Another year slips into eternity and a New Year dawns today.
Saying goodbye to the old year, people on Friday welcomed the New Year 2021 with a vow to of life anew.
Let the dead past bury its dead and start the day in fresh spirits, people touched by new sunshine also expressed their firm determination to turn around and overcome all odds or hurdles in the days to come.
The outgoing year, 2020, will be remembered as a bitter memory caused by the COVID-19 pandemic that has now become the greatest crisis, plunging the world into an acute health and economic crisis and the severity of which has not been seen in nearly a century.
Grave people of Bangladesh turn their eyes to the light, casting away the work of darkness.
“We will build Bangladesh as a developed, prosperous, hunger and poverty-free country and we are working to that end,” Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina said at the advent of the New Year while inaugurating the book festival at her official residence Ganabhaban in the city on Thursday.
Like other foreign countries, Bangladesh also witnessed increasing deaths caused by COVID-19 outbreak, frequent fire and other accidents.
More COVID-19 patients died in the last 24 hours, increasing the death toll from the pandemic to 1,813,278 while 83,131,445 people have been infected across the globe till filing this report. And 58,926,526 people have been recovered so far.
Like other foreign countries, Bangladesh has lost its eminent personalities including educationists, journalists, renowned lawyers, veteran freedom fighters, incumbent cabinet members, politicians, noted actors and singer and leading business stalwarts.
They had been suffering from either old-age complications or Covid-19.They will live in the hearts of Bengali people for years for their contribution to various sectors.
Greeting the rising sun of the bold New Year, country’s people also want a fresh start.
With the ray of new sunshine, the country will again get back its fresh shape that will touch and encourage people to go ahead.
Amid destruction, darkness and calamity of the COVID-19 breakout almost throughout the year of 2020, new life starts to come out again and the country looks forward with fresh hope and aspirations.
Everything in nature will give an impression of freshness as if the nature takes a new birth. But due to the Covid-19 pandemic this year, the day will be celebrated on a limited scale, maintaining health safety rules, including maintaining social distancing and wearing of masks everywhere.
It has paralysed economies and confined nearly four billion people to their homes as nations across the world closed their borders and shut down businesses in early 2020 to control the spread of COVID-19,
People irrespective of caste, creed and religion sought reprieve from the global Covid-19 pandemic as the deadly diseases has affected 218 countries and territories around the world.
More COVID-19 patients died in the last 24 hours, increasing the death toll from the pandemic to 7,550,” the release said.
On the night of 31 December and the morning of 1 January, people in many countries all over the world are celebrating the beginning of a new year.
People also seek Allah’s blessings for the recovery of the coronavirus patients and keeping Bangladesh as well as world safe from the rogue virus.
On the other hand, braving all odds and hurdles, the country is witnessing a remarkable progress in different sectors of development.
And Bangladesh is now a role model both at home and abroad and it became the same due to initiatives of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.
All students from primary to public universities missed their respective beautiful campuses almost throughout the year due to the COVID-19 pandemic that compelled them to stay of home.
Earlier on March 16, the government closed all the educational institutions of the country to prevent the spread of coronavirus.
Since then they have been staying home and attending virtual classes and examinations as they know nothing about the reopening of the educational institutions.
When many foreign countries suffered a deep economic recession caused by the Covid-19 pandemic, Bangladesh tackled the situation with making the right decision and doing the right thing throughout the year.
Initially many predicted that Bangladesh, one of the world's most densely-populated countries would be affected badly by the COVID-19 pandemic.
But the government led by Bangabandhu’s daughter Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina fought against the COVID-19 calling it a “war” and kept the country’s all sectors afloat throughout the year despite a lot of hurdles, different foreign countries and various indicators say.
Many world leaders and head of the sates lauded Bangladesh's remarkable economic growth amid the Covid-19 pandemic and attainment of capability in facing climate change challenges under the leadership of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.
Bangladesh's 5.21 percent economic growth during the Covid-19 pandemic is something spectacular and it was a special success of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's extraordinary leadership, they added.
Country’s foreign exchange reserves touched a new record of over US$42 billion amid coronavirus crisis.
On the other hand, the country’s remittance crossed $20 billion benchmark for the first time in the history. It is almost 42 percent more from the figure of the corresponding previous year. It was $14.59 billion at the same time last year.
The inflow of remittance added to raise the foreign exchange reserves to over $42 billion, according to the Bangladesh Bank. And remittance is the key driver to raise the reserves to the highest point.
Apart from these, country’s export earnings have also shown signs of a rebound, posting 0.76 percent year-on-year growth last month.
The export earnings of over $3.07 billion last month, however, missed the target by 8.2 percent, according to data published by the Export Promotion Bureau.
Besides, according to the official data of the National Board of Revenue, the overall revenue collection totaled Taka 87,092.71 crore during this five-month period against the target of Taka 1,12,959.83 crore.
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina led government has transformed all possibilities into potentialities in building a digital Bangladesh.
The country has still not been fully successful in ensuring safe food for its people although the country has achieved self-sufficiency in food production amid Covid-19 pandemic and natural disaster like flood this year.
It has become self-sufficient in food production under the leadership of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.
After a two-month deadlock, the government withdrew lockdown for the sake of the country’s economy to resume the economic activities like most of the European and Western countries.
The country initially imposed the nationwide lockdown on March 26 to stem the spread of the coronavirus and it was later extended several times until May 30.
Restrictions imposed on public transportation, businesses and almost all public and private organizations respectively were lifted and people returned to their respective workplaces
However, all educational institutions remain of shut since March.
And the government has extended its all-out support to keep the academic activities from primary to university level continue through virtual classes and examinations so that the country’s students would not be affected
On the other hand, all government agencies are working in commercial, industrial, political and non-political organisations in the campaign to make people aware about wearing facemasks against the backdrop of fresh surge of the Covid-19 as cold intensifies.
