Veteran journalist Toab Khan passes away

Dainik Bangla editor and Ekushey Padak-winning journalist Toab Khan passed away.

He breathed his last around 12:40pm today at United Hospital, Sharifuzzaman Pintu, executive editor of the daily, told The Daily Star.

Toab Khan was admitted to the hospital with old-age complications, his colleagues said.

Born on April 24 of 1934 in Satkhira district, he studied in Jagannath College, now a university.

He started his journalism in 1955 through Sangbad. He was the news editor of Dainik Pakistan which was renamed as Dainik Bangla after the independence of the country in 1971.

During the Liberation War, he worked with Swadhin Bangla Betar Kendra also.

Toab Khan was the press secretary to the then Prime Minister Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman in between 1973 and 1975. He later served as chief information officer of Press Information Department and director general of the Press Institute of Bangladesh (PIB).

The eminent journalist joined Bangla daily Janakantha in 1993 as the advisory editor.

Toab Khan received the Ekushey Padak in 2016.

Last year, he joined as the editor of Dainik Bangla again after the newspaper was decided to republish under a new management following a hiatus of around two decades.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has expressed her deep shock at the death of the veteran journalist.