When I was in Dhaka, starting from my boyhood, I used to wait the entire year in expectation of this day. Rather, more correctly, in expectation of the first breeze of the Spring to suddenly caress my body in a solitary evening street..... ....(Read more)

Every day, women continue to be victims of rape, trafficking, acid-throwing, dowry deaths and other kinds of torture. At the opening of this new century, women are still not considered as equal human beings in many parts of the world.... ....(Read more)

One thing our socio-cultural norm avoids like a plague is self evaluation. Many writers in this forum sound very angry and frustrated. A mind that is truly liberated may have its reasons for this frustration, what is going on around us in Bangladesh, in our subcontinent as well as in the rest of the world cannot be reasoned or justified using any formula but insanity. I often ask myself  ...(Read more)

Whenever any context of a country comes incidentally in our movies, dramas, story books, novels and especially in our patriotic songs, it is intentionally mentioned to brainwash the common people that a country means its "holy soil", mountains, rivers or flowers. ...(Read more)

It is a response to the article "Islam Bashing – favorite pastime for some" written by Mr. K. Rahman which published in NFB on July 23, 2001. In his article,  he made some brutal comment against the atheists in general,  which led me to response accordingly. One of his traditional comment was - "Godless person can do anything without fear of consequences."  . ...(Read more)

Tagore and Einstein met through a common friend, Dr. Mendel. Tagore visited Einstein at his residence at Kaputh in the suburbs of Berlin on July 14, 1930, and Einstein returned the call and visited Tagore at the Mendel home. Both conversations were recorded. The July 14 conversation is reproduced here,  . ...(Read more)

Early in my teens, I began to lose my faith. It was a gradual process of asking myself questions until one day I realized that religion simply did not make sense to me. I was a child, and religion – or God – was not something I had thought much about. Till then, my experience of religion was to a large extent similar to other people. It was something that was just there... ....(Read more)

Epic is not a history. Epic is always fanciful whereas history is plain informative. So searching historical truth in an epic is just a mere hypocrisy and disgrace to its literary value. For such reasons, nobody look for Greek historical evidences in Homeric epic Odyssey or Iliad though it is true that the two epics were written entirely based on . ....(Read more)

Now come to the crux: "WHO created you?" is NOT the right question. It does not matter if individually A or B disagrees with my above assertion. Professional philosophers, scientists who are employed in all secular schools supported by tax payers and private sponsors (ranging form the mediocre to the top notch) have overwhelmingly reached a consensus on this... ....(Read more)

The fundamentalist Mullahs and other Islamic "scholars" dogmatically claim that Quran miraculously predicted many invention of modern science and all of those Quranic predictions and myths are flawless. Many web-pages, books and videos have been produced by the Islamic apologists proclaiming that some verses in their scriptures contain super- scientific facts.Their belief begin to reach to a firm level when they also find some occidental charlatan starts talking in favor of their faith... ....(Read more)

You are a Muslim-woman. You are a loving daughter of your poor village-parents, loving doll of your brothers/sisters. Without much formal education, you are thorough in your devotion to Allah/Prophet (SA)/Qur’aan, in your Namaz, Roja, Zakat, and other Islami rituals. Though unsung and unlamented, ... ....(Read more)

There are always a lot of debates and discussions in various e-forums on this topic, some of those contain a lot of verbiage. But unfortunately those really did not succeed in making any clear case, as far as proving the existence of God, or refuting any argument against the claim of God's existence. No surprise, as that's how it has been for centuries.... ....(Read more)

I have had the privilege of being an active member of Mukto-Mona since its inception about a year ago. My own association with it as a member was via rationalism, a philosophy I uphold as the guiding principle of my life and was also stated as an important ideal in Mukto-Mona's statement of purpose (Message #1). So on the occasion of the first anniversary of Mukto-Mona as a forum upholding rationalism, .... ....(Read more)

Miracle is something done by supernatural powers. Mysteires are "natural phenomena" about which we do not know anything. But we have been believing "Mysteries" as miracles as we did not know what was behind them.. ....(Read more)

When the horrendous handling of the FEER article issue still attracting a lot of flaks, our Govt again went about the Danish Aid withdrawal issue in its most callous way, just what was expected from our political guardians? I just wonder if we are ever going learn the educated way of handling of things. .(Read more)

Something awful seems to be happening to the traditional American sense of fair play and goodwill. The public response in support of the victims of September 11 notwithstanding, in general there seems to be a decline of empathy and altruism. Perhaps I am overreacting, but this deficiency seems to assume many forms.. .(Read more)

Communal riots are an indicator of socio-cultural schism existing between the communities. Every communal riot not only deepens this schism and hardens the socio-cultural divide, new found factors and reasons get added to the divide. The recent communal riots in Gujarat  . .(Read more)

Today is Pohela Boishakh. For the past six years, I greet the New Year with melancholy, for this was the day when a dearest friend once celebrated his birthday. For the past six years I have no way to communicate my good wishes to him from this world. Rafi's introduction to me was back in the days when I was living in Lalmatia and ....(Read more)

Ahmad Sofa (1943-2001), the last bastion of hope and honesty in the fast degenerating intellectual arena of Bangladesh, has breathed his last. Thus came to an end, rather abruptly, an extraordinarily eventful life of a supreme creative genius, an unabashed altruist and an undaunted warrior against all forms of injustice and hegemony. ....(Read more)

Artistic appreciation for many seem to be a result of extrinsic factors, like influences, popularity, constant exposure to a widely available and plugged art form,, an urge to go with the going fad or style, cultural bias among many others. For few is it due to a genuine desire to discover and appreciate the intrinsic quality of the art  .... (Read more)

Rabindranath Thakur, the celebrated Bengali poet, short-story writer, song composer, playwright, essayist, and painter who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1913. He introduced new prose and verse forms and the use of colloquial language into Bengali literature, thereby freeing it from traditional models based on classical Sanskrit. He was highly influential in introducing the best of Indian culture to the West and vice  .... (Read more)

Poems of Jibanananda Das have special meaning to all of us who are living in an alien land faraway removed from Bengal. The sensation that I get reading poems from Ruposhi bangla or Bonolata Sen cannot so easily be described through writing alone. How one could possibly describe his or her mood or emotion? As I am gracefully growing older, Jibanananda Das's poems are creeping into my mind. The joy that I get upon reading his fascinating poems ... ... ....(Read more)

I lived in New York for seven lucky years and loved every bit of it, so much so that I am now scared to revisit her for it's landscape has changed forever! I shared for sometime a serene household in an island called Staten on the other side of the East River with a die-hard India lover American dropout named Jonathan, we used to fondly call Janardan, and a Japanese girl Umiko with her furry feline   .... (Read more)

Staying inside the apartment has become too claustrophobic. My favorite little cozy apartment is just strangulating me with the TV coverage and the non-stop phone calls. No matter how much I try to lift up myself, the ghost of World Trade Center won’t leave me. It’s been three days that I am stuck at home unable to go to work. .... (Read more)

The incident of September 11 has affected a lot of people in many ways. However, I believe it has a long-term impact on the way the minorities will be treated in this country. For the first time in my life in the US, I am realizing the loneliness of being part of the minority group. As I hear more and more news of incidents of racial harassment, I feel embarrassed and ashamed. A friend was saying that  .... (Read more)

I found the first yellow leaf on my backyard today when the New York City was burning. The glass room is now lit with the soft caressing rays of the September's maturing sun. The trees are covered with a thin and fresh layer of morning dew. My diligent neighbor is out on board his noisy tractor, mowing his lawn. Birds are still around but will soon start their flight to the warmer .  .... (Read more)

The Inconsequential Politician
by Sylvia Mortoza

During the 19th and early 20th centuries, certain intellectual but romantic Westerners became much taken with "Orientalism." What started as a sophisticated adoration of all things Asian has evolved into unsophisticated middle-class hippieism seeking ashram enlightenment or the perfect rave at Vagator Beach in Goa.Few have taken the trouble to live there long enough to discover that Asia is not so much superior as muddling through pretty much like the rest of us.. ... ....(Read more)

Al-Bho(n)dorer Desh
by Fatemolla

I got hold of your book "Al Bho(n)darer Desh" and gone through it some time back [September]. As per your request I wanted to write up a review of it. But so many things are happening I couldn't keep pace with time. Now I realize it will take more time to do so- may be I will not be able to do so at all. I therefore decided to make tit bit comments on your book and post it to [Mukto-Mona] forum, of course if you permit, now and then.I like your style of writing. You have a rare capability of presenting ....(Read more)

Gandhi's Passion
by Stanley Wolpert

I got hold of your book "Al Bho(n)darer Desh" and gone through it some time back [September]. As per your request I wanted to write up a review of it. But so many things are happening I couldn't keep pace with time. Now I realize it will take more time to do so- may be I will not be able to do so at all. I therefore decided to make tit bit comments on your book and post it to [Mukto-Mona] forum, of course if you permit, now and then.I like your style of writing. You have a rare capability of presenting ....(Read more)

Mary Wollstonecraft : A Revolutionary Life
By Janet Todd

ABOUT her first published work, Thoughts on the Education of Daughters, Mary Wollstonecraft said, "I felt what I wrote!" Indeed, her writings reveal an evolution of her feelings, from belief in moral absolutes to support for the independence of women to a grudging concession that life grows more complex as reality erodes idealism.

Wollstonecraft wrote Thoughts in 1787 when she was 27 and running a school in Newington Green, near London. ....(Read more)

Why I am not a Muslim
By Ibn Warraq

In the wake of the Rushdie Affair, a report in the New York Times (Feb. 27, 1989) voiced a common fear: "Ayatollah Khomeini has probably succeeded in preventing publication in this country of books critical of Muslims & Islam". This prophecy has proved, fortunately wrong, witness the writings of Anwar Shaikh that have earned him a fatwa from the mullahs in Pakistan, or Dr. Morey's The Islamic Invasion (1992). Now we have the courageous work of Ibn Warraq, Why I am not A Muslim, first published in the USA in 1995.. ....(Read more)