EVERY year, as the Boro harvest nears, anxiety returns to the haor basin. The fields turn golden, the crop is almost ready and national food security quietly depends on a narrow window of time. Then comes the familiar threat: heavy rainfall, upstream water flow, rising rivers, embankment failure, and the possibility that months of labour may be lost in a matter of hours...
BANGLADESH’S agricultural future will be determined not only by how much food it can produce but also by how it powers that production. For decades, discussions on food security have focused primarily on seeds, fertilisers, irrigation coverage and crop yields. Energy, though central to modern agriculture, has often remained a secondary concern. Yet as fuel prices...
IN 2008, during my tenure with the University of Dhaka, I had a three-month postdoctoral fellowship at the Forum on Contemporary Theory in Baroda, India. I made friends with some Indian researchers there. Once I asked one of them about major writers in India. Most of the names they mentioned in response to my question were from Bengal. I wondered and asked...
In today’s hyperconnected world, cybersecurity has evolved from a technical concern into a core element of national security and strategic capability. Nations are no longer judged solely by economic or military strength, but also by their ability to defend digital infrastructure, protect sensitive data and respond effectively to cyber threats. As governments, financial...
THE proposed budget for the 2026–27 financial year is impressive by almost any numerical measures. At Tk 9.38 trillion, it is the largest budget in Bangladesh’s history. Allocations for education and health care have reached unprecedented levels. Social protection programmes have expanded. Tax relief has been offered on a range of essential commodities. Support has been promised for entrepreneurs, freelancers, exporters and vulnerable groups...
EXTREME heat is rapidly becoming one of Bangladesh’s most serious but least acknowledged climate threats. In April 2024, temperatures in parts of the country crossed 42°C during one of the longest and most intense heatwaves on record, forcing school closures and disrupting daily life on a wide scale. The event made clear that extreme heat is no longer an occasional...
THIS happened a decade ago. The chair of the department where I studied at the University of Dhaka in the early 1990s invited me, along with others, to an exchange of views on the Higher Education Quality Enhancement Project, officially HEQEP but jokingly ‘hiccup’ even to many university teachers. The University Grants Commission project, which the World Bank funded, was meant to upgrade university teaching, research and institutional facilities...
MORE than 15 years after his death, Michael Jackson remains one of the most recognisable cultural figures on the planet. New artists continue to dominate charts, social media produces celebrities at unprecedented speed and digital platforms constantly reshape popular culture. Yet Jackson’s influence endures in ways that extend far beyond music. His title as the “King of Pop” survives because he fundamentally changed how entertainment is communicated, consumed and remembered...
THE people of Bangladesh are all too familiar with the deceptive nature of sugar-coated political manifestos, which remain in discussion up until election time and are only to be shelved the moment a party takes office after the election, replaced by policies that often turn out to be deeply anti-people. In a country where commerce, industry, and governance are...
WALK into almost any university canteen in Dhaka and a familiar scene unfolds. Students sit for long hours over laptops, skip proper meals, rely on inexpensive fried snacks and sugary drinks between classes and often stretch their study schedules deep into the night. This is not an unusual or exceptional pattern; it is the everyday rhythm of campus life. Yet behind this...
FOR decades, Bangladesh’s relationship with India has often been described through the language of friendship, history, geography and interdependence. Yet every nation eventually encounters moments when friendship alone is insufficient and sovereignty demands a firmer vocabulary. The recent wave of push-ins by India’s Border Security Force appears to be one such moment...
