Saarc and Sheikh Hasina

Unfortunately, her decision not to attend the 13th Saarc Summit here in Dhaka does not meet the standard of my expectation from her. I believe, whatever may be her reasons, she made a big mistake by not attending the Summit and missed an opportunity to be viewed as a world-class leader. The worst part of the whole thing is that she is giving an excuse of Monga for her such decision. She was visiting the Monga-affected areas and distributing food among hungry people while the Summit was going on in Dhaka. Her feelings for hungry people of Monga-affected areas cannot be denied; however, I will most definitely question her sense of judgement as a leader and the timing to show such feelings for the affected people. Could she have employed her trusted party members to distribute food among the hungry people for a mere three or four days on her behalf while she could have attended the Summit? Or was she using Monga as an escape route for not attending this historic Summit? I hope not.