DHAKA: Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina on Tuesday categorically said Bangladesh has set an example in making the writer and social reformist Begum Rokeya’s dream of Naristhan (Land of women) come true to some extent.

Mentioning that the premier, opposition leader, speaker of the Parliament and its deputy leader all are women, she further said it was not possible to move on along with women only, though.

Sheikh Hasina made the observations in the ‘Begum Rokeya Padak-2014’ distribution ceremony on Begum Rokeya Day at Osmani Memorial Auditorium in city at noon.

Professor Momtaz Begum and social-worker Golap Banu received the award this year for their contributions for development of women.

However, Begum Rokeya’s ‘Sultana’s Dream’ is a classic work of Bengali science fiction as well as one of the first examples of feminist science fiction.

This short story was written in 1905 by the Muslim feminist, writer and social reformer who lived in the then British India, now Bangladesh.

The word sultana here means a female sultan, a Muslim ruler.

The book depicts a feminist utopia in which women run everything and men are secluded, in a mirror-image of the traditional practice of purdah.

In the story, women are aided by science fiction-esque “electrical” technology which enables farming without labor and flying cars; the female scientists have discovered how to trap solar power and control the weather.

This results in “a sort of gender-based Planet of the Apes where the roles are reversed and the men are locked away in a technologically advanced future.”

Crime is eliminated, since men were considered responsible for all of it. The workday is only two hours long, since men used to waste six hours of each day in smoking. The religion is one of love and truth.

BDST: 1252 HRS, DEC 09, 2014