Adnan R Amin

THE MIDDLE PATH

The writer is a strategy and communications consultant.

The First King of Bengal

Before the tribes and kingdoms of pre-medieval Bengal could unanimously elect Gopala king in 750 CE, they had to endure a hundred years of utter lawlessness, infighting and bloodshed. We know how Gopala’s Pala Dynasty heralded a golden era in Bengal, little is known about the dark age, and what came before.

5y ago

Rifles, but no bullets

If I were the type to actually pour the unholy sherbet of bleaching powder and Harpic down my sink, I would at least keep mum about it. Unshakable faith in the Devil’s Rooh Afza is nothing to be proud of.

5y ago

Adieu, AB

AB is no more. The nation is in his debt, and there's nothing we can do about it. There are murmured demands for some sort of a national tribute or recognition. If you ask me, a man, who has won over hearts, has no use for medals.

6y ago

No merit in quotas

Anyone who has played “alley cricket” will know that it has its own rules: e.g. two “chiefs” get to select players in tandem, and (s)he who sends the ball over the wall must fetch it. Another such rule is that the owner of the bat will have an automatic place on the team. This last provision is an everyday example of a “quota system” where able performers are replaced by those wielding power over the selection process.

6y ago

Poetic Justice

Though he thought he had already died, the old poet found himself stumbling around a shady drugstore. Exhausted, as though from a long descent, the poet fell to the curb in a heap.

7y ago

Rohingyas and the cost of kindness

It is certain that the present Rohingya sensation will soon die down, and be replaced in public memory by something far more banal.

7y ago

Silence Of Friends: Activism in the Modern Era

Social media has opened floodgates of unexamined causes and unstoppable rebels. With the license to post/share anything and zero accountability, young men and women have taken to protests and activism over anything and everything.

7y ago

Social ripples of rape

When alleged rapist Shafat Ahmed and accomplice Shadman Sakif were arrested, and the former's father brought under investigation, I had decided not to write about the rape incident that took place in a hotel in Banani.

7y ago
May 16, 2016
May 16, 2016

A Reasonable Vice

A former family chauffeur was recently suspended from his beloved 'government job'.

May 3, 2016
May 3, 2016

Can climate gather steam?

When a car spontaneously caught fire in Dhaka last week, allegedly from a heated engine, social media comments invoked the ongoing heat-spell.

April 18, 2016
April 18, 2016

Matrix of Biometrics

The man was up against a cave wall, holding his freshly ground and moistened haematite pigment in a coconut shell. He had spent the morning painting two Babirusas (pig-deer) with the chewed, bristly end of a twig. It was a hot day in Borneo; the forest breeze did not reach inside the cave. He was about to wipe the sweat off his brow, when the sight of his arm gave him an idea. He placed his hand against the cave wall and blew paint all over it, leaving an unmistakable imprint on the side of the wall. Little did he know that 40,000 years later – his work of art would dethrone European caves as the earliest instance of human creativity. Unknowingly, he had also become one of the first, deliberate users of biometric information.

April 5, 2016
April 5, 2016

The Laws of Inertia

In 1988, Ershad's predictably dictator-esque declaration of a state religion led to the formation of the Committee to Resist Despotism

March 28, 2016
March 28, 2016

The Strongman returns

It should be no surprise to us that the political 'strongman' has resurged. The very word evokes images of a bare-bodied Vladimir...

March 13, 2016
March 13, 2016

The land of scared ideas

Sixty or seventy years back, higher education for the people of Bengal was a rare commodity. Racial and socioeconomic barriers held

March 2, 2016
March 2, 2016

A Democracy of Crisis

Psychologists have suggested that humans have a natural preference for negative news, the public experience of which they enjoy via mass media. The reason is not necessarily 'schadenfreude' or secret pleasure derived out of other people's misery.

February 3, 2016
February 3, 2016

Collateral of War and Peace

For Bangladesh's global image, January 2016 was not a good month. Allegations of sexual abuse by Bangladeshi peacekeepers

January 23, 2016
January 23, 2016

To burn a mockingbird

It was a windy August day, 1877 C.E. A young, darkish and mostly unimpressive youth was at Nulo Gopal's door...

January 16, 2016
January 16, 2016

Bangladesh at Bloggerheads

Like many Bangladeshis, I started concentrating on and paying closer attention to blogging from 2013. February 2013, to be precise.