Long Read
Banglabazar: All things book
Walking past the Jagannath University and Dhaka Collegiate School, amid heavy noise of construction work at Dhaka Sadar Post Office, these correspondents heard a voice that cut through the cacophony in narrow lanes of Old Dhaka.
Barind Farmers: At mercy of ‘water lords’
On April 9, Mukul Soren, a Santal farmer in Rajshahi, drank pesticide in a suicide attempt over not getting irrigation water from the same deep tubewell that allegedly led to the suicide of two farmers, also Santals, last year.
Bir Shreshtha portrait: Tale of the brush that brought them to light
The year was 1980. In room 16 of DU’s Shahid Shahnewaz hostel, Sheikh Afzal, a final-year student of Dhaka Art College, was deeply engrossed in painting the portraits of a number of Muktijoddhas. .The 21/22-year-old had very little idea about how they looked in real life..His only c
NARINDA CHRISTIAN CEMETERY / A silent witness to Dhaka’s history
With falling leaves, worn-out epitaphs and gravestones, and rustle of breeze whispering tales from four centuries ago -- Dhaka Christian Cemetery, known to city dwellers as Narinda or Wari cemetery, has been the resting place of many known or unsung heroes for decades.
As I Remember Syed Waliullah, My Papa
Thinking of Syed Waliullah and being his son always triggers contrasting feelings of joy and pride, melancholy and pain. Regrettably, neither my elder sister Simine nor I am able to remember much about our father, as we were both very young when he passed away.
Are we becoming a selfish, uncaring society?
Shemi’s ordeal proves that the ridiculously glamourised notion of the family being the guaranteed support system in drama series and films is grossly overstated.
LONG READ / Arial beel under threat
Arial Beel, one of the largest wetlands located in Munshiganj, is facing an invasion by illegal real estate developers. These business entities have acquired portions of the wetland, filling them up with sand and strategically placing signboards to attract potential buyers for residential development.
Miscarriage in the tea gardens
“We can read it ourselves inside our homes but we can’t organise a reading circle to share the contents of the manual, without
Dissecting your gas bill
Just one paisa of the gas bill being paid by a consumer, means Tk 35 crores in revenue for the utility companies.
The Burden of Proof
While most women who have undergone sexual abuse hide behind anonymity for fear of social reprisal, dance student Priyanka Rani Devnath emailed all the news organisations and called a press conference to talk about the violence she had undergone.
'Murder' it was
"The commissioner has not done anything ... Why are you killing him?" Repeating these words, a female voice kept screaming over a mobile phone moments after hearing a gunshot during a phone call, according to an unverified audio clip.
A war for oil #4: A war built on falsehood
For months and years, George Bush and Tony Blair built the case with certainty that Iraq is an evil power that possessed Weapons
Prison babies: childhood behind bars
What is it like spending the formative early years in one of the most overcrowded prison systems in the world? What protections are there in place to ensure they develop like any other child?
Why your drugs don't work
There are drugs that come as tablets or capsules and can be kept at room temperature. Then there are drugs that patients will not usually handle—reagents used by diagnostic centres to conduct tests or intravenous drugs administered by medical professionals.
MY BODY, THEIR CHOICE
In January this year, a woman in her early twenties named Sonia Akhter was brought to Dhaka Medical College Hospital haemorrhaging from a botched abortion.
Not merely a forest but life
The land mass that rose from the sea bed from the siltation of two mighty rivers, the Ganges and the Brahmaputra, supports a