Saiful I.

The ravages of the Bangladeshi liberation war in 1971 left many sectors in ruins. Career development opportunities and infrastructure were adversely affected as well, leaving gaping holes in our career development systems. A variety of skills and vocational training opportunities were missing or inadequate to cater for the long-term needs of the young Nation. It is against this backdrop that Democracywatch (DW) came into being in 1995 and started operations at Purana Paltan in Dhaka. Its mission was to offer diverse but relevant courses aimed at developing a new crop of confident young boys and girls armed with useful skills and ready to face the World. DW’s second objective was to train general people, develop civic habits, and organize discussions in order to advance the cause of democracy through civic participation by ingraining civic virtues and norms among the people of Bangladesh. Initial courses were in Life Skills, Democracy, Leadership, English language, Etiquette, Secretarial, Basic computing and many other confidence-building subjects. Through constant innovation, the courses and curricula have grown in terms of quality and variety since then. The organization is now able to offer much more specialized courses using the latest teaching methods and technology in very fine campus. The number of Democracywatch alumni has also grown significantly over the last ten years. It is very common to meet the former students and trainees in many responsible positions and offices all across the country. Most of the former students are proud to have had their training through Democracywatch. They refer to themselves enthusiastically as ‘Democracy watchers’ and have formed a Club by the same name, which is involved in imparting mini-life skills in the rural areas. This is not only a great honor and inspiration to Democracywatch, but also a challenge to heighten the tempo and become the best in terms human resources development.