As we try to make sense of consent, we have to recognise that consent is a nuanced issue. We have to unlearn what the media and mainstream entertainment have taught us about rape—that it has to be violent and involve physical coercion for it to be rape. We cannot underestimate the power of coercive control, or manipulation.

The Daily Star talks to three experts - a researcher, a labour activist and a development professional - about the progress Bangladesh has made and the challenges it still faces.

People tell her she is lucky to be alive, to have escaped the “clutches of death”. They tell her to “count her blessings” for making it out of the rubble that was once Rana Plaza, with her limbs intact. They remind her of all those who didn't share her fate.

Preparations for the Bengali New Year festivities are in full swing. The shops are abuzz with patrons looking for red and white attire...

Days before the Pahela Baishakh celebrations, unknown criminals smeared graffiti painted on roadside walls near Chittagong

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina yesterday embarked on a four-day state visit to India with a flickering hope of breaking the stalemate on the much-delayed Teesta water-sharing treaty. “I want to have a separate meeting with Mamata [chief minister of West Bengal], and I am waiting for that,” Hasina told a group of four Indian journalists hours after Indian Premier Narendra Modi received her at Delhi's Palam Air Force Station in a departure from his protocol.

It is only when the poor and other excluded sections of the population are sitting in the representative institutions of the state, in local elective bodies as well as in Parliament, that they will be able to ensure that their particular concerns are mainstreamed within the policymaking process.

March 25 has been declared as Genocide Day recognising the atrocities carried out by the Pakistani Army on civilians 46 years ago on this day. In this week's In Focus, Mashruk Ahmed tells the stories of these valiant freedom fighters of Bangladesh through their photos and words.

The last time anyone involved in investigating Tonu's case gave any real updates was last June.

A TV commercial by a prominent telecom company was brought to my attention through a Facebook post by a journalist.

Today we are publishing two documents from the recently declassified CIA files. These documents reflect on the developments following Yahya Khan's arrival in Dhaka on March 15, 1971 to meet Sheikh Mujib for “negotiations”.

A recent move by the Government to allow child marriage under special circumstances is tantamount to excluding many Bangladeshis from the benefits of growth and development.

Teaching is a profession that requires patience, skill and an enthusiasm for education. Teachers aim to inspire. Rokeya Begum, 27, an

The Bangladesh-India border has been labelled as one of the most securitised borders of Asia, if not of the world. During 2010 to

Keeping intact a provision that allows marriage of underage girls and boys in “special circumstances”, the Jatiya Sangsad last night passed the Child Marriage Restraint Bill 2017 with 18 and 21 as minimum marriageable age for women and men respectively.

An estimated 64 lakh people in the country suffer from depressive disorder while 69 lakh from anxiety disorders, says a new study of the World Health Organisation (WHO).

A group of teenagers spray-painted a historically black school with racist and anti-Semitic messages recently in Virginia. The judge, as reported by the Huffington Post on February 7, 2017, served the young men an unusual punishment: writing reports on a list of books and movies, besides also visiting a Holocaust museum and doing research on the swastika.

The country has already become a lower middle-income country. So far so good! However, these indexes don't always tell us the whole truth about the states of governance, corruption, poverty, inequality, and most importantly, frequent violations of human rights across the country.

Gazi Kamrus Salam Sohan went to Syria in December 2014 to join Islamic State, believing he was answering a holy call. But after a five-month stay in the war-torn country, he got disillusioned as he learnt that the terror group kills Muslims as well.

Mongla Port is no Bermuda Triangle, also known as the Devil's Triangle in the Atlantic Ocean, where several ships and also aircraft are said to have mysteriously vanished. But when it comes to ships full of fertiliser, they can disappear under equally mysterious circumstances from this port in southern Bangladesh, about 14,000km east of Bermuda Triangle.