Ahrar Ahmad

Today, the question of being a 'good teacher' generates a new vernacular.

The two words in the title are evocative, complex and slippery.  What after all is “home”, and what does “displacement” really mean? 

The “idea” of a constitution may be old.  After all even Aristotle had written about them. 

On September 2, the student front of a political party announced its intention to form committees in 16 private universities.  It was greeted with apprehension and alarm. 

Under what authority can the police make such a demand and compel its acceptance?

If Marcellus saw the picture of college students brutalising an innocent man, he would surely have said to Hamlet that “something is rotten in the state of Denmark.

Prof Rehman Sobhan (RS) continues to amaze.

Badruddin Umar may not necessarily be a very popular person. That statement is a little ironic for two reasons. First, he is the pre-eminent “popular” (people’s) scholar and second, given his tastes and preferences, he would probably wear that judgement as a badge of honour.

Given the doubts, confusions and anxieties of the modern age, it is perhaps expected—and certainly obvious—that there is a resurgence of religiosity almost everywhere.

Bangladesh offers many important insights and perspectives in these grim and uncertain times. They indicate the uniqueness that defines us as a people, and the original contributions we are making to the world of politics and governance.

I am fortunate, indeed blessed, to have been a part of Dhaka University (DU) as a student and a teacher from 1967-75.

One of the grand paradoxes facing Bangladeshis is expressed in the negotiations and contestations on the simple question about who they are, particularly in the context of the strains caused by the Universalist claims of their religion on the one hand and the particularist demands of their ethnicity and culture on the other.

Bangladesh illustrates a most intriguing and delightful puzzle in international development. After its independence in 1971, it was dismissed

The ubiquity of the word “secularism” (it is mentioned in more than 75 of the world’s constitutions as an ideal the State promotes, or an organising principle that it affirms), and the passionate discussions it generates throughout the world, sometimes distracts us from the fact that its origins are relatively recent.

The demand was predictable. Given the outrage that has been generated by the vicious acts of assault and dehumanisation that have been inflicted on women over some time, it even appears justifiable.

Dr. Anisuzzaman’s life was a radiant gift to us, his departure an irreparable loss. The usual metaphors that have been applied (tower of strength, conscience of the nation, a reassuring lighthouse, an iconic intellectual/cultural presence , an institution by himself, a large and shady tree, the embodiment of humanist principles, and so on) may all be applicable.

The American project was founded on rank hypocrisies. On the one hand, President Thomas Jefferson, who wrote the stirring words in the Declaration of Independence that upheld “these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal”, did not free his own slaves (not even Sally Hemings, who bore him six children).

It is almost axiomatic that free speech is indispensable to democracy.

On April 8, Bernie Sanders was compelled to fold his bid for the Presidency. Consistent with his decency as a human being, his graciousness as a

The word “politics” is much maligned and stigmatised. It suffers from a huge image problem both in the world as well as in Bangladesh.