Tajul Islam Has Gone Into Retirement

Farewell given to Tajul Islam

By Prof. M Zahidul Haque

Retirement—Ah! What a great exeunt! Often in humor, retirement is referred to as the World’s largest tea or coffee break!

Whatever the case may be, retirement is retirement—an exeunt from the active service for entry into a new life-journey without any fixed duty or shared responsibility.

Well, Md. Tajul Islam, Senior Lab Assistant of the Department of Agricultural Extension and Information System, Sher-e-Bangla Agricultural University (SAU) went into retirement on 12/12/2023. Of course, he will be on PRL (Post Retirement Leave) for the next one year prior to become a Pensioner.

Farewell given to Tazul Islam

Tajul Islam has dedicated 30 years of his life serving the AEIS Department of SAU. Before joining to SAU, he served the Economics Division of Bangladesh Agricultural Research Institute (BARI) for around 10 years. It may be mentioned here that before up-gradation of the then Bangladesh Agricultural Institute (BAI) to Sher-e-Bangla Agricultural University in 2001 by then and present Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, BAI was operated under the administrative management of BARI (through the Agri-Education Wing of the Ministry of Agriculture) and academically as an affiliated institute of BAU,

Mymensingh. Earlier BAI used to function as the Agriculture Faculty of Dhaka University. Further it is to be indicated here that the Bengal Agricultural Institute (later Bangladesh Agricultural Institute) was founded by the then Chief Minister of undivided Bengal Sher-e-Bangla A K Fazlul Haq in 1938. When under BARI, inter-transfer of employees between BARI and BAI could be done.

Recently a farewell function was organized by the AEIS Department to honor and celebrate the retirement of Tajul Islam. Among others, the function was addressed by Prof. Mohammad Hossain Bhuiyan (retd) , Prof. Dr. Md. Rafiquel Islam, Prof. Dr. Md. Sekender Ali, Prof. Dr. Md. Shofiullah Mazumder, Prof. Dr. Md. Humayun Kabir, Prof. Dr. Ranjan Roy, Assoc. Prof. Nur-E-Shahrin Nurani, Dy. Registrar Md. Bashirul Islam. Asst. Registrar Md. Tareq Hasan.

The farewell meeting was presided over by the Chairman of the Department Prof. Md. Abul Bashar while it was conducted by Prof. Dr. Md. Mahbubul Alam.

The speakers recalled their memories with Tajul Islam and acknowledged with due appreciation Tazul’s devotion and honesty. They wished a happy, healthy and peaceful long life for him.

Tazul Islam in his speech expressed his thanks and gratitude to all the members of AEISD family for the affection they have shown to him during his service life.

To get back to the beginning, on retirement, an employee actually starts a new phase of his/her uncertain life journey. In most cases, a retired employee faces a number of problems including accommodation problem. Majorities of the govt. employees do not have their own house in Dhaka; they find themselves being at sea to arrange a suitable accommodation as the rent is sky-high and they are no more get house-rent allowance after retirement.

Nowadays, the prices of daily-use commodities is exorbitant, it’s becoming increasingly hard on the part of the retirees to bearing family expenditure, children’s education expenses, etc. The situation greatly worsens when someone from among the family members becomes terribly sick by some critical/dreadful disease. In some cases, the family gets bankrupt in arranging treatment expenditure.

Meanwhile it is heartening to note that AEIS Department has been maintaining the tradition of offering farewell reception at their own contributions to the members of Department who goes to retirement. By the blessings of the social media, the Department keeps communication with Faculties, Officers and Staff through two forums on Facebook which is efficiently managed by Asst. Registrar Md. Tareq Hasan.

It is sincerely hoped that the communication between present and retired employees will be strengthened in the coming days and joy and sorrows of life will be mutually shared.

Retirement is not the end of the road but continuation of the old journey through a new way of life!

(Prof. M Zahidul Haque retired as Professor and was also a Dean of Faculty of Agriculture at Sher-e-Bangla Agricultural University, Dhaka.)