PLASTERS having flaked off the ceiling in several rooms of the Dr Muhammad Shahidullah Hall in the University of Dhaka has once again exposed the neglect of student safety. A large chunk of plaster came off the ceiling of a bathroom in an extension building of the hall early July 29. While no injuries were reported, resident students say that such incidents are far from...
ROAD safety has continuously been put at bay as the number of fatal accidents has only increased for seven years since the road safety movement in 2018 after a bus killed two college students in Dhaka on July 29 that year. The government made the Road Transport Act 2018 in September that year. Police data show that 2,635 died in road accidents...
DHAKA appears to be hurtling towards an ecological disaster as its last remaining trees and water bodies are being wiped out in the name of development. A recent Change Initiative study shows that in 44 years, the capital has lost a half its tree cover and 60 per cent of its water bodies. The research shows that green coverage fell from 21.6 per cent in 1980 to 11.6 per cent in...
THIS is unfortunate that the interim government, which assumed office after the overthrow of the Awami League government on August 5, 2024 in an uprising that began on July 1 that year as student protests against civil service job reservations, has yet to comprehensively enlist all who died and became wounded at the hand of law enforcers who were aided by the...
THE interim government鈥檚 instituting a national pay commission to decide on an increase in the salary of public servants in six months has come as a surprise to economists, especially amidst a chronic revenue shortfall, growing government borrowing and increased inflation. The pay commission has come in less than a month after the interim government introduced...
THE continuation of extrajudicial killing and custodial death during the tenure of the interim government, which was installed after a political changeover that promised meaningful changes in governance, is worrying. Right group Odhikar in its latest report, published on July 24, says that at least 29 people were extrajudicially killed between August 9, 2024 and this June 30...
THE death of Bangladeshis continues at the hands of India鈥檚 Border Security Force, with at least 34 having died, after being shot or tortured by the Indian guards, during one year of the interim government. Rights group Ain O Salish Kendra says that 15 died in firing and from torture by the Indian guards in January鈥揓une. Two were killed in January, one in February, three in...
A PERSISTENT decline in private-sector credit growth is concerning as it has direct, adverse impact on industrial expansion, investment and job creation. Bangladesh Bank data show that private-sector credit growth fell to 6.40 per cent in June 2025, the lowest level...
THE police arrested former chief justice ABM Khairul Haque at Dhanmondi in Dhaka in the morning on July 24. A court in the evening sent him to jail in connection with a case filed on July 6, 2025 with the Jatrabari police for the murder of a young man, shot dead...
ACADEMIC activities continue to remain stalled at the Khulna University of Engineering and Technology after the students assaulted their teachers in February. An absence of the vice-chancellor has only added to the academic stalemate, putting teachers, general students and their guardians in trouble. This appears so as academic activities had been stalled for more than...
THE legacy of filing cases against hundreds of unnamed people, as has been by successive governments, including the authoritarian Awami League government, regrettably persists. After the Awami League regime was toppled in an uprising, it was expected that the abuse of legal devices would end. But the legacy, unfortunately, continues apace. In the recent examples, the...
