Main Page «
Front Page «
Metro «
Business «
International «
Sports «
Editorial «
Op-Ed «
Home «
Timeout «
Letters «

Archive «
Launch Supplement «
Special Supplements «

Secondary education is facing the challenges of inequality because of uneven infrastructural, curriculum and educational facilities at the government and rural institutions in the country.
   Some schools run by the public sector and also the urban private schools are enjoying more facilities than the schools and madrasas in the rural areas, said the speakers while addressing the launching ceremony of the 8th Education Watch report-2007 at the city’s LGED Bhaban on Monday.
   The report styled ‘The State of Secondary Education: Quality and Equity Challenges’ was prepared by the Campaign for Popular Education, Bangladesh, an alliance of 1000 non-government organisations, which is working on education in cooperation with the Education Watch Group.
   Former adviser of the caretaker government and chairperson of the Education Watch, Kazi Fazlur Rahman chaired the session while education and commerce adviser, Hossain Zillur Rahman attended as chief guest. Secretary in-charge of the Ministry of Primary and Mass Education, Badrul Alam Tarafdar attended as special guest.
   They said as some institutions were getting more facilities than the others it caused some discrepancy among the students, ultimately hampering the national development of the country.
   According to the report, the government schools are much ahead of the other institutions like rural private schools and madrasas in terms of school structure, class room, laboratory and computer education facilities.
   More than three quarters of the government school teachers are trained while only one-fifth of the madrasa teachers and about 60 per cent of the private school teachers have undergone training programmes, it said.
   The government should increase its investment in the educational institutions to improve the infrastructural and educational facilities and hold training programmes for the teachers to enhance the quality of the secondary education, the study said, adding that the government should also monitor the activities regarding utilisation of the investment in the education sector.
   A member of the Education Watch, Samir Ranjan Nath and convenor of the group, AMR Choudhury, discussed some major findings of the study report.
   At the Dakar declaration in 2000, following the conference on education for all (EFA) held in Thailand in March 1990, about 150 countries including Bangladesh had committed to achieving education for all by 2015 with specific focus on the quality and equity, they said.
   The government and a large number of NGOs have taken several steps to fulfil the commitments, but no adequate measure has been taken yet to assess the progress in implementing the commitments.
   The education adviser said, ‘To ensure the quality we must focus on shifting to a holistic approach from the fragmented one regarding the national policy on education.’
   The secondary education in Bangladesh has three streams, general education, madrasa education and vocational education. The number of institutions under general stream is 19,148, under madrasa stream 9,215 and under vocational education the number is 1,265.

Shaheed Noor Hossain Day was observed across the country on Monday, with major political parties taking fresh vows to restore democracy and people’s fundamental rights.
   On this day in 1987, Noor Hossain, a young pro-democracy campaigner, was killed in police firing near Zero Point in Dhaka, during protest demonstrations against the then autocratic regime of HM Ershad.
   With the slogan ‘down with autocracy’ inscribed in white paint on his chest and ‘let democracy be freed’ on his back, the youth took the centre stage of that day’s street agitation until he was shot.
   The killing of Noor Hossain, a Juba League activist, further fuelled the movement and turned the struggle for democracy into a popular uprising that led to the fall of Ershad on December 6, 1990.
   Since then, political parties, social and cultural organisations have been observing the day as Shaheed Noor Hossain Day.
   Awami League president Sheikh Hasina and BNP chairperson Khaleda Zia issued separate statements paying tributes to the martyr and highlighting the significance of the day.
   Members of socio-political and cultural organisations remembered the pro-democracy, martyr and mourners wore black badges and placed flowers at Noor Hossain Square at Zero Point, where he was killed and his grave at Jurain in Dhaka.
   Communist Party of Bangladesh placed flowers at Noor Hossain Square at Zero Point. The party president Manjurul Ahsan Khan paid tributes to Noor Hossain and said autocratic and evil forces could never be friends of democracy.
   Bangabandhu Sangskritik Jote, Bangladesh Chhatra Union, Left Democratic Alliance, Ekattarer Ghatak Dalal Nirmul Committee and Pachattarer Ghatak Dalal Nirmul Committee were among the organisations which paid tributes to the fallen hero at Shaheed Noor Hossain Square.
   The Shaheed Noor Hossain Society hoisted a black flag atop its office and mourners wore black badges marking the day.

The Election Commission on Monday wrapped up registration of voters, who applied after the expiry of the field-level enumeration, under its special power with BNP chairperson Khaleda Zia still remaining unregistered.
   ‘The commission under its special power enrolled about 200 voters. The registration process is over. Now the task of changing address of voters’ areas for upazila elections is going on,’ secretary to the EC secretariat M Humayun Kabir said at a press briefing.
   The EC record shows that applications of 396 persons, who intended to be voters, were accepted by the commission till November 6.
   Chief election commissioner ATM Shamsul Huda, while receiving final voters’ roll from the army on October 14, said excepting for some important persons like Khaleda Zia, people left out of the voters’ roll would have to wait for registration until the ninth parliamentary polls.
   ‘There is no chance [for the left out people] to become voters before the upcoming elections. They will get the chance to be registered or [voters can] change address when the scheduled update of the voters’ roll begins early next year – from Jan 2 to 31,’ he said.
   The CEC also said ‘The Election Commission has special powers to include a person [in the list] before the polls schedule is announced.’
   Khaleda Zia, also the immediate past prime minister, is yet to be registered as a voter. Khaleda was approached by the EC several times before her release on bail, but she refused to be registered while being behind bars.
   Awami League chief Sheikh Hasina, also a former prime minister, registered herself as a voter on June 10 in the special jail.
   According to new electoral laws, a person who has not been registered as a voter, cannot contest elections.
   Replying to a question about registering the name of Khaleda Zia, who missed the deadline by refusing to be voter from jail, the secretary said, ‘If she [Khelada] wants to be a voter, it will be done under special power of the commission.

The High Court on Monday asked the government not to arrest or harass Awami Swechhasebak League president AFM Bahauddin Nasim and assistant private secretary to former prime minister Sheikh Hasina Alauddin Ahmed Chowdhury without due legal process.
   A High Court division bench of Justice Tariq ul Hakim and Justice Farah Mahbub passed the order after hearing separate writ petitions filed by Nasim and Alauddin challenging the ‘arbitrary’ actions of the police.
   The court on Sunday asked Bahauddin to surrender in the trial court within 10 weeks after he had appeared in the court and prayed for bail in four separate cases.
   The same court on Sunday directed the police to refrain from arresting or harassing him during the period of 10 weeks.

Academics, politicians and rights activists at a commemorative meeting on Monday paid rich tributes to Manabendra Narayan Larma, the founder of Parbatya Chattagram Jana Sanghati Samiti, marking the 25th anniversary of his death.
   They said Manabendra was not only a leader of the ethnic minority communities but also a leader of all those who were denied their rights as he represented their voice.
   He was a man of courage, who had organised an armed struggle to safeguard the rights of his community, they said at the programme at the National Press Club.
   Academic Kabir Chowdhury said Manabendra was a man whose name still inspired the younger generation years after his death. ‘The killers thought they would wipe out his name from history. But the reality is different. He is remembered by all. But people pronounce the names of his killers with extreme hatred,’ he said.
   Serajul Islam Chowdhury, professor emeritus at Dhaka University, said the imperialist axis was out to suppress any struggle for self-rule and Manabendra was killed by the imperialists in his noble battle against them. ‘We have not yet achieved the freedom we wanted through the war of liberation. The non-recognition of the ethnic minorities in the constitution proves that Bangladesh is yet to become a democratic country,’ he said.
   He said the country needed a united struggle to realise the dream of MN Larma, the dream of the people as a whole.
   The Communist Party of Bangladesh president, Manjurul Ahsan Khan, said it was distressing that those who had formulated the constitution of 1972 did not speak about the four basic principles of the constitution.
   Journalist Kamal Lohani presented the MN Larma memorial lecture at the programme.
   Workers Party politburo member Haider Akbar Khan Rano, former adviser to the caretaker government Sultana Kamal, writer Selina Hossain, Dalem Chandra Barman, Sadeka Halim, and Bangladesh Adivasi Forum general secretary, Sanjeeb Drong, attended the programme conducted by Robayet Ferdous and Dipayan Khisha.
   Before the discussion, different organisations placed flowers at the portrait of MN Larma.

Pro-Jamaat Islami Chhatra Shibir supporters demonstrated on the Rajshahi University campus as their 48-hour ultimatum to the authorities to expel the students involved in cultural activities from the university ended Monday.
   The university authorities would be responsible for any untoward incident as they failed to expel members of RU unit of cultural group Udichi and campus-based theatre group Dhumketu Natya Sangsad, whose production ‘Mandar’ angered the Shibir.
   Shibir activists, in the guise of ‘Sachetan Chhatra Samaj,’ chanted slogans against the cultural groups on Monday and walked in a procession joined by a large number of outsiders, campus sources said.
    Students in general were worried about the Shibir’ deadline and demonstrations since Monday morning scared many of them away from the campus.
   Huge continents of law enforcers were deployed on the campus.
   Sacheton Chhatra Samaj, meanwhile, launched a signature campaign against what it said defaming Islam through cultural propaganda. Some students alleged that they were forced to put their signature.
   Senior teachers blamed the university administration for failing to bring the situation under control as religious fanatics were trying to create a chaotic situation.
   Dr Mojaffar Hossain, convener of the Progressive Teachers Society, alleged that the RU authorities unleashed the fundamentalist forces against those who harboured progressive and liberal thoughts.
   Religious fundamentalists were conspiring to foil the December 18 general elections, he said.
   A senior administrative official said Jamaat-Shibir clique created the new issue as part of their plan to get their members enrolled as admission tests are beginning on November 16.
   ‘Shibir earlier gave a proposal to the university authorities to enrol their people,’ the official said.
   Malay Kumar Bhowmick, a professor of the management department and a cultural activist said that such unreasonable issues were being created to divert people’s attention from the movement against removal of Baul sculptures in Dhaka.
   Meanwhile, the probe committee, headed by social science faculty dean Professor Sadequl Islam, started its work on investigation into the content of Mandar, a drama staged on November 3 by Dhumketu Natya Sangsad which earned wrath of Shibir, a student body loyal to Bangladesh Jamaat-Islami.

Several hundred madrassah students on Monday went on demonstrations in the Rajshahi city demanding ‘punishment’ for cultural activists for staging a drama titled ‘Mandar’ on the Rajshahi University campus a few days ago.
   They said the cultural activists had staged the drama defaming Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) on November 3.
   Dhumketu staged the drama on the campus in protest at the dismantling of baul sculptures in the Dhaka airport crossing. But the pro-Jamaat student organisation Islami Chhatra Shibir found fault with the drama as there was a character named ‘Rasul Mia.’
   On Monday, the madrassah students brought out a procession from the Bara Mosque at about 5:15pm and after parading different streets they held a rally in the Zero Point area.
   They threatened to launch a tougher movement in the country if the authorities failed to ‘punish’ the cultural activists of Rajshahi University. They also demanded the RU authorities should expel the cultural activists from the university.
   The madrassah students staged the programme at a time when the Shibir gave a 48-hour ultimatum to the RU authorities to expel the cultural activists by Monday.

The Bangladesh Telecommuni-cation Regulatory Commission has reduced bandwidth charge by 60 per cent with effect from December 1.
   A news release of the commission on Monday said the step was taken aiming at enabling the internet users to get the connectivity at lower rate which would eventually expand information and communications technology across the country.
   The commission asked the internet service providers and other people concerned to reduce the charge in line with reduced bandwidth charge.
   The commission also asked all the mobile phone and public switched telephone network operators to re-fix the tariffs for the subscribers, the release said.

The government has appointed Mahbub-Uz-Zaman, now serving as director general of South Asia wing of the foreign affairs ministry, as Bangladesh’s next high commissioner to Sri Lanka.
   Mahbub, a career diplomat, joined the Foreign Service in 1988, said a news release of the ministry on Monday.
   During his two-decade career, he served Bangladesh missions in New York, New Delhi, Ottawa, Tokyo and Geneva.