When sixth grader Runa got her first period, she told her mother, who suggested she use rags as napkins. However, Runa did not receive any other information on the dos and don’ts of menstrual hygiene.

Financial literacy is defined as the ability to recognise and effectively use diversified financial skills, tools and services, especially with reference to personal banking management, investment strategies and budgeting.

The CCTV footage showing the killing of senior ASP Anisul Karim at Mind Aid Psychiatry and De-Addiction Hospital on November 9 has created a renewed focus on the mostly unlicensed and unregulated private clinics that have cropped up across the city in recent years to cater to a “market” of patients who are easy to take advantage of because of the social stigma surrounding their ailment—drug addiction and related psychological or mental health issues.

We are almost at the tail-end of the year 2020. What a year this has been! We haven’t lived it.

The United Nations’ renamed World Social Report 2020 (WSR 2020) argued that income inequality is rising in most developed countries, and some middle-income countries, including China, the world’s fastest growing economy in recent decades.

A common question is how and by whom are prices fixed in the market? The question arises because every now and then the price of one essential consumer item or the other goes up without our notice.

Each time we learn about a potential Covid vaccine, there is jubilation throughout the globe. Perhaps, the most widely and closely tracked things in the world now are the most promising vaccines.

Saudi Arabia has taken multiple steps to polish its tarnished image in advance of this weekend’s hosting of the virtual summit of the G20 that groups the world’s foremost economies and in anticipation of an incoming Biden administration in the United States that is expected to be critical of Riyadh and potentially more conciliatory towards Iran and non-violent Islamists.

President Donald Trump will leave the White House in January, thank goodness. Unfortunately, his malign influence on American politics will remain.

University life is going to be the best time of your life! We often hear this growing up, and yet when we do reach that level, we find that it is not at all what we expected it to be. So, what exactly did we expect and why are we not satisfied?

“Soon to be shadowed”—read the caption of an image on The Daily Star’s front page last week. It featured the iconic Shontrash Birodhi Raju Bhashkarja, and looming over it, the towering structures of Bangladesh’s first-ever metro rail, the MRT 6, still under construction. The image brought into focus an issue that has been a point of contention for the students of the University of Dhaka (DU) for four years now.

Weakened by Joe Biden’s electoral defeat of US President Donald J. Trump, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu risks being caught between a rock and a hard place as Jordan, the Palestine Authority and the United Arab Emirates manoeuvre for control of what is to Jews the Temple Mount and to Muslims the Haram ash-Sharif, the third most holy site in Islam.

The difficulties associated with the transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources such as solar and wind were touched upon in the last US presidential debate, bringing the contentious topic to the forefront again. Hopefully, it’s not too late.

The Mro community of the Chimbuk hills is passing days in great uncertainty.

Despite positive economic growth in recent years, Bangladesh has one of the lowest tax-to-GDP ratios (9.3 percent) in the South Asian region. It is 23.1 percent in Nepal, 16.8 percent in India and 11.0 percent in Pakistan.

I often wonder if I would be any different, feel any different, if I were a mother to a son, rather than a daughter.

The World Bank has finally given up defending its controversial, but influential Doing Business Report (DBR). In August, the Bank “paused” publication of the DBR due to a “number of irregularities” after its much criticised ranking system was exposed as fraudulent.

In the year 1890 during the British colonial regime Hari Mohan Maiti, an adult man aged 35, was charged in the Calcutta High Court with causing the death of his bride Phulmonee who was just about 11-years-old.

Migration continues to be an important agenda due to its role in development.

Recently, Dhaka South City Corporation has brought some changes to its waste collection system, unfortunately creating more dissatisfaction among its inhabitants than relief.