To the politicians and their vetoes and dismissals of any proposals that might bring some change—what language do you use with them? What of their language that otherises an entire people to dehumanise them?

On a single visit to the Chadni Chowk gully at the Gawsia/New Market area, I had witnessed, store by store, the gradual devolvement of the name for Mysore cotton to Maisha cotton.

In the foreword, I wanted to capture how I, as a child, grew up listening to different stories: ghost stories, mythical stories from both Sanatana and Islamic religious scriptures, and fairy tales from 'Thakurmar Jhuli', compiled by Dakkhinaranjan Mitra Majumdar. It was a time when there were no boundaries for my imagination.

A translation of Ahmed Sofa's essay on Dostoyevsky

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a mom in Dhaka must be in want of a balcony-garden

That was the first time in my life I’d smelled charred meat. I could tell it was different from the kind you’re supposed to eat, and my mother had to hold me as I threw up violently on the side of the street.

For eons piano keys unmoved Lay silently asleep

Surveying the decorated wall now vibrantly alive with Winnie the Pooh and Harry Potter characters, Sarah allowed herself a satisfied grin.

But I bloom like a flower:/ Soft and strong.

Autumn transcended Winter– / Crispness in the air fell pale.

rise, rise—now evening dies: sun-born in valleys with burning olive trees—where  women like me plod one day at a time,

TRIGGER WARNING: Suicide, death, and gore.

For once, can love look like a Sunday morning; filled with warmth, calmness and motionless?

People, places, things  I do not know how I remember 

Sweet cold air finds its way to my lungs,

How do you attempt to understand testimonies of mass public trauma?

wounded limbs heal faster, / than a wounded conscience

Never in his wildest imaginations had Aniket thought that everything would come together so well. Nearly everyone he invited had come.

In abated breaths in freshly-packed, measly-charged tin can rides across the city, two lovers held hands, as if they were born that way.

Sixteen personalities have been named as winners of the Bangla Academy Sahitya Puroshkar (literary award) 2023