Ibn Khaldun (1332-1406) and Karl Marx (1818-1883) are separated by five centuries of history and two civilisations and yet they exhibit some very important similarities. I discovered this when I was undertaking my Master of Arts (MA) studies in Political Thought at the University of Kent, UK. I realised that they both believed that history […]

On 16 December 1971, the nine months nightmare ended with the surrender and humiliation of the Pakistan army. It was an army under the dictatorship of General Yahya Khan that launched a completely unnecessary, bloody war on 26 March 1971 against a section of his own country, the eastern wing of the then Pakistan, that […]

A reflection on the eve of Bangladesh Victory Day I have been thinking about feminism and the relentless efforts and struggles that it has been waging for women’s liberation and equality. I have started to reflect on the society into which I was born, the various places where I moved in and out from after […]

Why was Bangladesh created and what kind of Bangladesh was dreamt of by those who fought for and supported the efforts for independence during the liberation war? There is currently a deep confusion about the reason why Bangladesh was created and what kind of Bangladesh was envisaged by the supporters of independence. I think the […]

These two young children were being helped by Barrister Shajahan’s project for street children in Dhaka. I do not remember the exact name of the project, but he once told me how, to win the trust of the street children, he would dress up scruffy and hang around on the streets where the street children […]

I have two minds on this, based on short and long term issues. I know how the initial welcome of Bihari Muslims after the partition of India in 1947 turned, later, into hate against them and the marginalisation of the community. They have been living in a nightmare situation ever since without a place they […]

I have worked in many major inner-city regeneration programmes in the UK, including on the Greenwich Waterfront Strategy and Stratford City Challenge during the early 1990s, and subsequently in Ealing, Bedford and Brent. I also worked in the development of the unsuccessful Woolwich/Plumstead City Challenge bid in 1992. It was an intensive and insightful learning […]

As we talk about decolonising knowledge and make efforts in this regard, we should be clear about what needs to be done. There is a possible and most probably danger that we will replace euro-centric history with another centric history Euro-centric history There is an increasing realisation, and rightly so, about what’s wrong with euro-centric […]

We are entering December 2020, the month 50 years ago in 1970 when Pakistan held a free and fair general election covering both wings of the country after about twelve years of military dictatorship. The result of the election and what happened next set a motion in place and, by the following December in 1971, […]

74 YEARS OF PARTITION | The Evolution of the relationship between Pakistan, India and Bangladesh After listening to the discussion in the on the above I was prompted to reflect on the topic and write something on the topic. Some elements of the developing imaginations of the Hindu nationalists in India during the 19th and […]