More than 1.4 million* students of Bangladesh study in an education system that has historically kept itself isolated from the rest of the world.

News stories of two young women accusing the son of a well known jewellery store and one of his friends, of raping them at a hotel in Banani after a birthday party, are doing the rounds, evoking all sorts of reactions among the public.

“If at first the idea is not absurd, then there is no hope for it.” – Albert Einstein

The article on the flash floods in the haors of Sunamganj was eye-opening as to the present circumstances of the flood-affected farmers and residents.

The world's heaviest man, who at one point weighed almost 600 kilogrammes (1,300 pounds), has undergone successful gastric bypass surgery, his doctors in Mexico say.

Q. Youngsters are very much into 'slumber parties.' Even we had them in our teen days but that was more than one and a half decade ago. How should parents handle the demand for night outs by girls and boys? Is it necessary, does it have good aspects to it, or is it all bad?

From 1891-1901 Tagore was continuously in Bengal. He used to come in Naogaon’s Patisar to observe the estate’s condition till 1937. His grandfather Prince Dwarkanath Tagore bought this estate in 1830. Actually to look after that estate Tagore came to Patisar in 1891.

“The reasons birds can fly and we can't is simply because they have perfect faith, for to have faith is to have wings.” — J.M.Barrie, Scottish novelist and playwright

Shakib Khan, one of the biggest movie stars of present-day Bangladesh, alleged that many FDC directors spend time “chatting instead of doing work”.

We, travellers, have fallen in love with Sajek's stark, burnt-umber coloured cliffs that jut upright throughout the valley.

Book Fair 2017

The people set afloat by the flash floods of the haor areas are not blaming their luck—or some supreme being. The only omnipotent force they are naming is far nearer, in the Sylhet metropolis and goes by the name of the Water Development Board.

Last week I read the article titled 'Living with the ghost of Rana Plaza' (published in Star Weekend on April 21, 2017) which revealed the psychological condition of the Rana Plaza victims.

At least 32 people are killed in an Islamic State group attack near a refugee camp on the Syrian side of the border with Iraq, a monitor says.

British inventor Richard Browning lifts off from the shore of Vancouver Harbour in a personal flight suit that inspired references to comic superhero 'Iron Man.

There's a popular saying among different species that hold very opposite meanings: 'When it rains, it pours and when it pours it floods.'

While the global media is traumatised by an impending nuclear war and a lunatic running the most powerful country in the planet, the journalists of Bangladesh have declared a week-long holiday in what can only be called a shocking turn of events.

May Day 2017

My father taught us to wear our Bengaliness with pride. It was impressed upon us that we, by being born Bengali, had inherited a rich intellectual and artistic tradition.

Pristine, paper white walls. Monorail lightings fixed on the ceiling. And reverent silence.