Shuprova Tasneem

On January 5, 2020, a second-year student of Dhaka University was raped in Kurmitola after she mistakenly got off at the wrong bus stop at around 7pm on her way to a friend’s house.

The sky was unusually blue for an early morning in late November, the day Aly Zaker passed away. Everything else that happened after feels like a sort of blur, except I distinctly remember thinking that he would have appreciated the beauty of that cold, clear morning in Dhaka.

We were on strike today to protest the attack on India. None of us went to the university. I sat at home and prepared examination questions. I didn’t go anywhere else today. By evening, I had finished the question paper for the Honours students.

The CCTV footage showing the killing of senior ASP Anisul Karim at Mind Aid Psychiatry and De-Addiction Hospital on November 9 has created a renewed focus on the mostly unlicensed and unregulated private clinics that have cropped up across the city in recent years to cater to a “market” of patients who are easy to take advantage of because of the social stigma surrounding their ailment—drug addiction and related psychological or mental health issues.

I always believed I lived in a tolerant society. What else could one think, growing up in independent Bangladesh?

This past week, the world has been transfixed by the high-drama US elections and the soon-to-be ex-President Trump’s temper tantrums, as his opponent Joe Biden slowly overtook him to become the President elect of the United States.

It the donors’ conference co-hosted by the US, UK, EU and UNHCR on October 22, the international community pledged USD 597 million in humanitarian assistance for the Rohingya.

This month, the release of a gang rape video in Noakhali forced us to take a long, hard look at ourselves and confront an ugly but often overlooked reality—women and children are falling victim to sexual violence on a daily basis in Bangladesh.

On the first day of this month, a class 4 student of a madrasa in Teknaf was forced into a classroom by one of her teachers and raped. The child managed to go home to her mother, but fainted from blood loss right after, and is still receiving treatment at hospital. The accused teacher was arrested on the same night.

The story of migrant labour has two polar opposite faces in Bangladesh—one is the “success story” of hard-earned foreign exchange being sent back to the country by our dedicated migrant workers, keeping their families afloat and propping up the economy as well.

They say that when Rome was burning, its mad emperor Nero stood on its great walls and fiddled while his city was destroyed. While it’s difficult to verify the veracity of an event that is said to have occurred in the year 64, this image comes to mind when we look at Trump and Bolsonara’s (mis)handling of the coronavirus pandemic in their respective countries.

For 29-year-old Taiyyaba Khatun, a Rohingya woman living in Kutupalong refugee camp in Bangladesh, providing food for her children became an everyday struggle after she had a fall out with her husband.

If empty statements could produce peace, the new Israel-UAE deal, brokered by US President Trump and his son-in-law Jared Kushner, would be the beginning of the end of hostilities in the Middle East.

Since the pandemic started in Bangladesh and schools closed on March 17, we’ve seen the same inconclusive news reports at regular intervals about the situation of school examinations.

As early as March 2020, Human Rights Watch warned that migrants and stateless people are more at risk of virus transmission in Malaysia, and that Malaysia needs to ensure health care for all without discrimination.

How does a country come to terms with a blot in its history as dark as the mass murder of intellectuals during the liberation struggle of Bangladesh?

How does one mourn during a global pandemic? I’ve asked myself this question numerous times since the onset of Covid-19.

On July 1, The Daily Star shared horrific pictures of the violence inflicted upon 14 year old Asma Khatun, a domestic worker employed in the capital’s Uttara.

“In life, your parents come first, after the Great and most Benevolent Allah. They are the greatest blessing and safest shelter. Because of the mercy of Allah and the sacrifices of my parents, because of their prayers, advice, courage, discipline, love, affection, encouragement—for standing next to me like mountains through all my troubles—I have been able to earn my Bachelor’s degree from the Oxford of the East, Dhaka University.”

Over 100 days of Covid-19 in Bangladesh have brought with it more than one lakh recorded cases of coronavirus and over 1,300 recorded deaths in the country.