Highlighting the potential of Bangladesh’s human resources, Milon said the country’s students and researchers had the capacity to compete at the international level.
Education Minister Dr A N M Ehsanul Hoque Milon. File photo
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Education Minister Dr A N M Ehsanul Hoque Milon. File photo
Education Minister Dr A N M Ehsanul Hoque Milon today (14 November) said the government is keen to increase investment in the education sector, particularly in science, innovation, research and development.
He also said research institutions and related organisations would have to come forward in this regard.
The minister made the remarks while addressing a conference titled “Chemical Innovation for Future Challenge” as the chief guest. The event was organised by the Bangladesh Chemical Society at the Nabab Nawab Ali Chowdhury Senate Building of Dhaka University (DU).
Mentioning that around Tk 5,000 crore has been allocated for the HEAT project under the University Grants Commission (UGC), he said various research and development projects were underway in the country and the government wanted to invest more in science and technology, innovation and research.
Highlighting the potential of Bangladesh’s human resources, Milon said the country’s students and researchers had the capacity to compete at the international level.
Recently, 23 scientists from the University of Dhaka were included in the list of the world’s top 2% of scientists. This was a matter of pride for the country, he said.
However, human resources must not remain merely an invisible asset but must be turned into productive and visible assets. For this reason, the government was also placing emphasis on increasing investment in technical education, the minister added.
Referring to garments made from plant fibres and the need for research into the diversified use of jute, he said jute fibre was extremely important.
Yet Bangladesh had not made the expected progress in the diversified use of this resource or in expanding the range of jute products. He stressed the need to increase research to develop new products from jute fibre.
He noted that there was also scope to increase the use of environmentally friendly and biodegradable jute bags.
The minister said an initiative had been taken to provide uniforms to primary school students across the country from the beginning of 2027. The government also planned to provide jute bags to students for carrying books and exercise books.
Raising the issue of the recent Secondary School Certificate (SSC) examination results, Milon said the pass rate this year was 52%, and the results had not met expectations.
In this situation, he said, the grades of around 45,000 students had changed so far following the re-scrutiny of answer scripts.
Of them, around 5,000 students who had previously failed had passed after re-scrutiny, while the grade point average (GPA) of around 3,790 students had increased. He added that the causes of these irregularities and errors would be investigated.
In addition, re-examinations for those who had failed in one or two subjects would be held soon, he added.
Addressing the students, he said there were 57 public and 116 private universities in the country. Against a total of around 15 lakh seats, approximately 550,000 students had passed. Therefore, there was no reason to be overly worried about university admissions, he said.
DU Vice-Chancellor Professor A B M Obaidul Islam spoke at the programme as the chief patron.
The programme was chaired by Bangladesh Chemical Society President Dr Md Emran Kaiyum. The society’s General Secretary Dr A K M Lutfor Rahman, DU Pro-Vice-Chancellor Professor Almoazzeddi Alfesani and Rangamati Science and Technology University Vice-Chancellor Professor Joynal Abedin Siddique also spoke.
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