Dhaka, May 2 -- When Daud or poet Daud Haider passed away, last week it was almost with a relief that I took the news. I was expecting it and very ready because I knew what he was going through and what he had become as he lay in the hospital waiting to die. He had an accident a few months back falling down the stairs, had a stroke, was diagnosed in the hospital with his second or third bout of cancer and lost his power of speech and movement. You rarely get worse than that.

As he lay in the hospital, all he could do was stare. However, he managed to communicate that he was a victim of an accident and not an attack by anyone. That was all that he could convey, his last moments were shrouded in the same careless mystery that can't fully e...