Anwarul Haider

As police search for a motive, 19-year-old Sifat faces the unbearable task of burying his mother and three sisters

Days after a schoolboy was found dead in a dormitory at Farid Ahmed Bhuiyan Academy in Lakshmipur, a case has been filed against leaders and activists of Awami League over an attack and vandalism at the institution on June 16.

He had alleged torture by seniors in complaint with school; family says he was beaten to death

Inspections find empty classrooms, poor oversight and falling attendance across island schools

Siraj Mia, 70, a farmer from Katabunia village in Char Amanullah Union of Subarnachar upazila, Noakhali, had spent Tk 10,000 this year cultivating soybeans on 40 decimals of land. He had hoped to harvest 12 to 15 maunds (1 maund = 40 kg) and, with prices ranging from Tk 1,500 to Tk 1,600 per maund, expected a profit of Tk 10,000 to Tk 14,000.

A general diary was filed over the alleged rape and torture of a woman in Noakhali’s Hatia upazila on Sunday, after which a forensic test of the victim was conducted at Noakhali General Hospital yesterday -- two days after she was admitted on Saturday.

The National Human Rights Commission yesterday sent a letter to Hatia Police Station in Noakhali, asking the law enforcers to register a complaint and take necessary legal steps over the alleged rape and torture of a woman there.

Noakhali-5, seen as Awami League General Secretary Obaidul Quader’s “impenetrable fortress” for a decade and a half, transformed into a fiercely contested battleground for the BNP and Jamaat-e-Islami after the 2024 uprising.

The 192-kilometre road network within Lakshmipur municipality has become largely unfit for vehicles due to years of neglect.

Residents of the 150-year-old Noakhali municipality have long suffered due to a poor drainage system.

An acute shortage of teachers has long been hampering academic and administrative activities at 16 government high schools across the nine upazilas of Noakhali.

The broken roads include 3,509 km of paved roads, 209 km of brick-paved roads, and 5,310 km of earthen roads

Floodwaters have begun to recede from most areas in Feni, where continuous rainfall and hilly run-off since June 8 caused embankments to collapse at 12 points along the Muhuri, Kahua, and Silonia rivers, inundating large parts of Parshuram, Phulgazi, and Feni Sadar upazilas.

Over 2,300 ponds flooded, 2,371 hectares of crops destroyed, and 125km of roads affected

Nineteen-year-old Sajjad Hossain had no alternative but to start building a new thatched home for his two sisters, mother and himself since their house was swept away by a flood four months ago in Pashchim Aloka village, situated on the banks of Muhuri river in Feni’s Parshuram upazila.

Most SMEs lost all of their belongings and now seek government assistance

Sixty-year-old Kofil Uddin watched helplessly as floodwater crept into his home at Bhabani Jibanpur village in Noakhali’s Begumganj upazila on August 10. More than a month has passed, but the house is still under knee-deep water.

The ongoing flood has washed away the fish from 85,379 farms in Noakhali, causing losses of around Tk 576.50 crore as well as affecting thousands of fish farmers, said Noakhali Department of Fisheries sources

People wishing to distribute relief materials among the flood victims are finding it very difficult to reach remote areas due to a lack of boats.

Millions of people were still left without electricity and any means of communication, and relief materials had not reached many remote areas where families were stranded in flooded villages for days.