M Jahirul Islam Jewel

Impact of Covid-19: Jhalakathi lemon growers feel the pinch

Despite high demand at retail markets where it is selling for good prices, lemon growers are failing to sell the produce at profitable rates due to a drop in the number of interested buyers at Bhimruli wholesale market in Jhalakathi Sadar.

Amphan, a bolt from the blue

It’s water, water everywhere. Strong current coupled by the fierce gales has inundated almost everything that can be seen through the eerie darkness. Women and children have been huddled in a boat tied up with a tree in a nearby jungle with men straining every nerve to survive the perilous night by grasping something firm.

Dr Manisha to the rescue

As the crisis originating from the coronavirus deepens, people, especially the poor and needy, are looking up to their local leaders to deliver.

Shortage of testing kits worry Barishal doctors

An inadequate supply of testing kits to detect the novel coronavirus across Barishal division has become a headache for doctors in the region.

‘How I will buy food for my family’: Daily wage earners counting losses during coronavirus outbreak

As some people with more regularised jobs and businesses gradually begin to work from home or enter stay-home modes across the country, livelihoods of low-income people are being hit hard.

Demand high, pay low

Coconut grower Shahinur was shocked to see how a single green coconut was being sold for Tk 80 in Barishal city near Sher-E-Bangla Medical College Hospital. But, at her village, in close proximity to the city, she recently sold each coconut to traders for only Tk 12.

A noble initiative for fishermen’s literacy

Fishermen of Elisha village and nearby areas in Bhola Sadar upazila can now aspire to be literate as a group of local youths under the banner of East Elisha Foundation, a voluntary organisation, started a school for them.

10 years in the making

How long does it take to complete a two-year project for constructing a medical facility? For a government hospital struggling to cope with patient flow, the answer is more than a decade.

Grabbing puts canal on death throes

Once flowing Rajapur canal in Jhalakathi is nearly dead now, thanks to the mindless encroachment and pollution by locals on both sides of the waterbody.

BIWTA salvage wing needs salvaging

MV Dudu Mia-1, a clinker-loaded cargo vessel, sank in the Kirtonkhola river in Barishal on December 14 after a head-on collision with a passenger launch. It has not been salvaged yet.

Dhalchar exposed to the elements

The hapless people of the remote island of Dhalchar union, 35 kilometres from Kossopia on the mainland, have found an innovative way of facing cyclones -- they go deep into the mangrove forest and hold trees to hang on for saving life.

Students touch up Payra with paint

When students of their age usually spend their weekend playing games or hanging out with friends or family, twelve students in Barguna town made it their mission to use their spare time to bring colour in people’s lives.

Bhola Mayhem: No headway in probe

One month into the attacks on law enforcers, houses of Hindus and a temple in Bhola’s Borhanuddin upazila, police are yet to identify the masterminds behind those or the “hackers” who broke into the Facebook page of Biplob Chandra Baidya.

Cyclone Bulbul leaves 10 families in Bhola with no breadwinners

Jewel and his two siblings were waiting for his fisherman father who promised to return home with new dresses, but they only received their father’s body yesterday morning.

Forgotten torture comes to light

The video starts with one Hasan beating an elderly man -- whose hands and legs are tied and who is visibily unconscious -- with a wooden stick. Shouts can be heard off camera, which then pans to the victim’s around 12-year-old daughter, who tries to come to her father’s aid. “Younger women than you have been raped,” Hasan says to her. At this, she backs away.

Hacker ‘not precisely identified’

Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan yesterday told the BBC that they were yet to identify the person who had hacked the Facebook ID of Biplob Chandra Baidya, but Facebook authorities had given the Bangladesh government some idea, not any concrete information about the hacker.

Rumour of pir’s arrest brought on hell

A number of religious leaders, including imams, in Bhola had broken their promise to the local administration of taking all necessary steps to postpone the fateful October 20 rally.

Bhola Hindus living in fear

Fearing further attacks, most of the Hindu families in Bhola, have stopped sending their children to schools and restricted their business operations, said the community leaders.

Local admin, cops were ill-prepared

For two days, hate speech was spreading via Facebook messenger and the local administration and police failed to grasp the gravity of the situation and act accordingly, locals of Bhola’s Borhanuddin upazila said.

He was the victim of a plot

The first phone call which awoke Biplop Chandra Baddya on Friday, right after lunch, may have been the most life-changing one he had ever received.

Scarred by horrors of hate crimes

Sattya Prashad Das spent his whole life teaching religious education and humanity to his students, irrespective of religions and caste in his locality in Bhola’s Borhanuddin upazila.

Fishermen denied fair prices as preservation facility absent

Fishermen of Dhal Char in Charfashion under Bhola are often deprived of fair prices as they have to sell the perishable item in a hurry to middlemen due to lack of preservation facilities.

Risky trips thru’ rivers

Frequent movement of unauthorised vessels, hidden islands and narrow channel have made around 50 kilometres of Dhaka-Barishal naval route extremely risky.

Barishal’s biggest hospital grapples with doctor crisis

More than 43 percent of doctor posts are vacant at Sher-e-Bangla Medical College Hospital (SBMCH) in Barishal for a long time, depriving patients of required healthcare due to shortage of physicians.

Why is Sunam not an accused?

A number of accused in the Rifat murder case yesterday vented their frustration inside and outside the courtroom, asking why local Awami League lawmaker’s son Sunam Debnath was not named in the case.

No room for dengue patients

Dengue patients are facing acute shortage of beds at Sher-e-Bangla Medical College Hospital (SBMCH) in Barishal.

Pontoon shortage causes sufferings to passengers

There has been a shortage of pontoon at Barishal launch terminal for a long time, causing sufferings to passengers in boarding

Rifat Murder: Questions over a human chain

Eighteen days after Rifat Sharif was murdered in Barguna, a human chain was formed in the town to press for the arrest and punishment of his wife Aysha Siddiqa Minni.

Rifat Murder Case: Four accused still at large

A month has passed since the murder of Barguna youth Rifat Sharif, but the police are yet to trace four accused named in the FIR of the murder case.

Big thugs of a small town

Long before their alleged involvement in the killing of Rifat Sharif, brothers Rifat Farazi and Rishan Farazi were already known as two terrorising figures in the small town of Barguna.

Minni’s family gripped by sense of insecurity

Even a month ago, their household was like that of any other family’s. They would spend time together, have meals together, and sometimes children would play on their yard.

Teacher hacked in Barishal village

A schoolteacher was hacked by a group of students in Barishal’s Muladi upazila on Thursday after he protested derogatory statements written against him on the school wall recently.

Trawler Capsize: 17 fishermen still missing

Perennial poverty have lately forced hundreds of fishermen to sail their vessels into the Bay of Bengal for deep sea fishing, ignoring a government ban.

Barguna Murder: Another key suspect held

Police arrested Rifat Farazi, an accused in the sensational Rifat murder case, on Tuesday night, a day after prime accused Nayan Bond was shot dead in what officers said was a gunfight.

Slow-moving vehicles pose risk during Eid

Azad Hawlader was going to his village home in Jhalakathi from Dhaka along with his family to celebrate Eid. On the way, they faced a road accident, and he and his wife had to be taken to a hospital on Saturday.

Unmarked speed bumps a nightmare for commuters in Barishal

Speed-breakers are meant to slow vehicles’ speed, which eventually maintain traffic discipline and curb accidents. But when these bumps are not marked to ensure visibility, they can cause more accidents than they prevent.

8 days in jail for crime he knew nothing about

Suddenly one day, he came to know that he has a second wife. He was also told he even tortured that woman for her father’s failure to pay him Tk 1 lakh in dowry. Sazzadul Haque, executive director of Barishal-based Zam-Zam Nursing Institute, was in utter shock and disbelief when he was told

On night of fright, trees their saviour

Several hundred people in Dhal Char union of Bhola’s Charfassion upazila had to take shelter in the jungle like “primitive people” during the Friday night’s cyclonic storm Fani as there is no cyclone shelter in the island of about 17,000 people.

Unabated Poaching: Number of deer in Monpura forest on decline

Unabated poaching of spotted deer is threatening the species to become endangered in Bhola's Monpura forest.

Brick chips used in highway!

Although the use of stone chips is mandatory for carpeting of important roads, the designated contractor of Rajapur part of the under-construction Barishal-Pathorghata highway has been using brick chips with low quality chips, locals claimed.

Passengers exposed to high risk

Many auto-rickshaws in Barishal city are using household gas cylinders, exposing passengers to high risk of accidents, according to the Department of Explosives (DoE).

Manpura forests in peril

Felling of trees by “influential people” is damaging the biodiversity of Bhola's Manpura Island, making it prone to natural disasters.

Holding on to what's left

Apart from being a boon to the city and its residents, canals also enhance the scenic beauty of their respective locales. They are perfect locations for taking a breather when city life wears one down.

In grabbers' clutches

In a bid to stretch usable land, people have been encroaching canals flowing through Barishal city.

Only in memories

Even a few years ago, Barishal did not witness much waterlogging that the city is experiencing nowadays.

Misreading chest pain for acidity jeopardises patient's life

A heart attack victim has been thrust upon death's doorstep as wrong diagnosis and treatment in a Barishal-based private clinic has increased the patient's chance of sustaining permanent and irreparable damage.

Patients suffer due to mad rush at Barishal river terminal

Cancer patient Ali Hossain Khan chose launch to go to Dhaka for his appointment with an oncologist there on Friday. But he failed to manage any cabin on any launch for two consecutive days since Thursday.

Justice put on hold

Scores of litigants are forced to wait for justice in different criminal cases including murder and rape in Barishal region, as more than a hundred forensic reports have been pending with Sher-e-Bangla Medical College Hospital (SBMCH) for the last five months.

June 19, 2020