The lead headline in the Daily Star on July 4 reminded us of the arrival of an austere time, but another story inside was even more depressing, telling us that, according to the Global Emotions Report 2022, Bangladesh is the seventh saddest nation in the world. And we became miserable well before the onset of high inflation and cost of living crisis. How was it possible? Haven’t we got dozens of occasions round the year to celebrate - some religious, some cultural, and many more political? Or, are we about to hear that some quarters opposed to the government and its world-class development have been conspiring against us? The Global Emotions Report, however, is not produced by any of the opposition parties, including the BNP, or human rights groups. It is a report by the global polling giant Gallup, constructed as part of its annual survey on people's emotional well-being.  In its quest for assessing the emotional state of the people and what contributes to their happiness or unhap...

THE media’s 50-year journey in Bangladesh is similar to our tumultuous politics. Its characteristics, purpose and behaviour over the five decades have transformed according to changes in the custodians in power. Accordingly, its development can be broadly defined in different segments of time that includes two brief periods of media freedom. However, the second episode was the brightest that took place following the restoration of democracy in the 1990s. The first period of freedom was very brief, lasting for less than two years after independence. But as the civic liberty and democracy started gradually shrinking and reduced to a one-party rule, our press had suffered the worst. But again, in between two different military regimes — there were contrasting scenarios. The military regime that ruled between 1975 and 1982 reversed the blanket nationalisation of newspapers that was brought in by BAKSAL, the lone political party created through dissolution of the Awami League and few other ...