Education Minister Makes Midnight Visit to Printing Presses

Education Minister A N M Ehsanul Haque Milan made a midnight visit to six printing presses in the capital to inspect the progress and quality of textbooks being printed for the upcoming academic year. He visited the presses shortly after midnight on Monday (September 28). The Education Ministry’s public relations department confirmed the visit around 1am.

During the inspection, the minister checked the quality of the paper, binding and printing of the textbooks. He also collected sample copies from book bundles and examined their overall quality. He instructed the printing authorities to ensure that all textbooks meet the required standards.

Professor Mohammad Abu Naser Tuku, member (Text) of the National Curriculum and Textbook Board (NCTB), said printing of textbooks for the new academic year is progressing at full speed. The authorities plan to deliver the books to educational institutions ahead of schedule so that students can receive them on January 1 during the ‘Book Festival’.

According to NCTB data, a total of 309,228,439 textbooks will be printed for the 2027 academic year for students from pre-primary to Class 9, as well as students from ethnic minority communities. The total government expenditure for the printing programme is Tk 18,901,639,328. Under the printing plan, 82,167,730 books are being produced for pre-primary, primary and ethnic minority students, while 33,296,400 books are being printed for Classes 1 to 5 at the Ebtedayi level.

Around 180 million textbooks will be printed for Classes 6 to 9 at the secondary level. Of these, the highest number—55,627,235 copies—has been allocated for Class 9. In addition, 9,004 Braille textbooks are being prepared for visually impaired students. Several new subjects have also been included in the upcoming academic year’s curriculum. New textbooks are being printed for ‘Physical Education’ and ‘Our Culture’ for Class 4, and ‘Joyful Learning’ and ‘Technical Education’ for Class 6. The NCTB has completed the necessary preparations to ensure that the new, revised and updated textbooks reach students within the scheduled timeframe.