Mushfiq Mobarak

The Bhola cyclone is primarily described as a natural disaster. That is not wrong, but the description is incomplete. It was also a political event. It helped turn anger into a project, and a project into a nation. Why do some independence movements succeed while many others fade or are crushed? The birth of Bangladesh in 1971 is one of the rare cases in which a separatist movement not only gained mass support but also prevailed in open conflict against a powerful state.

In February 2021, Covid-19 numbers started rising again in South Asia with the official daily case counts rising beyond 400,000 in India, 6,000 in Pakistan and 7,500 in Bangladesh, straining their health systems. The massive surge in India soon spilled over across the border into Nepal, leading to "apocalyptic" scenes of overwhelmed hospitals. This virus knows no borders. Containing it has necessitated global cooperation among scientists, policymakers and society.