Many of them could not believe that Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina herself is in their front. It was an unbelievable event for them to talk to the Prime Minister.

“For Allah’s sake, I can’t believe that you are talking to us,” said a laborer in Mymensingh dialect.

In reply, the PM said: You brought me here. Gono Bhaban will not feed the rich people. As long as I am here, (Gono Bhaban) will feed you.

The day laborers had talks with the Prime Minister at Gono Bhaban last Saturday evening.

On her way to her official residence after the National Film Awards ceremony, Sheikh Hasina desired to talk to the laborers who worked to clean the lake inside the Gono Bhaban.

She asked to stop her car and, to their utter surprise, the PM appeared in front of the workers.

According to a facebook post of PM’s Special Assistant Mahbubul Hoque Shakil, the PM had earlier treated the laborers, numbering about 150, with lunch inside the Gono Bhaban.

She also gave some gifts for their families.

Referring to the lunch hosted by the Prime Minister, one worker told her: We had a wonderful lunch with the polau and mangsho.

“You are my guests,” was the reply of the PM.

Shakil in his FB post, titled “an evening without media focus, Bangladesh’s PM or Sheikh Hasina with day-laborers”, said: We saw grateful eyes of the workers filled with tears when they met the Prime Minister.

“Once again we saw how Bangladesh’s PM appears to be a daughter of Bangabandhu, how she appears to be a mother... she is Sheikh Hasina,” wrote he PM’s Special Assistant.

As a note, Mahbubul Hoque Shakil also mentioned that the facebook post might have been violation of secrecy condition of his service, “but I did it.”

BDST 1131 HRS, May 12, 2014