Loss of a great mentor

Niloufer Manzur, renowned educationist and founding principal of Sunbeams School, passed away on Tuesday at the capital's Combined Military Hospital. She was 74.

She was admitted there with symptoms of pneumonia. On Sunday, she tested positive for Covid-19 and received plasma therapy. However, her condition started to deteriorate and she breathed her last around 3am on that day.

The noted educationist left behind her husband Syed Manzur Elahi, former adviser to a caretaker government and chairperson of Apex Footwear Ltd, son Syed Nasim Manzur, daughter Munize Manzur, daughter-in-law Dr Samia Huq, six grandchildren and a host of friends, admirers and students.

Daughter of late Dr Mafiz Ali Chowdhury, who was a minister in Sheikh Mujibur Rahman's cabinet in 1972, Niloufer was venerated as an academician for founding Sunbeams School, one of the leading English-medium educational institutes.

She founded the school in 1974 when Bangladesh's education system was fragile and English-medium schools were extremely rare, establishing it at her residence with only 15 students, a few chairs and desks and a meagre loan of Tk 10,000 from Janata Bank.

She led the institution as its principal for 46 years and gradually built it as one of the country's top schools.

In 1996, Sunbeams launched GCE Ordinary Level courses and its first batch of O-Level students passed in 1998.

Today, the school has two campuses in the capital: one at Dhanmondi and another at Uttara. Currently, it has more than 1,100 students and 161 teachers are employed.

She is regarded as a pioneer for facilitating English-medium education in the country where students are also taught Bengali language, literature and heritage.

Niloufer was related to the institution as "Head of School" even before her death. She used to visit the campuses regularly until the start of the pandemic.

After closure of all educational institutions, she used to supervise administrative tasks from home.

During her long resourceful teaching career, she has touched the lives of thousands of students who have established their careers all over the world. Her students offered prayers and condolences on social and mainstream media when they learned about her demise.

She was buried after a private namaz-e-janaza maintaining all necessary health directives.