The election for the 2025 executive committee of PEN Bangladesh, the international association of writers, poets, and human rights activists, has been completed.
Professor Dr Shamsad Mortuza has been elected president, while Jahanara Parvin has been elected general secretary of the newly formed committee.
In the previous committee, writer and publisher of the online news portal Bangla Tribune and English daily Dhaka Tribune, Kazi Anis Ahmed, served as president.
The organization’s annual general meeting and election were held on Saturday.
Parvez Hossain, Muhammad Mohsin, and Shamim Reza were elected as vice presidents.
Hamim Kamrul Haque and Mohsin Habib were elected joint secretaries.
Lovely Talukdar was elected treasurer, Sharafat Hossain as publicity secretary, and Zahid Shohag as office secretary.
The executive members elected are Shakira Parvin, Mohammad Moheuddin, Dr Suraiya Farzana Hasan, Shahed Kayes, and Wasim Palash.
Poet Maleka Ferdous served as the chief election commissioner.
Translator and professor Abdullah Rafique-um-Munir Chowdhury and fiction writer Shahnaz Nasreen were election commissioners, while advocate and poet Tanzim Al Islam acted as the secretary to the election commission.
After partition, Pakistan PEN, a branch of PEN International, started its journey in 1948. At that time, its president was Dr Muhammad Shahidullah and its general secretary was Syed Ali Ahsan.
After Bangladesh became independent in 1971, it was renamed as “PEN Bangladesh”.
