While schools are primarily responsible for facilitating schooling activities for the students, there are other factors as well that play crucial roles in ensuring the best learning experiences. Community partnership is one of them.

On the occasion of International Literacy Day, proclaimed by the United Nations in 1966, there will be pronouncements with much fanfare about the vital role of literacy in national development and the progress that has been made.

When you first read it, it may seem like something scripted for the silver screen: the story of a Bangladeshi woman who is struck by an awful tragedy—her 17-year-old daughter lured away by traffickers and forced to work in a brothel in India.

As Indian Foreign Secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla was wrapping up his talks with senior US officials in Washington on the evolving situation in Afghanistan,

Imagine a scenario where a restaurant chain, famous for chicken dishes, is forced to shut down dozens of its outlets due to supply shortage.

The US withdrawal from Afghanistan will likely clarify what the Gulf’s security options are.

To be fair, modern media is white men’s invention. Even though the Chinese invented paper and printing, Gutenberg’s type-set printing of papal indulgences and the Bible launched media into the religious, commercial and cultural space, which initiated the Industrial Revolution and imperialism.

When I talk about Bangladesh’s climate change response, I get excited by the thought of three milestones.

On some level, the pandemic weighs down on every single human being - those of us who are still fortunate enough to live through these times. There continues to be people whose actions (or inactions) directly contribute to the loss of innumerable lives. I have not yet been able to process the mindset they have or where they are coming from. All I know is that I am prompted to withhold my judgement (at least for the anti-vaxxers and the people denying the pandemic, not for the reckless partiers and travellers). The existence of this group of people serves as yet another reminder or blatant proof of the failings of modern society, especially because of its ever-increasing polarisation.

Some days ago, an elderly woman came to my office to open a bank account for her domestic help.

As the Covid pandemic drags on and schools and universities continue to remain closed, children and youth in particular are tired of being cooped up at home. Serious as they are, it is not just the loss of livelihoods and education that affect us; we need to have social contact, relaxation, and recreation.

There is mounting evidence from around the world that the Covid-19 pandemic has not been gender-neutral. In the developing world, women are bearing the brunt of the secondary effects of the pandemic—both economically and socially.

Abul Mansur Ahmad was a polymath well-known for his work as a writer, journalist, editor, legal expert and politician at the same time. Few others possessed such a diverse set of talents—in that he remains unmatched in contemporary history.

In its fight against the Covid-19 pandemic, India achieved two milestones in five days between August 27 and 31 while vaccinating its people. Both relate to a new high in the number of vaccine recipients—1.03 crore doses on August 27, and 1.28 crore on the last day of a month that saw nearly 18 crore doses being administered, up from 13.45 crore in July and 11.97 crore in June.

Now that the United States’ destructive 20-year war in Afghanistan has ended, Afghans tremble at the last laugh of the Taliban.

About 56 million children in 130,000 primary and secondary schools in the United States, including about six million students in 30,000 private schools, are returning to a second school year this autumn under the spell of the pandemic,

The Covid-19 pandemic, rising rates of global poverty and inequality, persistent conflict, and the escalating climate and biodiversity crises are shocks and stresses that together contribute to increasing hunger, as well as growing food and nutrition insecurity. To help tackle this urgent problem more effectively, and make the global food system more stable and resilient,

Seeing the varying degrees of Covid that the world has experienced over the last one and a half years, we can safely assume that this pandemic is here to stay.

The Taliban have taken over Afghanistan—that is yesterday’s news. That thousands of distressed Afghans were crowding Kabul Airport to try and escape the country has also become an old fact.

Captain Nawshad Ataul Quaiyum has passed away. The world goes on, you and I go back to work, and perhaps everyone will soon cease to talk about him except occasionally—even the hundreds of passengers he saved back in 2016. Everyone, except his family. But today my heart is heavy, and so I can’t help but write.