We would like to recall with gratitude some harbingers of education from East Bengal (now Bangladesh) in the 19th century, who have ‘illumined’ the lives of generations by founding modern educational institutions at the primary, secondary and university levels in British India.
In this write-up, I shall briefly touch upon a few eminent personalities of the past who have enriched the lives of generations through their varied contributions to society in the fields of education, arts, sport and culture.
Bishop Reginald Heber (1783-1826) was an Oxford educated Anglican clergyman from England, a man of letters and a notable hymn-writer. As an intrepid traveler and a curious observer, he has left behind an interesting travelogue entitled: ‘
Amar Ekushey (Immortal 21 February) is a day of special significance for us in Bangladesh, as we recall with reverence and gratitude, all those young brave-hearts who made supreme sacrifice by giving up their youthful lives for a noble cause.
It was in Kabul, Afghanistan, on 24th December, 1972, when suddenly in the late afternoon the first snow flurries of the season began.
Mohammad Ishfakul Majid was born on 17 March, 1903 in Jorhat, Assam, Bengal Presidency in British India, to an illustrious old
Prior to the abolition of Zamindari in East Bengal (Bangladesh) in accordance with the ‘East Bengal State Acquisition and Tenancy Act of 1950’, the Bhawal zamindar estate was the second largest feudal landholding in the Dhaka district.
The failed Indian rebellion of 1857 also led to the ‘demise’ of the rapacious East India Company (EIC) in 1858, when political power was transferred to the crown-in-parliament in England with the founding of ‘The British Empire in India’ (1858-1947), popularly known today as the British Raj.
We, the Bangalees in Pakistan were ecstatic with joy. However, soon the reality also dawned upon us that we were stranded in Pakistan. The million dollar question was, when and how shall we all go back to liberated Bangladesh? There would be long months of anxious waiting and uncertainty ahead of us.
I had written on Colonel Gurbaksh Singh Dhillon (1914-2006) of the Indian National Army (INA), in an article published in The Daily Star on June 19, 2017 entitled, “A Letter from the Tiger's Den.”
Jnanendra Nath Gupta was born in 1869 in colonial Bengal. His father, Ghanashyamdas Gupta, was a district judge and, therefore, he spent his childhood in various parts of Bengal and Bihar.
The advent of the holy month of Ramadan, ever since the year 2000 CE, reminds me of an idealistic soul, a gallant freedom fighter against British colonial rule in India, who so graciously replied to my letter, that too, from an unknown.
Khan Bahadur Qazi Azizul Haque was born in 1872, in the village of Paigram Kasba, Phultala, in the Khulna district of Bengal, British
I spent a part of my impressionable years, that is to say, my boyhood school days in Islamabad, West Punjab, Pakistan.
Swinton on his return to Britain in 1766, writes Taifoor, had taken a certain Mirza Sheikh Itesamuddin of Nadia, Bengal, along with
Henrietta Aimee Elizabeth Simpson, née Stephen, lives in Edinburgh, Scotland. We were introduced by a mutual friend, the
My friend Charles Greig is a distinguished British Art historian and scholar. He was born in 1955 of aristocratic British and
