Tribute | The Daily Star

  • Adieu my friend, Ambassador Harun ur Rashid

    This is to redeem my pledge to my friend and classmate Ambassador Harun ur Rashid and write his obituary if I survive him.

  • Tribute to Sir Fazle Hasan Abed

    It is with deep sadness that we learned of the passing of Sir Fazle Hasan Abed, our Abed bhai.

  • Sir Fazle Hasan Abed: A tribute to an innovator and implementer

    I had my first encounter with Sir Fazle Hasan Abed in 1971 in Oxford. Abed called to inform me on the efforts by him and his group in London in support of Bangladesh’s liberation struggle.

  • No person or issue is ever too small

    Sir Fazle Hasan Abed once said to me, “small is beautiful.” He was a systems thinker before that term had even entered our consciousness.

  • Thank You, Abed Bhai

    It was in March 1979 when I met Sir Fazle Hasan Abed for the first time. He called me for a job interview. I met him at his modest office of the then Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee (BRAC) on Circular Road, Moghbazar.

  • A force larger than life

    Lord Campden is what his friends would call him, in the heady days that lie between youth and adulthood. He was a sharp dressing, cigar smoking, culture-loving European aesthete—a finance executive leading a privileged life in London, one of the great world cities.

  • SM Ali: A visionary journalist who served the nation

    Syed Mohammad Ali, popularly known as SM Ali, a distinguished journalist of Bangladesh, was born ninety-one years ago in this month—on December 5, to be specific—in a well-known literary family of Sylhet. His is a candid portrait of a journalist who decided early in life to devote his intellectual and writing gift to serving the nation.

  • Professor Ajoy Roy - A profile in patriotism, human rights, and science

    Ajoy Roy has worn many hats throughout his life—as a bright scientist; professor of physics; human rights and secular activist; author; and perhaps

  • A champion of the common man

    Sher-e-Bangla was an “institution” rather than an “individual”. So say his critics as well as his admirers.

  • Prof Mohammad Shah

    A cherished scholar lost to reckless driving

    Mohammad Shah, a well-known scholar and professor of history at University of Chittagong, died on September 29, 2019. After a fatal road accident at Hathazari, Chattogram, in which he was involved, he was put on life support, and on the eighth day in hospital, he breathed his last. What a tragedy! We, his students, couldn’t hold back our tears.

  • Qazi Motahar Hossain Death Anniversary

    38th Death Anniversary: Qazi Motahar Hossain- A pundit of versatile knowledge

    While learning how to subtract and multiply, a boy surprised his uncle, Kazi Abul Hossain, by discovering the rules of division in advance. Later, this young boy gained fame as the first statistician, scientist, educator, chess player and prominent literary figure of

  • A Man in ‘Forty’ Million

    In 1891, shortly after the death of Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar, Rabindranath Tagore wrote, “One wonders, how God, in the process of producing forty million Bengalis, produced a man.”

  • The pioneer of the Green Revolution

    Today marks the 10th death anniversary of Dr Norman E Borlaug (1914-2009), a shining star in the history of global food security and mankind, who dreamt and led the Green Revolution.

  • Remembering ‘Banglar Rumi’

    On this day, exactly eight years ago, Syed Ahmadul Huq—a very well respected public servant, noted scholar, Sufi practitioner and philanthropist—bade us farewell leaving behind a rich legacy of his scholarly research and interpretative works of Sufi masters,

  • Abul Mansur and his all-seeing mirror

    “In ordinary mirrors, you see only the reflections of what is visible about men, but my friend, artist Abul Mansur has created a mirror that reflects the invisible, the veiled. In Abul Mansur’s mirror, the real faces of masked men who roam amongst us, hiding their true agenda, get exposed in all of their monstrosity.” Kazi Nazrul Islam wrote this in his preface to Abul Mansur Ahmad’s “Aina” (Mirror), which pretty much sums up what the book is about.

  • August 1975 and thereafter

    What happened in August 1975 was a great tragedy perpetrated by an anti-people clique who did not want Bangladesh to move in the direction its people had desired it to take. The desire embodied a dream and an ideology, and for its fulfilment the people had

  • The legacy of Bangabandhu

    Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman believed that: “To do anything great, one has to be ready to sacrifice and show one’s devotion. I believe that those who are not ready to sacrifice are not capable of doing anything worthy. To engage in politics in our country and to

  • Tribute to Mozammel, my warrior friend

    Khandaker Mozammel Haque passed away early Thursday, August 8, 2019. Readers may know him for his contribution to the

  • Feroza Begum.

    The legacy of a legend

    It was May 1990. World renowned singer Feroza Begum was on a three-month tour of the United States as part of the first Nazrul Conference in North America. I had the rare privilege of accompanying her on the tour and observing a legendary personality from up close.

  • A quiet revolutionary and his temple of hope

    On April 17, 1971, in the midst of a genocidal operation by the Pakistani forces, a quiet voice of sanity reminded the world what was at stake, and went on to lay the groundwork for an independent Bangladesh.

  • A tribute to the life and legacy of Maryam Mirzakhani

    The second death anniversary of Iranian mathematician Maryam Mirzakhani has passed quietly early this week. Not many people in Bangladesh are probably familiar with the work of this mathematics genius, but globally, she is held in high regard because of her

  • Politics loses its Ershad factor

    With the death of General Ershad, a prominent factor in Bangladesh politics has come to a close. From a soldier to a military dictator and then to a political leader, Ershad would surely be regarded by many as lucky. The man, who was supposed to be in prison until death, will now be laid to rest with the honour of the leader of the opposition in parliament and former special envoy to the PM. Not only that. Many of those who had once been his arch enemies are now grieving his passing.

  • Fifteen years without my father

    Time went too fast. It seems like yesterday we were leading a peacefully happy life under the guidance of our father Humayun Kabir Balu.

  • Sufia’s Flight

    Through her veil, staring out the plane window, Sufia N Hossain, formally known as Sufia Khatun, must have felt a whirlwind of emotions when her eyes met the vignettes of Calcutta: the Victoria Monument reigning over the flat landscape,

  • Professor Serajul Islam Choudhury.

    Serajul Islam Choudhury: Our leading literary and cultural critic

    Life is all about enjoying work,” said Serajul Islam Choudhury on his eightieth birthday. Widely acclaimed as our foremost intellectual and as our leading literary and cultural critic, Choudhury exemplifies nothing short of phenomenal productivity. Today—June 23—

  • Begum Sufia Kamal, as I knew her

    Begum Sufia Kamal became “Khalamma” in a few swift seconds of her introduction to me the first time I was in her house.

  • The man who fearlessly fought for freedom

    Today, May 19, 2019, is the 48th anniversary of the passing of my beloved father, Shaheed Abul Kalam Shamsuddin. Abba was one of the leading organisers of Bangladesh’s independence struggle in 1971. He was a born leader who, despite having everything going for him as a privileged CSP officer and the SDO of Sirajganj, chose to engage in active resistance movement against the Pakistani army and led by example.

  • Subir Nandi

    ‘Music has no short cuts’

    While reminiscing about his childhood days at Teliapara Tea Estate of Habiganj, Subir Nandi used to say, “I was born in nature and I was taught music by nature.” As a young boy he would often listen to long plays in the peace and quiet of the tea garden which eventually encouraged him to take up music. Dada’s (he was like an older brother to me) father, Sudhangshu Bhusan Nandi, an army man and a music lover who managed the tea garden, owned a large wooden box full of long play records of various genres. Thus there was no dearth of music for the young Subir to draw inspiration from.

  • Tribute to Professor Abdul Momen

    It is hard to believe that Professor Momen sir is no longer with us. He left us on May 10, 2016. Professor Momen was a wonderful human being and an empathetic social worker. He was an upright person all his life and was amiable and affectionate towards the people around him.

  • Tribute to a soulful voice

    To us, he was simply Phool Da, his pet name, because of his love for flowers. The best gift one could give him was a bouquet of flowers, his favourite being a combination of roses and tulips.

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