Forewarning can minimise the devastation of river erosion
We have been witnessing increasing incidents of river erosion this year, which has already devoured vast areas of croplands and homesteads of people across the country. Do you think river erosion has been causing more damage this year compared to previous years?
12 October 2019, 18:00 PM
‘Bilateral approach without powerful underwriting will not solve the Rohingya crisis’
A sustainable solution to the crisis is contingent upon the voluntary repatriation of the Rohingya people to their homeland in Rakhine state in Myanmar, with their safety, security and dignity ensured. After two failed attempts to set the repatriation process on its due
30 September 2019, 18:00 PM
What’s stopping students with disabilities from pursuing education?
Many of us are probably not aware of the condition known in medical science as cerebral palsy, which affects a child’s muscle tone, movement, and motor skills.
22 September 2019, 18:00 PM
Achieving universal literacy status: How far have we progressed?
Right after the country’s independence, when the literacy rate in the country was 16.8 percent (according to UNICEF), a group of young people in Kochubari-Krishtopur, a village of Thakurgaon, started a movement to make all the villagers literate.
12 September 2019, 18:00 PM
City corporations’ inaction and people’s woes
With more than three and a half lakh people already having been infected with dengue fever, as per a report by the daily Prothom Alo on July 23, the dengue situation in the country has gone totally out of control. However, data from the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) shows that a total of 7,766 people have been infected till July 23 this year. This is because the DGHS only keeps track of data of some particular hospitals and clinics, and those who were infected but did not go to a hospital were excluded from government estimates.
24 July 2019, 18:00 PM
Why filing complaints is absolutely necessary
I assume there is hardly anyone amongst us who has never felt cheated after buying a product or taking a service in exchange for money.
2 July 2019, 18:00 PM
The challenges in reviving our jute sector
It seems that the present crisis in the state-owned jute mills will hardly be over with the Tk 169.14 crore allocated by the government to the Bangladesh Jute Mills Corporation (BJMC) to pay the workers their dues.
29 May 2019, 18:00 PM
Striking a balance between development and environment
Just as a country’s development cannot be sustainable without a properly functioning democracy, development without environmental protection is also bound to fail. While Bangladesh is advancing with its various development projects at a fast pace...
3 May 2019, 18:00 PM
We live, if our forests live
Different organisa-tions working with forests and the environment have come up with different estimates of Bangladesh's total forest coverage. While the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change estimates that Bangladesh currently has 17 percent forestland,
18 April 2019, 18:00 PM
Let Nusrat's demise strengthen our demand for justice
Nobody can survive after suffering 75-80 percent burn injuries. Despite this fact, we had hoped that Nusrat Jahan Rafi would somehow survive, by a miracle perhaps.
11 April 2019, 18:00 PM
Raising our children amidst poisonous air
This is no city to raise your children in,” a friend was telling me the other day. “Either you leave the country or leave the city and go somewhere where your kids don't have to breathe poison.”
5 April 2019, 18:00 PM
When teachers are threatened for revealing the truth
During the last days of March in 1971, when there was fear among everyone at Dhaka University—the teachers, students and general staff—that the university could be attacked by the Pakistan military anytime, Jyotirmoy Guha-thakurta, a professor of English department of the university, was the provost of Jagannath Hall.
29 March 2019, 18:00 PM
'We should not use groundwater for the next 15/20 years'
The depletion of groundwater table in Dhaka has made water crisis in the city acute, especially during the dry season. What are the reasons behind this?
21 March 2019, 18:00 PM
Old Dhaka needs a change from within
Mubasshar Hussain, architect and vice president, Bangladesh Poribesh Andolon (BAPA), talks to Naznin Tithi of The Daily Star
4 March 2019, 18:00 PM
'There are more inequalities now than there were in the 70s'
Anthropologist Dr Jenneke Arens lived in Bangladesh from 1973 to 1975 to do a study of power relations between poor and rich peasants and the position of women in a village.
18 February 2019, 18:00 PM
Will mega projects provide genuine solutions?
Bangladesh Delta Plan 2100 is aimed at ensuring food and water security and coping with disasters through water resource management. Could you please elaborate on how this mega scheme is going to achieve those goals? If this plan is implemented, will our rivers get back their natural flow?
8 February 2019, 18:00 PM
Pratik's death and irregularities in the university recruitment process
The recent case of suicide of Taifur Rahman Pratik, a student of Genetics Engineering and Biotechnology Department at Shahjalal University of Science and Technology (SUST), because of the alleged injustices done to him by his teachers,
26 January 2019, 18:00 PM
Hill teachers in dire straits: They deserve to live in dignity
It may be hard to believe but Rajendra Lal Tripura, an assistant teacher of Hamachang Forungni Govt. Primary School, has not been getting his salary for the last two years.
15 January 2019, 18:00 PM
Closing the gender gap in women's political empowerment
The World Economic Forum's “Global Gender Gap Report 2018”, published before the last general election in the country, has surprised many as it placed Bangladesh in the 5th position among 149 countries in terms of closing the gender gap in the sub-index “political empowerment”.
8 January 2019, 18:00 PM
What this election means for young voters
Contrary to popular belief that our young generation is indifferent about politics, our universities, colleges and even schoolgoing children have proved in the recent past that they are not only politically conscious but also willing to play their part when it's time. This was proved during the recent quota reform movement as well as the road safety movement.
27 December 2018, 18:00 PM