Zahir Raihan was one of the most talented film makers in Bangladesh. He was born on 19 August 1935 in the village Majupur in Feni District. He was one of the ten students to go out in a procession on 21 February 1952 despite a ban on such activities imposed by the authorities. As a result, he and many others were arrested and taken to prison. Raihan was also present at the historical meeting of Amtala on 21 February 1952. He also took part in the mass movement in 1969. In 1971, he joined the Liberation War.

All through his life, Zahir dreamt of a democratic society, a society that would ensure freedom of speech. He had many dreams about our film industry too. He made a legendary film Jibon Theke Neya based on the Language Movement of 1952. It was a protest against the autocratic government then ruling our country. The family portrayed in that film symbolically represented East Pakistan. The family was ruled by an autocrat who had to go to the prison for her conspiracy. During the Liberation War in 1971, this film was shown outside Bangladesh. Celebrated film makers like Satyajit Ray, Mrinal Sen, and Ritwik Ghatak appreciated the film. Raihan gave all the money the film made to the Freedom Fighters' trust. Besides, his great documentary on Pakistani atrocities, Stop Genocide, helped create world sentiment in favour of our Liberation War.

On 30 December 1971, someone informed Raihan about an address somewhere at Mirpur, where he might find his brother, the famous writer Shahidullah Kaiser, who had gone missing from 14 December 1971. Kaiser was captured and killed by the Pakistani army and the local collaborators during the last days of the war. Accordingly, Raihan left home to get his brother back but he never returned.

Zahir Raihan's dream was fulfilled. He could see the emergence of an independent Bangladesh though he did not get back his brother. And it's a pity that this dreamer could not live to see his dream come true.

The advantages of the Internet technology have made it possible to emerge a good number of web sites to facilitate social relations among people around the world. These are known as social networking services or social networks. At present, Facebook is the most popular. Google+, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc. are other frequently used social services. Social network services are web-based and hence, provide ways for the users to interact through the Internet. These services make it possible to connect people sharing interests and activities across the borders and thus have made a lot for the users to feel that they really live in a global village. Why are social networks expanding so fast? The answer is simple. Most of the social services are cost-free. You can make use of them free, paying a very little to your Internet service provider. Secondly, you can make your personal profile public before the entire online community. It is like presenting yourself before the entire world. You can also look into other people's profile if you are interested. It is simple and easy. Thirdly, social networks allow users to upload pictures, multimedia contents and modify the profile. Some services like Facebook allow users to update their profiles. Fourthly, networks allow users to post blog entries. User profiles have a section dedicated to comments from friends and other users. Finally, there are privacy protection measures too. A user himself or herself decides over the number of visitors/viewers, and what information should be shared with others. 

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'Heritage' is what we inherit from the past, live with in the present and then pass on to our children or future generation. Our unique source of life and inspiration is our cultural and natural heritage. When we speak of 'World Heritage', it indicates places and sites that we inherited from the past and pass on to the future generation of the entire world.

The 'Shat Gambuj Mosque' in Bagerhat is such a heritage. It became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1985. Originally, the historic Mosque City was known as 'Khalifatabad'. It is situated at the outskirts of Bagerhat town--not very far from the dense mangrove forest of the Sundarbans. Khalifatabad was a Muslim colony. It was founded by the Turkish general, a saint warrior Ulugh Khan Jahan in the 15th century. The infrastructure of the city reveals significant technical skills in many mosques as well as early Islamic monuments. Baked bricks were used for the construction of the buildings. The planning of the city was dominated by the tradition of Islamic architecture and the decorations were a combination of Mughal and Turkish architecture. 

Khan Jahan built a network of roads, bridges, public buildings and reservoirs to make the city habitable. There were about 360 mosques in the city. Among them the most remarkable is the multi-domed Shat Gombuj Mosque. The mosque is unique in the sense that it has 60 pillars that support the roof, with 77 low height domes. The 4 towers at 4 corners have smaller domes at the top as well. The vast prayer hall has 11 arched doorways on the east and 7 each on the north and south for light and ventilation. It has 7 aisles running along the length of the mosque and 11 deep curves between the slender stone columns. These columns support the curving arches created by the domes. The thickness of the arches is 6 feet and have slightly narrowing hollow and round wall.

The west wall in the interior has 11 'mihrabs' (niche in mosque pointing towards Makkah). These mihrabs are decorated with stonework and terracotta. The floor of the mosque is made of brick.

Besides being used as a prayer hall, Khan Jahan used the mosque as his court too. Today, it is one of the greatest tourist attractions and one of the best architectural beauties of Bangladesh.

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