Author: Priya Saha

Hundreds of mental health experts have expressed “grave concern” over the Government’s new policing bill, saying it will have a “profound negative impact” on young people.More than 350 clinical psychiatrists and psychologists signed a letter urging their political representatives to oppose the bill that limits protesting rights and expands police stop and search powers.The Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts bill was approved in the Commons in March 2021 and is currently being reviewed in the House of Lords ahead of another vote on Monday.The bill is widely opposed by human rights and racial justice activists, with “Kill the Bill” protests…

Bangladesh is surprisingly underrated when it comes to travel destinations, even though its stunning features 100% make it a bucket list destination. Bangladesh is not normally the first on anyone’s list of countries to visit. But that doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be or that it doesn’t have a wealth of things to see and explore. It is an undiscovered destination with a rich culinary culture. If one does find oneself in Bangladesh, be sure to try out their many delicious street foods. Much of what one will find in Bangladesh is similar to what one would find in the neighboring…

PRISTINA, Kosovo (AP) — Kosovo police on Saturday said they had stopped from entering documentation that Serbia had sent to allow the ethnic Serb minority to take part in a referendum.A statement said that one car and two trucks were stopped at the Merdare border crossing point with Serbia a day earlier. The trucks have been confiscated while six people in the vehicles were turned back.Serbia is holding a referendum on Sunday on amendments to boost the independence of its judiciary as part of reforms needed for the country to move closer to European Union membership. Belgrade wants its ethnic…

LONDON — Ornate English and Bengali typography adorns the signs of Taj Stores, one of the oldest Bangladeshi-run supermarkets in the Brick Lane neighborhood of East London. The signs evoke a part of the area’s past, when it became known as “Banglatown,” and eventually home to the largest Bangladeshi community in Britain.But Brick Lane’s future is looking very uncertain, said Jamal Khalique, standing inside a supermarket opened in 1936 by his great-uncle and now run by Mr. Khalique and his two brothers.Modern office buildings of glass and steel and a cluster of apartments and cranes tower above the skyline. New…

Indian so-called democratic valuesINDIA claims itself as the world’s largest democracy, having a population of more than one billion. People of all religious communities are living in the country.But, they are facing terrible conditions when it comes to offering religious duties. People cannot perform their religious obligations openly in India.As per international standards/values, the mere population and size of a country is not the measure to decide about the fate of any democratic state. A nation must have strong values, inclusiveness and democratic norms so that it can be termed as a proper democratic state.In India’s case, no such value…

By Stephen Uttom (UCA News) — The Bangladesh Hindu-Buddhist-Christian Unity Council (BHBCUC) has been working for the rights of minority communities in Bangladesh since 1988. With 12 percent of the South Asian nation’s 160 million people belonging to minority groups, it’s a daunting task to ensure the protection of their rights. For Nirmol Rozario, a Catholic and one of three presidents of the BHBCUC, the rise of Islamic fundamentalism in the country poses a big challenge to minority rights. “The non-communal Bangladesh after independence ceased to exist after the assassination of the father [Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman] of our nation…

Published: January 14, 2022 17:31:08 | Updated: January 14, 2022 23:21:44 Hundreds of thousands of Hindu worshippers gathered on the banks of India’s Ganges River on Friday for a holy bathe despite a 30-fold rise in coronavirus cases in the past month. Hindus believe a bath in the holy river on the Jan. 14 Makarsankranti festival washes away sins. A large number of devotees were taking a dip in the sacred river where it flows through the eastern state of West Bengal, which is reporting the most number of cases in the country after Maharashtra state in the west, reports…

A lone Asian girl, raised on government subsidies, put herself on a plane to a foreign continent on a full scholarship she half-fluked, to a boarding school where she was surrounded by literal royalty and cherished daughters of millionaires. Ticking ‘all the diversity boxes’ – ethnic minority, socio-economic background, disabilities – she was told that if she ever did succeed, it would be in spite of the differences that were stacked against her. She knew that, though she felt lonely in her ‘otherness’, she couldn’t be the only one who also felt that same overwhelming sense of being an ‘outsider’,…

Bangladesh achieved victory in the liberation war on December 16, 1971, fought by the Allied Command of Bangladesh Mukhti Bahini and Indian Forces Back in 1947, Bengal Presidency was divided into ‘West Bengal’ and ‘East Bengal’, mainly on the basis of religion. The former became a part of India and latter, that of Pakistan, known as ‘East Pakistan’. Ali Mohammad Jinnah, the then Governor-General of Pakistan, declared ‘Urdu’ as the official language of Pakistan, which was not liked by the people of East Pakistan (present Bangladesh). They led a language movement and on February 20, 1952, West Pakistan Government issued…

When Ushpreet Singh arrived in Whitehorse, Yukon, in late 2020, he was dismayed to find that the town of 33,000 people did not have a gurdwara — a place of worship for Sikhs like him. At the time, there were about a dozen Sikh families in Whitehorse and a makeshift Sikh committee, but no meeting place. So Singh set about trying to establish one himself. “I asked where all the paperwork was and when I saw it, the total donation was $6,000 in 20 years,” the 23-year-old tells Global News. “It was not enough to establish a temple, it was…

Saturday’s reviews in The Irish Times are Susan McKay on On Bloody Sunday by Julieann Campbell; Mia Levitin on To Paradise by Hanya Yanagihara; Catherine Taylor on the best new translated fiction; Estelle Birdy on I Came All This Way to Meet You: Writing Myself Home by Jami Attenberg; Jane Casey on Breaking Point by Edel Coffey; Rachel Andrews on Accidental Gods: On Men Unwittingly Turned Divine by Anna Della Subin; Harry White on Nikolay Myaskovsky: A Composer and His Times by Patrick Zuk; Daniel Geary on How Civil Wars Start by Barbara F Walter; Matthew Shipsey on Roopa Farooki’s…

The Bangladesh Hindu-Buddhist-Christian Unity Council (BHBCUC) has been working for the rights of minority communities in Bangladesh since 1988.With 12 percent of the South Asian nation’s 160 million people belonging to minority groups, it’s a daunting task to ensure the protection of their rights.For Nirmol Rozario, a Catholic and one of three presidents of the BHBCUC, the rise of Islamic fundamentalism in the country poses a big challenge to minority rights. “The non-communal Bangladesh after independence ceased to exist after the assassination of the father [Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman] of our nation [in 1975]. Now the country is torn apart…