Two Bangladeshi writers—26-year-old Anmana Manishita, a lecturer at BRAC University, and 33-year-old Shazed Ul Hoq Abir, a lecturer at East West University—have been shortlisted for the 2026 Commonwealth Short Story Prize.

Children of 1972–73 came of age alongside Bangladesh itself. In Azimpur’s close‑knit colony, a telephone became a neighbourhood lifeline, television was a shared ritual, and the Buriganga was our afternoon escape.

I sit on a chair. Sometimes I wish I were sitting on my old chair of humble plastic, but right now my chair is a plush armchair, with armrests no less, swaying and swooning on its cabriole legs of sturdy s-curve perfection.

There are a few old trees with wide trunks—I do not know their names—just beside my library. I never forget to have a quick look at the leaves during coming and going to the library.

The unnamed You can get lost trying to  get back to the exit at the Vatican Museum. 

There is always a subtle tension when a story migrates across cultures. Some narratives travel with the lightness of wind, reshaping themselves almost effortlessly inside new imaginations, while others arrive heavy with the weight of the worlds that first produced them.

Shell-shocked, I talked to the office staff. They all looked sad, a little perplexed too, perhaps seeing my very unusual, distressed face.

For the Class of ’69 at Dhaka University, that bond was embodied in one man—Syed Mayeenul Huq. He wasn’t just a friend; he was the quiet, steady centre that held their entire constellation together.

There is a strange insanity that comes with being a woman in her 20s. A haunting fear that follows like a thought lingering in the back of our minds, refusing to leave.

Before returning to Australia, I felt a quiet urgency to visit my elderly and ailing relatives in Dhaka. Not just a social obligation—it was something deeper, a whisper from within. I heard such visits were acts of virtue, but for me, it was more about connection, memory, and respect..A fe

Long, long ago, when the world was younger, wiser, softer, when the animals were braver and the people were gentler, when art lived and music sailed, and the skies were a true, honest blue, there lived a man who loved a woman, and they lived in a little house they loved very much. How they met o

This cracked, restless earth beneath our feet— granules of memory grinding,

Children pulled from rubble in Gaza, dust-white faces against red bricks—

Every night, a market forms near the mill gate. When it’s time for that market to close, Fulbanu stands on the high bank of the pond, waiting for her husband’s return.

The bus stop was empty as usual, I sat waiting for a sight of one. Then he came. A man in a faded red shirt with a bag hanging on his back, running as if the devil himself had taken out a lease on his shadow.

Scorching in a way the April sun never was. / Scorching in a way a fever never feels. / It wasn't just grief

In a time where spectacle often overshadows sincerity, where art sometimes forgets its heart, Lojithan Ram offers a whisper. A blue whisper. And in that whisper, you may just hear your own name

When it comes to our fathers, especially the ones who try to be good men, a rampant affliction known as patriarchy has left us with no language to imagine them outside of what they were to others. Strip away the roles, and what’s left?

Her voice, thin as a whisper, sharp as a blade, sliced through the kitchen air thick with mustard oil and regret.

Like little boys racing against red-orange hues against dark, dark blue to spread the day’s news;