLM scheme which pulled in many. The police have arrested him but so what? No money will be recovered, no compensation will be paid and after a period of time he will be let out. And during this period he will have a lovely time in jail as all biggies do. So he knows what he was doing and the risks involved. Crores have been salted away somewhere and he will one day have full access to it. In the meantime, for those who have lost all their money, there is nothing.
Several issues emerge out of this. It seems, we still believe that anyone with a religious education is honest and clean. This is despite the universal knowledge of many big and petty social crimes committed by the seminary and clergy society. Rural areas are full of anecdotes where such kind of people commits all sorts of crimes including sexual ones. Yet it’s the rural people who had so much faith in him. Does it mean that people tend to have more faith in them as human beings?
The answer is no. If one looks at the MLM scam history, one will see that he could be a first from the clergy world in this business and he had in fact learnt his trade from a non-clergy run MLM where he was doing a part-time job. So, the so-called “secular “ world is the leader in this business and they are overwhelmingly the space occupant of the criminally corrupt world. And people trust them.
However, a man with a religious visage- beard and cap on the head – do have an advantage over others. It’s similar to a female con who would raise less suspicion because women are generally not seen in that role.
Another interesting perspective is that one expects religious and other morality as factor in the life of thieves. There is a general feeling that lack of morals could be the cause of high crime rate particularly scam and swindles and they occupy our mind because it affects ordinary helpless people more. So the explanation is more about the role of religion as a protector of morality hence ordinary people’s safety. Religion is their last hope of protection.
So the shock is that, if religion is not going to protect them, who will? It’s the most ancient of all social traditions but appears unable to help them.
The impact will be of many kinds. Some will have less confidence in faith institutions, some will want to strengthen it and some will cling to it even more. But all together represents a major psycho-social crisis where traditions are seen as crumbling and no new value structure replacing the older ones. This collective existential crisis is a serious one.
