Osmani International Airport,Sylhet airport

Osmani International Airport is located 5 miles north-east of Sylhet in Bangladesh serving as the country's third international airport. The airport is operated by the Civil Aviation Authority of Bangladesh (CAAB) and is served by Biman Bangladesh Airlines, the national airline which at one point earned most of its revenue from this airport, GMG Airlines, the first private airline in Bangladesh, United Airways (Bangladesh) and Royal Bengal Airline, British-Bangladeshi owned airlines operating domestic services in Bangladesh.

The vast majority of passengers using the airport are expatriate Bangladeshis and their descendants from the Sylhet Division living in the United Kingdom.

Expansion

The airport was initially served by domestic flights from Shahjalal International Airport by the country's national airline Biman Bangladesh Airlines. After many years of lobbying by expatriates living in the UK, limited expansion of the airport was carried out to enable medium-sized aircraft, such as the Airbus A310 used by Biman, to operate. The work was completed in October 2002 and the airport was designated an international airport by the government. However, the airport was not up to international standards to be capable of fully accommodating international flights due to many shortcomings with the instrument landing system and runway lighting system and was seen as a move to stave off pressure by the government.

Nevertheless, on 3 November 2002, the airport received its first international arrival. Biman flight BG020 from Kuwait via Abu Dhabi landed at 10:05 with 215 passengers en-route to Dhaka. The disembarking passengers on the inaugraul flight were greeted by then Finance & Planning Minister, M Saifur Rahman and State Minister for Civil Aviation and Tourism, Mir Mohammad Nasiruddin. For a brief period, Biman also operated a direct service from London but was later re-routed via Dhaka.

Additional expansion of the runway and improvements to the runway lighting and airport facilities were commenced in 2004 to enable wide-bodied aircraft to safely land and takeoff from the airport.

The South Asia Transport and Trade Facilitation Conference report of 2006 (by the United States Trade and Development Agency) noted that the development of the airport "up to the standards of an international airport" to "encourage private sector participation in air transport" were projects that were under consideration by the government.

Work started in 2006 to upgrade the terminal facilities to enable handling of international flights. The improvements include construction of a new terminal building, two Jetways and a taxi-way. In May 2007, the foreign affairs adviser, informed journalists that the works were on scheduled for completion in June 2007. He also confirmed that Biman will be operating Hajj flights directly from the airport during the Hajj season later in 2007. However, the runway expansion works had not been completed in June with the foreign affairs adviser indicating in August that "minor dressing work" still remained. The work was finally finished in December 2008. A new budget has been passed that said that the airport is getting a new refueling system,expanding the airports and the runway and adding two new more runways,it is getting new instruments for control tower and runway,new terminal,6 more jet ways,and lighting instruments for all runway the project is suppose to start in 2011 and suppose to end at 2014 these new improvements will turn the airport into a true new international airport,it is said to that Antonov An-225,Boeing 747-8 or or even any larger aircraft then that could land easily.

History

Osmani International Airport was built during British rule of the Indian Subcontinent, partly to check Japanese aggression from Burma.

The airport was formerly known as Sylhet Civil Airport but was re-named after General M A G Osmani, a Bangladeshi Independence War hero. General Osmani was born in Sylhet in 1918 and served as the Supreme Commander of the Mukti Bahini (Freedom Force) and Bangladesh Armed Forces during the Bangladesh Liberation War.

Airlines Destinations

Biman Bangladesh Airlines Abu Dhabi, Cox's Bazar, Dhaka, Dubai, Jeddah, Muscat, Riyadh , London- Heathrow

GMG Airlines Dhaka

United Airways Dhaka, London-Gatwick

Regent Airways Dhaka

Barisal City

Barisal City, বরিশাল Bariśāl, is an old port on the Kirtankhola on the northern shore of the Bay of Bengal in southern Bangladesh. It is now the divisional headquarter of the Barisal Division and consists of 30 wards and 50 mahallas. The area of the town is 19.99 km². Barisal municipality was established in 1957 and was turned into a City Corporation in 2000.

Barisal City has one police academy.

Durgasagar: with an area of about 2,500 hectare, is the largest pond or dighi of southern Bangladesh. It is located at Madhabpasa village of babuganj upazila, about 11 km away from barisal town. Locally it is known as Madhabpasha Dighi. According to a desire of Rani Durgavati, mother of Raja Joynarayan, the dighi was dug in 1780 (1187 BS). There are coconut trees around the dighi which together with the dighi are bounded by brick-walls. In the middle of the dighi, there is an island with bushes. Migratory birds usually come here during winter. The surrounding areas of the dighi has now been turned into a picnic spot.

Barisal is a rice producing center of Bangladesh. Balam (a kind of baasmati) is the most popular rice in Barisal. It is also famous for Betel Leaf, a typical south Asian chewing item. As Barisal is surrounded by river so fish is plenty in there.It is said..

"Dhan (paddy) nadi (river) Khal (canal) ai tine Barisal."

Means, paddy,river and canal this three thing makes Barisal.

Coconut is very common in there as it is a costal area. Hog Plum in Barisal is very famous.

Exports: Fish, medicine, bidi (local tobacco) and handicrafts.

Barisal was a semi-independent area in Mughal period because of heavy fighting between them and Hindu chiefs. In course of time, it fell under Bengal Nawabs and British India, later passed to Bangladesh.

Following the partition of India in 1947, the area of Bangladesh became a province of Pakistan, initially known as East Bengal, and then, from 1955, as East Pakistan. The people of East Pakistan Province declared their independence as the nation of Bangladesh on March 26, 1971, while fighting a savage war against the central Pakistani government. The separation from Pakistan took place, with extensive aid from India, on December 16, 1971 as a result of the third Indo-Pakistan War. Bangladesh was soon recognized by most other nations, although Pakistan withheld diplomatic recognition until 1974 and China did not recognize the nation until 1976. Bangladesh was admitted to the United Nations in 1974.

The central city of this region is the city of Barisal. It is one of the biggest river ports in Bangladesh. It is a city with nearly 0.38 million people and a divisional headquarter, medical college, cadet college, some pharmaceutical industries, textile industries and the Bangladesh Inland Water Transport Authority's head office. Barisal is fast growing city of the country stands on the Kirtankhola River. Country's first short landing and take off airport has been completed in Barisal and a private Airlines named Air Bengal has begun its regular air flight between Dhaka Tejgaon Airport and Barisal.

The city is sometimes called the "Venice of the East" or the "Venice of Bengal".

Population

According to an estimate of 2008 Barisal has a population of 210,374; male 53.28%, female 46.72%. Literacy rate among the town people is 85%.

Population by Religion

Muslim 90.64%; Hindu 8.38% and Christian 0.98%.

Mosque: 130, church: 5

Temple: More than 200

Transport

Road: 200 km

Airport: 1

Port: Internal port

River is also a popular transport system with other district.The luxurious launch journey connects between the south and Dhaka city. It is one of the most enjoyable night journey ever you could get in your life. The launches are really royal, majestic and with pomp and 

Name of some Bus in Barisal route. 1. Eagle Paribahan 2. Sakura Paribahan 3. Druti Paribahan 4. Hanif Enterprise 5. Ilish Paribahan.

Noted Barisailese

Abala Bose, social reformer and wife of Jagadish Chandra Bose

A.K. Fazlul Huq, (Mayor of kolkata (1935, first Muslim mayor of kolkata), Prime Minister of undivided Bengal (1937–1943) and of East Bengal (1954), Home Minister of Pakistan (1955) and Governor of East Pakistan (1956–1958)

Altaf Mahmud noted bengali film song composer and one of the martyred intelligentsia in 1971.

Amal Kumar Raychaudhuri, physicist

Anil Biswas (composer) noted Hindi and bengali film song composer

Aroj Ali Matubbar, noted Astronomer and Philosopher.

Aswini Kumar Dutta, social reformer and philanthropist

Abul Hasnat Abdullah - Pioneer of Peace Treaty

Jibanananda Das, famous Bengali poet.

Kamini Roy, famous poetess and first woman graduate with honours in the subcontinent.

Kadambini Ganguly, first female graduate and first female physician in the entire British empire

Kusumkumari Das, poetess and mother of Jibanananda Das

Mithun Chakraborty, famous actor.

Mohiuddin Jahangir (Bir Shreshto) was a Captain in the Bangladesh Army during the 1971 Liberation War. The main gate of Dhaka Cantonment- "Shaheed Jahangir Gate" is named in his honour.

Pannalal Ghosh renowned musician and flutist

Partha Dasgupta, eminent economist.

Parul Ghosh, Hindi and bengali film singer

Priya Ranjan Dasmunsi, Minister of parliamentary affairs and information, India.

Salman Khan, Founder of Khan Academy

ShantiSudha Bose @ Kanak Dutta freedom fighter and vocal artist

Sufia Kamal, poetess

Sushmita Sen, famous actress.

Shaheed Abdur Rob Serniabat - Great politician

Surendra Nath Dutta - noted freedom fighter

Swadesh Ranjan Dutta - poet and pioneer to small stories in bengali literature

Tapan Raychaudhuri, noted historian.

Tofazzal Hossain Manik Miah Founder Editor of The Daily Ittefaq.

Utpal Dutt (29 March 1929 – 19 August 1993), was an Indian actor, director and writer-playwright

Chittagong, চট্টগ্রাম,

Chittagong, চট্টগ্রাম, Chôţţogram, is a city in southeastern Bangladesh and the capital of an eponymous district and division. Built on banks of the Karnaphuli River, the city is home to Bangladesh's busiest seaport and has a population of over 2.5 million, making it the second largest city in the country.

Located between the Chittagong Hill Tracts and the Bay of Bengal, Chittagong is a major commercial and industrial center as much of Bangladesh's export and import passes through the Port of Chittagong. The port has extensive facilities which are undergoing further development as Bangladesh prepares to serve as a transit country between North East India, Nepal, Bhutan, Southwest China and parts of Burma.According to a report released by International Institute for Environment and Development, Chittagong is among the ten fastest growing cities in the world. Much of the city is surrounded by hilly terrains, and is experiencing rapid urban growth along with increased congestion.

During the early 17th centuries the city was called by the Portugese by the name Port Grande then a part of the Arakan Kingdom, before falling under Mughal rule in 1666. It was later renamed by the Mughals as Islamabad. In 1930, Bengali revolutionaries led by Surya Sen launched the Chittagong uprising against the British Raj, during which British armories, telegraph and telephone offices in the city were attacked and hundreds of Europeans were assassinated in the Chittagong Club. During the Burma Campaign of the Second World War, Chittagong's port served as a major supply line for Allied forces while its airport was a major station for US Air Force combat aircraft. After the Partition of India, the city became a part of East Pakistan. During the Bangladesh Liberation War, Chittagong witnessed some of the heaviest fighting with the Mukti Bahini attacking Pakistani navy ships and the Indian navy firing missiles at Pakistani naval installations. It was in Chittagong where Awami League leader M A Hannan and liberation war hero and future Bangladeshi president Ziaur Rahman famously announced the declaration of independence of the country on behalf of independence leader Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. Chittagong was also where the assassination of President Ziaur Rahman had taken place during a failed mutiny in 1981.

More than six hundred years ago an Islamic preacher Hazrat Badar Aawlia arrived in this city from the seas and chose Cheragi Pahar as his vantage point to spread the message of Islam among the locals. It was at the apex of this hill that the he lit a chati (lamp) and called out (ajaan) for people to join him in saying prayer to God. Chittagong's etymology can then be traced unmistakably back to "chati." And the hills are at the core of Chittagong's mythology.

Another theory is that the first group of brahmins to have settled in this region (after it was incorporated into Bengal from the Arakanese) were 'chatt-upadhyays'. Hence this region came to be known as chatto-gan (gan is the prakrit/bengali term for village). A fact confirming this theory is that the majority of the kayastha of this region were of the kashyap gotra, which is also the gotra of the Chattopadhyays.

Shahjalal International Airport

Official full name Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport, formerly Zia International Airport, শাহজালাল আন্তর্জাতিক বিমানবন্দর, located in the capital Dhaka, is the largest airport in Bangladesh. It started operations in 1980, taking over as the country's sole international airport from Tejgaon Airport. It is the home base and hub of all airlines of Bangladesh, including Biman Bangladesh Airlines, GMG Airlines, and United Airways.

The airport has an area of 1,981 acres (802 ha). Nearly 52% of the country's international and domestic arrivals and departures occur through this airport, while the country's second largest airport, Shah Amanat International Airport in Chittagong, accounts for about 17% of passengers. Approximately 4 million international and 2 million domestic passengers and 150,000 tons of freight and mail pass through the airport annually.

Shahjalal International Airport connects Bangladesh with many major cities of the world; Biman Bangladesh Airlines flies internationally from the airport to 13 cities in Europe and Asia.

Location

The airport is located in Kurmitola, 11 NM (20 km; 13 mi) north of the capital Dhaka.

History

In 1941, during the second world war, the British government built a landing strip at Kurmitola, several kilometers north of Tejgaon, as an extra landing strip for the Tejgaon Airport, which at the time was a military airport, to operate warplanes towards the war fields of Kohima (Assam) and Burmese war theatres.

After the creation of Pakistan in 1947, Tejgaon Airport became the first civil airport in what was then East Pakistan, current day Bangladesh. Following the independence of Bangladesh, to accommodate the increase in air traffic, a new airport was constructed on the Kurmitola airstrip. In 1981, the airport was officially inaugurated by President Abdus Sattar. It was renamed the Zia International Airport, after the assassination of president Ziaur Rahman.

In 1992, the airport terminal area experienced rapid expansion with addition of boarding bridges and equipments. A multistorey car park with space for 500 cars was also built at this time.

In 2010 the name was changed from Zia International Airport to Shah Jalal International Airport by the Bangladesh government, named after one of Bangladesh's most respected Sufi saints, Shah Jalal.

Why Bangladesh should opt for e-passport?

BANGLADESH passport has been modified at least four times in last three decades. The seventies' version, a big book, had hard cover. The photograph of the holder was pasted with glue. In the eighties the booklet became smaller. The photograph was laminated to stop forgery. Later, the passport had its number perforated. The existing machine readable passport, introduced in the late nineties, is more or like the passport of many countries. In it the photograph of the holder is laminated. Unfortunately, the contents remained unchanged. Hand-written, personal information take eight pages of the latest passport booklet. On renewal, 10 pages are spent for the purpose. My first passport, issued by the Bangladesh Embassy in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia was signed by seven functionaries and bears seven rubber stamping. My latest passport issued by the Bangladesh Embassy in Washington, DC bears thirteen rubber stamping and ten signatures. It gives the impression that Bangladesh is a highly bureaucratic country with a love for rubber stamping its travel document. 

It, in no way, indicates the love for efficiency or systematic functioning. In e-passport, in contrast, all the information about is printed in a single page, with two lines at the bottom, for swiping by immigration personnel to verify authenticity of the travel document. No wonder, that immigration and security personnel at arrival and departure points across the world get annoyed having to go through so many pages of Bangladesh passports to check their validity. Being not machine readable it is often difficult to read the hand-written information of the Bangladesh passports. 

I have been denied boarding ships and aircraft. I have been detained for questioning at several foreign immigration points. And the immigration personnel keen to ascertain that it was not a forged passport. The bottom line: Bangladesh passport is an easy document to forge and cumbersome to glean information from. For the facilitation of safe travel, the UN International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) has asked all states, including Bangladesh, to standardise their passports. People now travel not only for business and tourism but also for doing jobs abroad. Bangladeshi workers abroad send home a lot of money in foreign currency. Therefore, it is relevant for the government of Bangladesh to abide by ICAO rules. 

Thee main difference between an e-passport and its older cousin, the machine readable passport, is that the former has an additional embedded micro-chip -- containing all the vital identification information -- and an antenna to communicate by radio with a base station located at the immigration check-point. Known as radio frequency identification chip, it uses the same technology used in a wide variety of applications such as inventory control in a retail store or a hospital, where the number of items, needing verification are in the millions. In addition to the biographic data, many countries have started checking biometric data for face recognition, fingerprints checking and iris scanning. Passport RFID chips make it possible. 

The immigration personnel can check it all without even touching an e-passport. It saves time. It is also user-friendly. Pre-programmed and extremely hard to tamper, RFID chip makes e-passport a secure document. The United States is now issuing "enhanced driver's licence (EDL)", based on this technology so that US citizens can travel to the neighbouring countries without a passport by car or ship. It is impossible to upgrade a machine readable passport booklet to an e-passport. But, the data on the RFID chip can be upgraded easily and any time. Bangladesh should replace its existing passport booklet with e-passport to meet its ICAO obligations. The UK, for instance, has extended visa-free travel facilities to holders of Taiwanese e-passport. Introduction of e-passport will benefit Bangladesh economy. Bangladesh should take the logical option rather than go for outdated passport documents. Machine readable passport creates the opportunity for corruption. E-passport does not. The writer lives in Vancouver, USA Source: