Browsing by Author "Islam, Sadia"

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A postcolonial study of western systemic oppression in Things Fall Apart and Beloved
(BRAC University, 2024-01) Islam, Sadia; Noman, Abu Sayeed Mohammad
This paper explores the postcolonial dimensions of systemic oppression within the western context as depicted in two seminal literary works, Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart and Toni Morrison’s Beloved. The analysis delves into the portrayal of colonialism’s enduring impact on indigenous cultures and the subsequent internalization of oppressive ideologies by the colonized. By employing a postcolonial lens, the study shows the multifaceted manifestations of systemic oppression, ranging from cultural erasure and economic exploration to the psychological ramification of the African American experience during and after slavery serve as important case studies, revealing how these authors engage with the aftermath of colonial domination and its far-reaching implications. The comparative analysis seeks to highlight the shared threads of Western systemic oppression present in both narratives while emphasizing the resilience and agency of the oppressed in confronting and resisting the oppressive structures. Through an examination of the characters’ struggles and the cultural landscapes they navigate, this paper contributes to a deeper understanding of the complex dynamics of postcolonial literature and its critical implications for contemporary discussions on systemic oppression and cultural resilience.
An Appraisal of BRAC Bank Limited
(East West University, 2/17/2008) Islam, Sadia
At present 30 Private Commercial Banks are operating in Bangladesh. BRAC Bank Limited is one of the leading third-generation banks in Bangladesh. BRAC Bank is a scheduled commercial bank established under the Banking Companies. Act, 1991. The bank began its journey on 4th July 2001 with a primary objective of offering all types of commercial banking activities. The core business of the bank comprises of Corporate Banking, Retail Banking, SME Banking and Foreign Trade and Treasury Functions. BRAC Bank Limited has brought revolution in the banking sector of Bangladesh by their SME Banking. Currently the Bank has 34 branches and 400 SME Unit Offices situated allover the country. General Public and BRAC hold the majority shares of BRAC Bank Limited. Also International Finance Corporation (IFC) and Shorecap International have significant shareholdings in the bank. As on December 2007, BRAC Bank Ltd. had 8 directors with Mr. Fazle Hasan Abed in the chair. At 3pt December, 2007 the Paid-up Capital and Total Asset were Tk.1200.00 million and Tk.46382.60 million respectively. Total Deposit of BRAC Bank stood at Tk.37368.41 million on 3pt December, 2007, while total Loans & Advances stood at Tk.3246 1. 10 million. BRAC Bank Limited has a strong management consisting of a number of experienced & skilled officials. A group of devoted & well trained employees are working hard to render the best service to the clients. BRAC Bank has adopted latest technology to improve their quality of services. BRAC Bank is a socially responsible organization with an obligation to consider the interests of customers, employees, shareholders, communities and ecological considerations in all aspects of its operations. BRAC Bank Ltd. has maintained significant growth since inception. It holds a satisfactory level in the CAMEL Rating and its Profitability is also satisfactory. Although BRAC Bank Ltd. is not ranked among the top PCBs, still it has been able to build a respectable position due to dedicated management and innovative banking services to its clients. If the management of BRAC Bank can overcome the few drawbacks it has and come-up with effective marketing & financial strategies, BRAC Bank Ltd. can enter the list of leading PCBs in Bangladesh.
An enhanced CNN model for classifying skin cancer
(BRAC University, 2022-01) Haider, Kazi MD Minhajul; Dhar, Mondira; Akter, Fahima; Islam, Sadia; Shariar, Syed Ragib; Hossain, Muhammad Iqbal; Mostakim, Moin
Unrepaired deoxyribonucleic acid in skin cells causes skin cancer by generating genetic abnormalities or mutations, rising day by day. Detecting and diagnosing skin cancer in its early stages is expensive and challenging, giving superior treatment options. Given the severity of these issues, researchers have generated a set of early classification techniques for skin cancer. Skin cancer is diagnosed and segregated from melanoma by looking at the symmetry, color, size, shape, and other features of lesions. While there are various computerized approaches for classifying skin lesions, convolutional neural networks (CNNs) have been demonstrated to exceed standard practices. Moreover, CNNs are a type of deep learning that has been prominent in various fields, including medical imaging. Multiple machine learning libraries have been used in this paper. Also, we have used five pre-trained models such as Inception V3, VGG-19, VGG-16, Efficient Net B7, ResNet 50 models and presented our proposed model for skin cancer classification using the HAM10000 dataset, which is an enormous skin cancer dataset. Following that, each competent model’s image detection categorization accuracy is evaluated by comparing and assessing. This research reports a maximum accuracy of 85.25% for Inception V3 models within five pre-trained models and maximum accuracy of 90.55% for our proposed model. In terms of image detection, our experimental configuration shows that our proposed model can attain the best classification accuracy rather than the other five pretrained models. Our findings are helpful in providing a comprehensive comparison and analysis of many neural networks in the categorization of skins cancer.
An overview on the general merchandising department of Shwapno
(BRAC University, 9/3/2018) Islam, Sadia; Haque, K. M. Nafiul
Shwapno was established in 2008 under ACI Logistics Limited, with a vision to utilize the strong presence of ACIand make Shwapno what it is today, the largest retail chain in Bangladesh. The main motive of Shwapno is to reach a greater target group of people in Bangladesh and make a positive impact on their lives. That is one of the many reasons why almost every area has a Shwapno outlet and it is only expanding with days. Today, Shwapno has 70 outletswith a total retail space of more than 310,000 square feet and a workforce of over 2,500. The report is based on the research that I did on the General Merchandising Department of Shwapno. I was working as an intern under this department. The General Merchandising Department consists of six categories: Electronics & Appliances, Gifts & Toys, Home Accessories, Infotainment and Stationeries. These categories have been separated in order to put more emphasis on their quality and sales. This report consists of some updated sales and other analysis that I did to draw some conclusions. My work at Shwapno was both at the desk and on field as we were expected to visit the outlets to check on our respected categories as well as make excel sheets on all the updated data found on the server. I hope this report gives a clear idea of the work I did in these three months in Shwapno as an intern. With bounded access to internal information, I tried my best to provide as much information as possible about the GM department of Shwapno.
Analysing the Impact of Capital Structure on Financial Performance: An Empirical Study of State-owned Commercial Banks in Bangladesh
(Comilla University, 26-May-2025) Islam, Sadia
This report focuses on the impact of capital structure on the profitability of state-owned
Aprecise machine learning model: Detecting cervical cancer using feature selection and explainable AI
(Scopus, 2024-12-30) Shakil, Rashiduzzaman; Islam, Sadia; Akter, Bonna
Cervical cancer is a cancer that remains a significant global health challenge all over the world. Due to improper screening in the early stages, and healthcare disparities, a large number of women are suffering from this disease, and the mortality rate increases day by day. Hence, in these studies, we presented a precise approach utilizing six dif ferent machine learning models (decision tree, logistic regression, naïve bayes, random forest, k nearest neighbors, support vector machine), which can predict the early stage of cervical cancer by an alysing 36 risk factor attributes of 858 individuals. In addition, two data balancing techniques—Synthetic Minority Oversampling Technique and Adaptive Synthetic Sampling—were used to mitigate the data imbalance issues. Furthermore, Chi-square and Least Absolute Shrinkage and Selection Operator are two distinct feature selection processes that have been applied to eval uate the feature rank, which are mostly correlated to identify the particular disease, and also integrate an explainable artificial intelligence technique, namely Shapley Additive Explanations, for clarifying the
Biomedical waste in healthcare: a comprehensive study on microbial analysis, radioactive analysis and prevalence of opportunistic bacteria
(BRAC University, 2024-10) Meharunnesa; Islam, Sadia; Oni, Anika Ibnat; Haque, Munima
Proper biomedical waste (BMW) management is one of the crucial steps in ensuring public health. Covid 19 has given an emergence to maintain proper waste management. Microbial analysis and radioactivity tests are two objectives of this paper. Microbial analysis in BRAC University wet lab and radioactivity tests in Bangladesh Atomic Energy Center (BAEC) has been performed with three tertiary public hospitals' waste disposals including solid and liquid wastes. The waste has been collected from central waste collection bins of different departments including - pathology, urology, surgery, cardiology and hospital ward. The collected waste has been in contact with human beings and affects the human immune system labeled as infectious and hazardous. In this regard, opportunistic bacteria search is also included in this research. The organisms that have been found in waste are - Escherichia coli, Enterococcus faecalis, Klebsiella pneumoniae, Proteus mirabilis, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Staphylococcus aureus. Some other biochemical tests are in process for the recognition of further characteristics. Hence this research paper has been conducted following normal safe ranges of alpha, beta, gamma ray and microbial population in human contact for radioactive analysis. The research process is carried out with analysis and preparing proper management techniques through bio-statistical analysis using SPSS. It also intends to create awareness among the people involved in the health care unit further.
DEVELOPMENT OF HIGH-QUALITY SURIMI AND SURIMI BASED PRODUCTS FROM LOW-COST JEWFISH
(Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Chattogram Veterinary and Animal Sciences University, Khulshi, Chattogram-4225, Bangladesh, 2025-06) Islam, Sadia
Jewfish (Otolithes ruber), is an underutilized marine species with firm, white flesh and excellent gel-forming ability, holds promise for surimi-based value-added products such as fish ball. This study evaluated the proximate composition, biochemical parameters (TVBN and NPN), microbiological quality (TPC and pathogenic bacteria identification), and sensory attributes of O. ruber fish ball prepared with different binding agents sticky rice, corn flour, wheat flour, and their combinations compared to a control (surimi only). Samples were vacuum-packaged and stored under chilled (4 °C, up to 15 days) and frozen conditions (−8 °C and −25 °C, up to 100 and 120 days, respectively). Throughout storage, gel strength declined over time, particularly under chilled conditions. The control (S) exhibited the lowest gel strength (2.20 to 0.46 N at 4 °C), while the sticky rice, corn flour formulation (S3) maintained the highest strength (11.63 to 10.90 N at 4 °C, 11.63 to 10.64 N at −8 °C and 11.63 to. and 9.50N at -25ºC). Moisture content significantly decreased (p < 0.05) during chilled storage, with the most notable reduction observed in S (79.15% to 78.03%) and the least in S3 (67.72% to 67.22%). Similar trends were observed under frozen conditions, with more gradual changes. As moisture declined, ash and carbohydrate contents increased, while protein and lipid contents decreased. Biochemical parameters such as total volatile base nitrogen (TVBN) and non-protein nitrogen (NPN) increased during storage. The control showed the highest TVBN at 4 °C (6.99 to 45.26 mg N/100 g), while S4 had the lowest (4.16 to 37.86 mg N/100 g). NPN values followed similar patterns. Microbial spoilage exceeded acceptable limits (>6 log CFU/g) by 12 days at 4 °C, whereas all samples remained microbiologically acceptable at frozen temperatures up to 120 days. Sensory evaluation revealed that fish ball with sticky rice (S1) had the highest overall acceptability across all temperatures, particularly when vacuum-packaged. Optimal shelf lives were 14–16 days at 4 °C, 80–100 days at −8 °C, and 80–120 days at −25 °C.
Employee satisfaction of Banglalink
(BRAC University, 6/26/2016) Islam, Sadia; Mahbub, Asheka
This internship report represents the working experience on a telecommunication sector operated in Bangladesh named “Banglalink” as a part of completion for BBA Program. The main objective of the study is to get knowledge about the legal communication within various companies and also gaining the practical experience of corporate life and view the application of theoretical knowledge in the real life. Besides, it has provided me a chance to deal with some of the employees of different organizations. I have worked with the interconnection team. For that reason, I have focused on the activities of that team. Besides, I have presented my learning experience at Banglalink. I have discovered some positive and negative findings. On the basis of negative findings some recommendations are also given to improve the service quality of Banglalink. So far, from this report it can be said that it is one of the largest telecommunication company in the telecommunication industry in Bangladesh.
Identification and antibiotic susceptibility profiling of Escherichia Coli isolated from chicken cloacal sample in Dhaka Wet Market, Bangladesh
(BRAC University, 2024-11) Islam, Sadia; Esha, Neelima Jaman; Ishrat, Fariha; Haque, Fahim Kabir Monjurul
"The rise of antibiotic-resistant Escherichia coli (E. coli) in poultry is a major public health concern, as these bacteria can transfer to humans, posing risks of difficult-to-treat infections. Understanding E. coli prevalence and antibiotic resistance in poultry, especially in high-density commercial farming systems, is essential for developing strategies to manage this issue. Method: A total of 60 cloacal swab samples were collected from live chickens across twelve locations in Dhaka. Samples were spread on Macconkey agar and presumptive E. coli colony was taken based on Colony morphology which was round in shape and light pink in color. These colonies were picked and further sub-cultured on UTI media for screening purposes. On HI chrome UTI media purple color colonies were suspected as E.coli. From there four isolates were collected and streaked on Nutrient agar media for DNA extraction and other molecular identification processes. After that performing Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) and gel electrophoresis presumptive E.coli was identified from the chicken cloacal sample. Furthermore, antibiotic susceptibility testing was also done for these positive isolates by using Kirby-Bauer disk disc diffusion method followed by CLSI guideline Results: Our study found a high prevalence of E. coli in commercial broiler chicken and backyard poultry chicken (Shonali and Desi) with an overall prevalence rate of 78.33% across sampled locations. Broiler chicken showed higher E.coli contamination which is 66%. Comparatively, native breeds (Shonali and Desi chickens) showed lower E. coli prevalence, 21% and 15% respectively. A high resistance to tetracycline (89%), ciprofloxacin (59%), Amoxicillin (44%) was observed in antibiotic susceptibility tests and lower resistance was noted for meropenem and imipenem. Conclusion: The findings demonstrate that high-density commercial poultry farming is associated with increased E. coli prevalence and higher levels of antibiotic resistance, particularly for commonly used antibiotics like tetracycline. In contrast, indigenous breeds raised in less intensive conditions exhibit lower rates of E. coli contamination and resistance. This study highlights the need for stricter antibiotic regulations and improved farming practices to curb the spread of antibiotic-resistant E. coli in poultry "
Leaked (Political) Telephone Conversation in Bangladesh: A Conversation Analysis
(East West University, 2017-01-03) Islam, Sadia; Khan, Mahmud Hasan
The paper analyses a selected number of ‘leaked’ telephone conversations by some political figures of Bangladesh. The analyses are rooted in the ideals of conversation analysis (CA), particularly in the CA of telephone interaction. Leaked conversations are politically sensitive, and thus are rarely discussed in the academia. The data for this study is, however, collected from an open source, i.e., YouTube on which the conversations were circulated. The aim of the study is to examine the organizational structure of the telephone conversations carried out by political figures, i.e., political telephone conversation (PTC). The paper explains how individual political actors conduct formal and informal interactions over telephone as they discuss different sensitive issues in relation to politics and society. The paper investigates how the politicians open and close their talk, maintain adjacency pairs, and construct topics as they legitimize their arguments within a conversation. The findings of this paper are expected to contribute to a better understanding of how we can analyze and comprehend the organization of political conversations through the mechanisms of conversation analysis, and at the same time to provide a helpful documentation for further research on this ‘highly neglected’ field.
Media Lab, DIU as an Intern
(Daffodil International University, 22-12-11) Islam, Sadia
A professional learning opportunity known as an internship provides students with relevant, hands-on work that is connected to their area of study or career interest. An internship is a brief period of job experience that is provided by an organization. It is designed to provide applicants real-world experience as they apply their classroom knowledge to authentic work settings. It teaches people how to comprehend and efficiently carry out the intended duties and obligations in a given position. A summer internship combines theory and practice. Students who work as interns get experience in the workplace. Additionally, internships have the advantage of developing professional references, real-world experience for resumes, and networking possibilities.
Predicting Cardiovascular Disease Risk Among Bangladeshi Diabetes Patients Using Machine Learning and Explainable AI
(Daffodil International University, 2025-01-12) Islam, Sadia
Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is a leading cause of death, especially among diabetes patients, due to metabolic and lifestyle factors. This study aims to predict cardiovascular disease risk among Bangladeshi diabetes patients using machine learning and explainable AI, focusing on the role of Mediterranean diet adherence. Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is a leading cause of morbidity and mortality in diabetes patients, and early prediction can significantly improve health outcomes. A predictive model based on machine learning algorithms, particularly LightGBM , was developed and evaluated, achieving the highest accuracy of 99.37%. The model was further enhanced with explainable AI techniques to ensure transparency and interpretability of predictions. The dataset utilized clinical, demographic, and lifestyle data, including factors such as triglycerides, sleep patterns, smoking habits, and Mediterranean diet adherence. Results revealed that smoking, sleep hours, and diet adherence were the most influential factors in predicting cardiovascular risk. The model demonstrated strong performance across various evaluation metrics, including precision, recall, and F1-score, further validating its effectiveness. This research underscores the potential of machine learning to transform healthcare by providing early diagnosis tools, allowing for personalized interventions. The model can assist healthcare professionals in identifying at-risk individuals and reducing the burden of cardiovascular diseases in Bangladesh and similar regions, ultimately improving patient outcomes through early detection and targeted-prevention-strategies.
QUALITY EVALUATION OF DIFFERENT BRANDS OF CONDENSED MILK AVAILABLE IN BANGLADESH
(A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science in Dairy Science Department of Dairy and Poultry Science Faculty of Veterinary Medicine Chattogram Veterinary and Animal Sciences University Chattogram-4225, Bangladesh, 2023-09) Islam, Sadia
Condensed milk is one of the most popular milk products that gaining popularity in Bangladesh day by day. Sweetened condensed milk is a dairy product made by evaporating a part of the milk and sucrose mixture. An attempt was made in this study to evaluate the qualities of condensed milk of 4 different brands (Danish, Goalini Plus, No1, and Starship) available in local markets of Bangladesh. Three samples were taken as replicates for each brand. The chemical parameters studied in this experiment were acidity, sucrose, fat, and protein. The microbiological parameters were total viable count, coliform count, yeast, and mold count. In the case of protein and sucrose percentage, there was a significant difference ((p<0.05) within the brands. The highest sucrose was found in Goalini plus condensed milk (41.90±0.31) and the lowest in Danish condensed milk (40.70±0.46). A high level of protein was found in Danish condensed milk (7.47±0.23) and lowest in No1 condensed milk (6.60±0.26). In case of fat and acidity percentage, all four brands possessed a good quality grade and no significant (p>0.05) difference was observed. Fat percentages found highest in Goalini Plus condensed milk (8.53±0.23) and lowest in Starship condensed milk (7.73±0.23). The titratable acidity of the samples was measured on days 1 and 7. There was an increase in acidity with the progress of the storage time, but the values were in the acceptable range even on day 7. There were highly significant differences among the total viable count of bacteria of all brands of condensed milk (p<0.01) and the values were within BSTI standards. No coliforms were detected which indicated that good sanitary measures were adopted during the manufacture and storage. No Yeast and mold were found after 5 days of incubation. The result of acidity percentage and fat content were almost similar to different brands of condensed milk. It can be concluded that Danish and Starship condensed milk were better than the two others based on protein and acidity percentage.
Recruitment and selection processes of Urbo Films in attracting potential employees
(BRAC University, 5/24/2023) Islam, Sadia; Islam, M. Nazmul
I did my internship at Urbo Films, which is one of the rising advertising agencies in Bangladesh and has a bright future in this industry. Urbo Films is a media production company operating in a highly competitive industry that relies heavily on the skills and creativity of its employees. Urbo Films journey has been far more flourishing and influential than any other start-up agency in Bangladesh. I have prepared this report on the Recruitment and Selection Processes of Urbo Films as I was a part of their HR team during my internship period of 3(three) month 1(one) week. I completed my internship at Urbo Films from 01 January 2023 to 20 March 2023 as a requirement of a Bachelor’s Degree in Business Administration at BRAC University. This is particularly important for companies like Urbo Films, which rely heavily on the creativity and skills of their employees to produce high-quality commercials. Hence, the Recruitment and Selection Process plays a vital role in reaching out to a vast pool of candidates and identifying those who are the best fit for the job. In this report, I showed my insights into this agency’s Recruitment and Selection Processes and my recommendations for improving the current process. I am extremely grateful to my respected internship faculty, office supervisor and colleagues for assisting me to develop my internship tasks and office. This internship has provided me with the opportunity to learn about the industry and various management methods.
Sustainable Industrialization in Bangladesh: A Case Study of the Ready-Made Garments and the Leather Industries
(©University of Dhaka, 2025-02-05) Islam, Sadia
The world has already witnessed by the massive growth and this boom of economy brought detrimental changes in environmental quality. Due unplanned industrial development, the environment is losing its own balance. There is anxiety about the future of the world. So, to solve this problem the world need to find out some solutions. The world needs a kind of development process which will increase economic growth, but without harming the balance of the environment. Moreover, Sustainable development is a universally agreed development process to address all these challenging issues. Considering these issues the main goal of the study was to find out the prospects of Bangladesh to promote sustainable industrialization by 2030, and to examine the impact of the eco-innovation in the environmental sustainability performance to formulate long term policy for sustainable industrialization program. The nature of the work demands the collection and analysis of both primary and secondary data. Hence, to project how close the Bangladesh to achieve the target of SDG 9.2, this study considers indicator 9.2.1a and 9.2.1b. To forecast the country’s overall progress related with sustainable industrialization this study use ARIMA model and after forecasting the value this paper found that the manufacturing value added as a percentage of GDP will be 21.26 percent and Manufacturing value added per capita (in USD) for the year 2030 will be 354.33 USD in Bangladesh by 2030. This study found that indicator 9.2.1a is still far from achieving the target of manufacturing share of GDP by 2030. However, from the forecasting value of indicator 9.2.1.b this paper can claim that, the forecasted value USD 354.33 is very close to the targeted value USD 360.96. To fulfill the second specific objective, this study collected data from the manufacturing sector (RMG industry and Leather industry). The questionnaire was collected and complied from different important documents from the literature reviewed, but considering the data collection problem (during this Covid-19 pandemic), the study used only total 50 RMG and leather industries for collection of primary data. The collected data from the questionnaire survey was analyzed both by factor analysis to form an index for environmental sustainability performance, eco-innovation and eco-process innovation. The Classical Liner Regression Model was employed to prove the hypotheses. From the descriptive analyses of the study it is found that, eco-innovation concentrated on the reduction of materials use, reduction of energy use, reduction of pollution and replacing of materials with less polluting substitutes. The empirical result of this study has shown the eco- innovation has a positive relationship with environmental sustainability performance in the case of the manufacturing sector and also in the case of RMG sector of the Bangladesh. Specifically, from the empirical results it was found that eco-product innovation has a positive impact on environmental sustainability performance, but the eco-process innovation does not have any positive impact on environmental sustainability performance in the case of overall manufacturing industry and as well as RMG industry. But due to the inappropriateness of the data for factor analysis this study could not able to identify the impact of eco-innovation in the case of the leather sector. Therefore, for the implementation of sustainable industrialization in the manufacturing sector of the Bangladesh, it is necessary to implement various policies and programs covering all these factors.
Tweeter Suicidal Notes Identification Using Adversarial Deep Theory
(Daffodil International University, 2023-01-28) Dhrubo, MD. Mahadi Rahman; Islam, Sadia; Kabir, Mahjabin Binta
Depression is a common mental illness that can interfere with daily activities and productivity. Suicidal thoughts or attempts may result as a result. In today's society, suicide is a major issue. Suicide attempts should be detected and prevented early on in order to preserve people's lives. Natural Language Processing (NLP) and machine learning techniques were used to construct the platform, which was designed to interpret conversations. The proposed two-stage platform would evaluate conversation and categorize associated sentiments into four categories: “happy”, “neutral”, “depressive”, and “suicidal”. The first step of intent recognition would examine conversations and categorize associated sentiments into two categories: "YES" and "NO". We show how social media data and suicide notes can be used to identify people who are in danger of committing suicide. Suicide notes are usually written in letters and posted on websites, and they're also captured in audio and video. Suicide notes can be used as study material in NLP. This article comprehensively introduces and explores methods and algorithms from a variety of disciplines. We also investigate the implications of using the same gear and thus the security implications. For knowledge-aware suicide risk assessment, current research incorporated external knowledge utilizing knowledge bases and suicide ontology. Even this surgical technique however is actually currently there only available as well for state intervention among users whom had "checked out" either study and counseling. Still, it allows for scalable suicide risk screening, potentially identifying many people who are at risk before they engage with services in the health infrastructure. Finally, we review considering the current state of affairs work's shortcomings and offer some recommendations for further research.