Can Invest Bangladesh live up to the expectations?
26 August 2026
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Views
Our health system is better resourced now. Why can’t it still deliver?
26 August 2026
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Views
Why char children need a different education policy
26 August 2026
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Views
20 years after Phulbari: Don't repeat the mistake in the name of energy security
26 August 2026
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Views
Why are humanitarian workers increasingly in the line of fire?
25 August 2026
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Views
Public universities must not become instruments of political power
25 August 2026
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Views
Men must do more to curb violence against women
25 August 2026
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Opinion
We need energy security, not just a fix for the current crisis
25 August 2026
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MACRO MIRROR
The Rohingya cannot be left waiting for history to change
25 August 2026
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Views
The new NHRC law should widen access to justice, not restrict it
25 August 2026
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Opinion
Bangladesh should declare Ganges treaty obsolete before India's demands prevail
India wants shorter treaty terms (10-15 years) that will give it more frequent negotiating leverage. It cites “climate change” but only as justification for taking more water, not for climate-adapted governance. This is nothing but extractive negotiation, not cooperative adaptation.
25 March 2026
Operation Searchlight and the unrecognised genocide of 1971
History often remembers wars through the cold geometry of maps and the sterile ink of treaties, but for those who survived the tempest of 1971, history is a haunting sensory memory—the acrid scent of gunpowder mingling with the first rains of spring, and the terrifying, rhythmic clatter of tanks as they invaded the narrow, sleeping arteries of Dhaka.
25 March 2026
Why Bangladesh needs real-time waterway monitoring
It is a time to reflect on a critical yet often overlooked part of Bangladesh’s maritime system—the seabed and riverbeds that underpin our trade.
21 March 2026
Reflections on the moral crisis of modern leadership
“A fish rots from the head”—this ancient proverb reminds us that when leadership loses its moral compass, the entire system begins to decay.
19 March 2026
The cost of politicising VC appointment
Is involvement in politics a crime? Education Minister ANM Ehsanul Hoque Milon posed that question while defending the government’s decision to appoint vice-chancellors to seven universities and a new chairman of the University Grants Commission on Monday.
19 March 2026
Strait of Hormuz crisis shows why a renewable transition is urgent
A war thousands of kilometres away suddenly shows up in the prices of groceries, the cost of running a factory, government subsidies or import bills, and the anxious arithmetic of a family budget as the people navigate the long lines outside refuelling stations.
19 March 2026
Evidence, not assumptions, should guide education reforms
This piece is a rebuttal critically examining the article titled “We need education reforms that actually work,” published in The Daily Star on March 15, 2026. Dr Manzoor Ahmed’s evaluation of recent education reforms in Bangladesh contains assumptions and analyses without adequate research evidence.
19 March 2026
We must restore momentum in environmental governance
The environment remains a priority concern in Bangladesh given its status as one of the most vulnerable countries in terms of environmental degradation and climate change impacts.
18 March 2026
Will Family Card actually lift the poor or sink the economy?
The first and most pressing concern that arises from this programme is the fiscal sustainability that it requires.
18 March 2026
Too many holidays are bad for any growth economy
Amid the prevailing Middle East crisis and economic lull, Bangladesh is heading into a prolonged holiday period around Eid-ul-Fitr.
18 March 2026
Bangladesh never had a Habermas, but it desperately needs one
Germany had a Jürgen Habermas, who died on March 14, 2026. He was not just a philosopher writing for academics; he was a public intellectual, someone who used ideas to help society understand itself, confront its own mistakes, and imagine a better future.
17 March 2026
Stories from a delayed flight: Migrant anxieties amid the Middle East conflict
The flight from the Shah Amanat International Airport in Chattogram to Dhaka was scheduled to depart at 8:30 pm on March 12.
17 March 2026
Piety, protest, and the search for a sacred public life
I do not think the contemporary public mood in Bangladesh can be explained only through the old argument between secularism and religion.
17 March 2026
Why Bangladesh needs a balanced energy security strategy
The global energy market is again in turmoil, this time because of the US-Israel war in Iran.
17 March 2026
Building energy resilience in an age of global shocks
For Bangladesh, the latest tensions in the Middle East highlight how intricately national energy systems—and domestic economic stability—are now intertwined with global political developments.
16 March 2026
The multiplier effect of investing in women
It is estimated that closing the gender gap will add nearly $7 trillion to the global economy.
16 March 2026
Why Bangladesh needs a brand reset
For decades, the international image of Bangladesh has been shaped by a narrow and increasingly outdated narrative.
16 March 2026
July charter and constitutional reform: Will we waste a generational opportunity?
The oppression of citizens under the Sheikh Hasina regime resulted in the July uprising.
16 March 2026
The burqa and the bomb: A disturbing war narrative
It is the burqa again—the piece of cloth that many Muslim women choose to wear for religious reasons. Yet this garment has been burdened with some of the harshest and most dehumanising representations imaginable.
16 March 2026
A risky moment to liberalise capital exit
The Bangladesh Bank’s recent decision to raise the threshold for approval-free repatriation of foreign investment—from Tk 10 crore to Tk 100 crore—marks a significant step towards liberalising capital flows.
16 March 2026