Dowel Biswas

Bulletins told listeners what was happening; songs suggested why it mattered, sometimes signalling the freedom fighters on safer roads, and information that would be crucial to win the Liberation War.

The exhibition, titled The Handloom Tradition of Bangladesh, opened on March 8 at Bengal Shilpalay in Dhanmondi. Organised by the Bangladesh Handloom Board with support from the Bengal Foundation, the nine-day programme combines a curated exhibition with a small fair celebrating the country’s weaving heritage.

Dana’s arrival in Bangladesh carried the strange familiarity of a travelling salesperson, except that nothing she sells intends to cure anything at all.

Mukhopadhyay lived through the fractures of partition, the uncertainties of migration, and the routines of middle-class survival. Politics was inherited consciousness, not a slogan. Songwriting became a ledger of conscience: a daily reckoning with history, place, and identity. His voice quivered at the edges, not from lack of technique, but from the weight of feeling itself. Being Bengali was not taught; it had to be experienced.

Electoral symbols in Bangladesh are semiotic anchors, mapping decades of political life into objects instantly recognised by voters. Embedded in the textures of daily life, their meanings are layered, historically rooted, and culturally resonant. They also function as tools that can shape perception and nudge voter psychology.

When cultural institutions crumble, archives burn, and instruments shatter, it is not merely walls that vanish—it is memory, identity, and moral courage. Culture cannot be revised; it is what history has written. Every assault upon it shakes the quiet foundations of a nation’s conscience.

For Sunny, the film is not “urgent” — a word he resists — but it offers a revision of political history told through lived experience rather than rhetoric. “We’ve been mistreated by the British, by India, by Pakistan, by our own governments. These layers flow through the film. If it does anything, it helps us see where we stand politically, socially, and economically. And honestly, no one needs to watch a film. Sometimes not watching is the best choice.”

Last evening, that engagement unfolded with both reverence and vitality at “Aloker Ei Jhorna-Dharay” (The Eternal Illumination), a collaborative tribute by the Embassy of Sweden in Dhaka and HSBC Bangladesh.

At Chhayanaut’s Ramesh Chandra Dutta Memorial Hall on Sunday, nostalgia met reverence as artists, activists, and admirers gathered to celebrate the birth centenary of filmmaker Ritwik Kumar Ghatak and his twin sister, singer Protiti Devi.

The Ministry of Cultural Affairs has turned this remembrance into a national homage — a three-day festival from October 17 to 19 at Lalon’s resting ground in Cheuriya. There will be music, discourse, and a fair that carries the rhythm of his spirit.

The awards’ focus on technical categories is an act of cultural intervention, asking audiences and peers alike to reconsider who counts in the making of art.

The exhibition presents a rare visual chronicle of one of Bangladesh’s greatest treasures, Sultan, spanning from his reclusive days in his village home in Machimdia, Narail, to his later years. Photographs, letters—many never previously seen—allow viewers to step quietly into the private world of a man who preferred to live through his paintings, labour, imagination, and solitude.

That night in December 1921, while his comrade Muzaffar Ahmed slept, Nazrul scribbled furiously. By the morning, the air was charged with something new. “Bolo Bir, Chiro Unnoto Momo Sheer…” (“I am the Rebel Eternal, / I raise my head beyond this world, / High, ever erect and alone!”) he declared. It was not merely the birth of a poem but of a cultural rupture. Critics would later see in “Bidrohi” a break from the ‘Rabindric’ serenity that had long defined Bengal’s literary landscape—a new current of words forged in fire, laced with the clang of rebellion.

For decades, his works stood sentinel across the landscape of this country—quiet but powerful witnesses to our struggles, our resilience, and our history. “Sangsaptak”, perhaps his most defining piece, looms outside Jahangirnagar University’s central library like a frozen cry.

The artiste, whose lyrics and guitar immortalised the volatile, uncertain moments of the July Uprising through songs such as “Bhoy Banglay,” “Jonotar Beyadobi,” “Bhoy Banglay Bhoy,” “Ei Meye Shon,” “Rani Maa,” and “O Neta Bhai,” offered this correspondent a deeply personal glimpse into her creative process during a time when life seemed hollow and rebellion offered meaning.

Set against a parched desert landscape, the play follows a paranoid merchant, a humble porter, and a local guide as they journey across unforgiving terrain in pursuit of profit and survival. A fatal misunderstanding leads to tragedy, unfolding into a courtroom drama that questions whether justice can truly be impartial when wealth and power dominate the rules.

As Dhaka shimmered beneath days of rainfall, a quiet enchantment stirred inside the Sheraton Ballroom last Friday; however, this wasn't just another evening of performances. “Badol Diner Prothom Kodom Phul”, hosted by MW Magazine Bangladesh, unfolded more like a dream shared between memories and monsoon.

Panthakunja, located on Sonargaon Road, was once a rare oasis in the capital

More than just a home for the arts, it has long been a custodian of collective memory, responsible for shaping a culturally enriched, humane Bangladesh, rooted in its historical context. Despite its undeniable impact in preserving traditions, amplifying artistic expression, and cultivating national identity, the institution has long been a target for political manipulation, corruption, and political parties’ quests to control the cultural conscience of the country.

Pahela Baishakh heralds new beginning