Only a handful of Bengali filmmakers are revered in the realm of world cinema whose names are mentioned with legendary directors such as Jean-Luc Godard, Francois Truffaut, Ingmar Bergman, Luis Bunuel, Akira Kurosawa, Yasujiro Ozu, Ousmane Sembene, Federico Fellini, Michelangelo Antonioni, Glauber Rocha and others.

In recent years, a series of studies by the United Nations and World Bank applauded Bangladesh's efforts in curbing child mortality. In Asia, among the least developed and middle-income countries...

It was a balmy summer evening in mid-1970s when I first got to see director Mrinal Sen at a get-together in a club set up by my friends in my locality in a south Kolkata suburb. It was at the height of the Naxalite movement and the subjects of discussion with Mrinal-da, as he was popularly called then, were films and politics.

Syed Shamsul Haq's presence in Bangla literature is so all-encompassing and his brilliance so overwhelming in all the branches of creative writing in which he is present that the accolade that he was a literary genius would not in any way overstate his extraordinary talent.

Begum Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain, the legendary Bengali writer-activist whose leadership had transformed the lives of thousands of people in this region and beyond, was born on this day in 1880.

A pioneer of modern photography in Bangladesh, Anwar Hossain showed forthcoming generations what constituted modern composition.

The passing away of Bir Protik Taramon Bibi quietly in her home in Rajipur Upazila, at age 61, only 16 days before the commemoration of Victory Day, is truly a tragedy for us.

Today we all know of Kumudini and its institutions—Kumudini Hospital, Bharateswari Homes, Kumudini Nursing School and College, Kumudini Women's Medical College and Ranada Prasad Shaha University.

I wasn't ready for this. Zahin Ahmed, the executive director of Friends in Village Development, Bangladesh, popularly known as FIVDB, breathed his last in a Dhaka hospital on October 27. A cancer survivor, he unfortunately couldn't fend off the virulent infections that kept him in hospital for the previous ten days.

Around midnight of November 3, 1975 a number of army personnel entered the Dhaka Central Jail where the four national leaders, Syed Nazrul Islam, Tajuddin Ahmad, M Mansur Ali and AHM Quamruzzaman had been taken only a week after the assassination of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.

In the shade of the mighty Himalayas, the Torsha, Dhorla and Kaljani Rivers flow gently across the village of Balrampur in Cooch Behar. It was in this peaceful place that Abbasuddin Ahmed, the doyen of folk songs, was born on October 27, 1901 to Zafar Ahmad, a lawyer and Hiramon Nesa.

Dr TG Percival Spear of Cambridge University divided leadership into five types: (1) natural, (2) charismatic, (3) rational, (4) of consensus, and (5) by force. According to him, the natural leader is selfless; he is, in fact, not interested in leadership.

AB is no more. The nation is in his debt, and there's nothing we can do about it. There are murmured demands for some sort of a national tribute or recognition. If you ask me, a man, who has won over hearts, has no use for medals.

The first time I had met Ayub Bachchu was years ago at a recording in a studio called Art of Noise in Shegun Bagicha. The studio belonged to yet another music legend Foad Nasser Babu from the band Feedback.

It is said that a Baul is a mystic who is guided by his guru to seek divinity in human beings. The guru is like his guardian angel, and music is his way of giving him guidance. It broadens his mind and illuminates his horizon. And as he masters the language of the body, slowly but assuredly,

Uri Avnery, the Israeli activist-journalist who famously played chess with the Palestinian leader Yassir Arafat, died in Tel Aviv on August 20, at the age of 94.

It is with profound sorrow we write this piece about our dear friend Imtiaz Hasan Habib (1949-2018), who died peacefully while asleep in the early morning hours of August 27 at his home in Norfolk, Virginia.

The news of the unexpected passing away of Justice Kamrul Islam Siddiqui last week was a huge shock to me and many of his colleagues, friends and acquaintances.

Jodi tor daak shune keo na ashe, tobe ekla cholo re (If no-one heeds your call - then walk alone). The indomitable Rama Chowdhury, known to many as Ekattuker Janani (Mother of '71), had made this line from the famed Tagore song the guiding ideal of her life.

Abul Mansur Ahmad excelled in each of his professions as writer, journalist and politician, and such was his honesty that he worked without pitting one profession against the other.