A. Q. M. Bazlul Karim

AQM Bazlul Karim (1920–1998) was an educationist and soil scientist, born on 1 February 1920 in village Kalma in Lohajang Upazila of Munshiganj District. He passed SSC, HSC and BSc (pass course) examinations in 1936, 1938 and 1940 respectively. He obtained MSc degree in chemistry in 1942 from Aligarh Muslim University.

He started his career as a civil servant in Calcutta under Food Ministry, later joined as Junior Lecturer in Jadabpur College and finally as a gazetted officer in chemical standardisation laboratory under Food and Drug Ministry. On 21 September 1945, he left for London and got admitted as a PhD student in agricultural chemistry at Imperial College in London. He received his PhD in 1948 on a thesis titled 'Residual effect of fertilisers on the growth and yield of potatoes'.

After returning from London, Professor Abul Quasem Muhammed Bazlul Karim joined the newly established Department of Soil Science in Dhaka University (DU) as senior Lecturer in 1949 with m osman ghani, AKMF Huq, abdul karim and Hatem Ali as his colleagues in the department. He became a Reader in 1952. He received an offer as visiting scientist by the American Academy of Sciences and joined the Department of Soil Science and Botany in Davis Campus of the University of California, and worked there till 1961. After coming back from USA he became the head of Soil Science Department of DU and by the end of 1962 he became Professor. In 1967, he accepted the post of Director General of a project entitled Soil Survey of Pakistan and again returned to his original post of Professor of DU at the end of 1969.

He continued in this post till he was appointed as the chairman of the Bangladesh public service commission of independent Bangladesh in July 1972 and stayed there for five years.

In 1978, he again joined Dhaka University and continued till his retirement on 30 June 1982. Dr B Karim, in addition to his teaching assignment, had been presidents of Dhaka University Teachers Association, Federation of Bangladesh University Teachers Association and soil science society of Bangladesh.

Professor Karim participated in many national and international professional seminars and presented papers on basic scientific investigation on soils of Bangladesh. His fields of research were soil plant nutrients and soil chemistry. In recognition of his teaching, research and other activities he was honoured with the President's Gold Medal in 1974, Sher-e-Bangla Gold Medal in 1982 for education, Atish Dipankar Gold Medal in 1984, and 'Ekushey Padak' (posthumous) in 2000. Karim died on 6 July 1998. He left behind two sons (Yusuf Mahbubul Karim and Dr Ahmed Karim) and two daughters (Dr Niloufer Karim and Priti Karim).