BNP wants to overcome frustration � rstn Mohammad Al-Masum Molla

The BNP is planning to adopt a long-term strategy to strengthen the party and decide not to launch any strong movement for a few more months.

The plans came following several rounds of discussions and evaluation meetings at joint secretary general and organising secretary level.

The meetings summed up that the party would � rst reorganise itself to beat the frustration that had percolated through the organisation after the Jan-uary 5 polls, said a senior leader.

BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia will hold a series of workers meeting and public meetings in every division in the months ahead along with some is-sue-based programmes.

The party discussed all these plans and policies while joint secretaries and organising secretaries held a meeting at party Chairperson Khaleda Zia’s Gul-shan o� ce on Monday.

The BNP policy making body, the standing committee, will decide upon all these plans and decisions in to-night’s meeting.

“We have discussed many things in the meeting and all the issues will be � nalised in the standing committee meeting,” Mohammad Shahjahan, joint secretary general of the party, told the Dhaka Tribune.

A senior leader of the party seeking anonymity said they discussed upazila election, movement strategy and how to reorganise the party and on the basis of their observation and decisions they submitted a report to Khaleda Zia on Monday night.

According to the report, some cen-tral teams will be formed to visit thanas and upazilas to reorganise the grass-roots.

The report also said the party would withdraw all the expulsion orders is-sued during the upazila parishad elec-tions to strengthen the imminent an-ti-government campaign but as for the expelled leaders they have to apply for withdrawal of their expulsion orders with recommendation of the district and thana committees.

Another senior leader said Khaleda Zia would start holding meetings with

PAGE 2 COLUMN 6

Student bodies warn Gonojagoron’s Imran, ask him to realise ‘mistakes’ n DU Correspondent

Five students’ organisations have slammed Gonojagoron Moncho spokesperson Imran H Sarker for his “undemocratic and authoritative” atti-tude in managing the famed Shahbagh movement.

In a press conference at the Madhur Canteen on the Dhaka University cam-pus yesterday, the leaders of these or-ganisations asked Imran to realise his “mistakes” as soon as possible, warn-ing him that otherwise they would have to take steps against him.

They, however, did not specify whether taking steps meant dislodg-ing Imran from the post of the Moncho spokesperson.

The warning comes only two days after Imran had hinted that the plat-form might � oat a political party if the people of the country wanted it to.

Two days before that, ruling Awami League’s student body Chhatra League

in a press conference at the same venue said it was no more with the Moncho. In recent times, the Moncho activ-ists have openly got into scu� es with Chhatra League activists centring var-ious issues.

The � ve student bodies who or-ganised yesterday’s press conference were Bangladesh Chhatra Moitree, JSD Chhatra League, Chhatra Andolon, Chhatra Oikya Forum and the Chhatra Samiti.

All these groups and the ruling party’s student wing had been close-ly associated with the activities of the Gonojagoron Moncho since it was launched in February last year to press home the demand for ensuring capital punishment for war criminal Abdul Quader Molla.

Of these groups, Moitree and JSD Chhatra League are the student fronts of Bangladesh Workers’ Party and Jati-ya Samajtantrik Dal respectively – both allies to the ruling Awami League.

Bappaditya Basu, president of Bang-ladesh Chhatra Moitree and one of the organisers of the Moncho, read out a written statement that said: “We [205 organisations] selected Dr Imran H Sarker as the convener of the Gono-jagoron Moncho because he was not actively involved with any particular political organisation or any student body at that time. A few days later, when the movement was in full swing, Imran’s attitude began to change and he became autocratic. He began to ig-nore the others’ opinions inside the Gonojagoron Moncho and took vital decisions on his own. We tried to solve the problem internally, but failed.”

Regarding Imran’s hints about form-ing a political party, Bappa said: “We will never sacri� ce the countrymen’s sentiment for any individual’s wish-es. Rather we will take stern actions [against anyone who will do so] and do everything needed for protecting

PAGE 2 COLUMN 3

Cern will train science teachers in Bangladeshn Sheikh Shahariar Zaman

Cern – the biggest and the most prestig-ious particle physics research institute in the world – is going into an umbrella agreement with the Bangladesh gov-ernment to cooperate in the � eld of sci-ence and technology.

The matter was disclosed yesterday by Rolf-Dieter Heuer, director gener-al of the European Organisation for Nuclear Research (Cern) who came to Dhaka on Monday on a three-day trip.

He was talking to a small group of journalists at a city hotel yesterday.

Bangladesh and Cern signed an ex-pression of interest instrument last year while a memorandum of under-standing was likely to be signed in the middle of this year, he added.

The umbrella agreement would tell that Bangladesh and Cern wanted to work together and it would be support-ed by the government, he told journal-ists.

Under the agreement, there would be several arrangements such as pro-viding training to high school teachers and students or experiment-sharing between Cern and a Bangladeshi uni-versity.

A Bangladeshi student would also be sent to the institute in the summer for two months for training, Heuer said.

“We will arrange a workshop for high school teachers and train them with modern knowledge,” he said.

Heuer observed that Bangladesh needed to have good teachers to grow interest among young students about

science. He said he would not have be-come a physicist had his � rst teacher not been good.

He also said big projects such as the Apollo programme or the Higgs-Boson invention attracted young people to study science. When the � rst rocket was sent under the Apollo programme in the USA, many young students opted to study engineering.

Cern, which proved the existence of “god particle,” popularly known as the Higgs-Boson particle in 2012 and became a front page item, still attracts media attention.

“The world is still watching what we are doing,” Heuer said.

Cern has 21 member countries and two associate members and 10,000-11,000 scientists from 98 countries work there.

Pakistan, Russia, Cyprus, Turkey, Brazil and Ukraine have applied for as-sociate memberships and after signing the agreement, Bangladesh can also apply for it.

“The main thing is to have agree-ment with the government. It makes two things. One, it is more visible in

PAGE 2 COLUMN 6

UNFREEZE ACCOUNTSP3

20 pages plus 8-page Treehouse children’s supplement | Price: Tk10

Chaitra 26, 1420Jamadius Sani 8, 1435Regd. No. DA 6238Vol 2, No 11 WEDNESDAY, APRIL 9, 2014 | www.dhakatribune.com | SECOND EDITION

BusinessB1 The construction of luxury hotels will enjoy exemption from all taxes except for 5% customs duty on the import of building materials and equipment.

News5 Migration from villages to cities contrib-utes rapid urban growth in Bangladesh that poses serious threats to urban disaster since the cities are growing violating urban

development principles and standards, says a new study.

Nation6 The smuggling of potatoes to India through Mogholhat border in Lalmonirhat Sadar upazila is going strong because of negligence of Border Guard Bangladesh.

Op-Ed11 It is election time for the largest de-

mocracy in the world. This time it happens to be the largest elections ever held in any country, with a record number of voters set to exercise their voting rights.

Entertainment12 Shurer Dhara, one of the leading music schools of the country, is preparing to welcome Pahela Baishakh – the � rst day of the Bangla calendar – with thousand voices on April 14.

INSIDE

Traders from across the country bring boats loaded with watermelons to the Badamtoli fruit market. The fruit gains popularity during the summer as people eat watermelons to get a respite from the scorching heat SYED ZAKIR HOSSAIN

Fakhrul released from Kashimpur jailn Our Correspondent, Gazipur

BNP acting secretary general Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir was freed from Kashimpur jail yesterday, a day after he was granted six-month interim bail in a case.

Jahangir Kabir, senior jail super-inetendent of Dhaka Central Jail 2 (Kashimpur), con� rmed the news.

He said the BNP leader had earlier also secured bail in two other cases, � led with Shahbagh and Dhanmondi police stations, in connection with a petrol bomb attack on police car, van-dalism and other charges.

On Monday, the High Court bench of Justice Borhan Uddin and Justice KM Kamrul Quader granted six months’ bail to Fakhrul in a case accusing him of instigating a bomb attack in Malibagh during pre-polls violence on November 30 last year that killed one person.

Fakhrul walked out of the jail as the necessary papers of the bail order were scrutinised after it arrived at Kashim-pur in the afternoon.

PAGE 2 COLUMN 6

Public servants may not get salary hikePay commission chairman says public servants may get improved non-� nancial bene� ts instead of a hiken Asif Showkat Kallol

The national pay commission may drop the idea of hiking salaries of govern-ment employees from a point of view that it may lead to higher in� ation.

Instead, the commission is contem-plating improved non-� nancial bene-� ts such as insurance facilities, tuition fee allowance and free textbooks for the children of the employees.

After the third meeting of the com-mission yesterday, Chairman Moham-mad Farashuddin told reporters that the aim was to improve e� ciency of government sta� s without putting pressure on the consumer price index.

According to a government circular, one of the tasks of the National Pay and Services Commission – formed last year –is to � nd a way to adjust the sal-aries of government employees with prevailing in� ation rates.

The rate of in� ation in the country for March 2014 is 7.48%, says Bangla-desh Bureau of Statistics. For the same month, in� ation in the USA is 1.1%, and in the UK 1.7%. In India, in� ation for February 2014 was 6.73%.

The commission has put up two sets of questionnaires on the � nance ministry’s website seeking opinions and recommendations from the public servants about the next pay structure.

In those questionnaires, there are several questions where respondents are asked to give their opinions on whether the next pay structure should take into consideration the prevailing in� ationary pressures.

After yesterday’s meeting, Farashuddin said: “There were discussions on non-� nancial bene� ts such as providing for tuition fees of schools and colleges and givingfree textbooks and study materials to the children of the employees... We have also discussed short term insurance facilities for the employees alongside salaries. However, all these are still at the initial stage of consideration.”

Binayak Sen, research director of Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies, told the meeting that raising salaries and bene� ts would not solve the problem of living standards; rather the government needed to make sure that e� cient and skilled people were recruited, meeting sources said.

Then again, citing the example of Indian public servants and universi-ty professors many of whosemonth-ly salaries are as much as Rs80,000-Rs85,000 in addition to other facilities, Sen stressed the need for good pay to attract e� cient people into the govern-ment sector.

In Bangladesh, the pay scale for the senior most government employees is around Tk40,000 apa rt from other bene� ts.

Finance Minister AMA Muhith also reportedly agreed with the notion that just like the private sector, “talented” people should also work in the public sector.

One member of the committee pointed out that senior government sta� s should enjoy better insurance policies than the younger ones.

Another member reportedly said the government employees should start contributing towards a housing fund from the beginning of their services so that they could own houses by the end of their job tenures.

PAGE 2 COLUMN 3

Just like the private sector, ‘talented’people should alsowork in public sector

9 | ‘PINGS’ KEEP MH370 SEARCH IN LIMBO 14 | BET ON ROONEY FOR BAYERN CLASHTreehouse | MIND READING 7 | IF THE HOUSE COULD SPEAK

The main thing is to have agreement with the government

WATERMELONS GALORE: FEELING THIRSTY?

News2 DHAKA TRIBUNE Wednesday, April 9, 2014

CHT Development Board Bill placed in JSn Tribune Report

The government tabled the Chittagong Hill Tracts Development Board Bill 2014 in parliament yesterday, mainly to replace the existing ordinance promul-gated by Gen Ziaur Rahman in 1976.

When passed, the bill will establish the Chittagong Hill Tracts Development Board in Rangamati. The government will then appoint the chairman and the vice-chairman of the six-member board.

State Minister for Chittagong Hill Tracts A� airs Bir Bahadur Ushwi Sing placed the bill to continue ongoing de-velopment projects in the region, which lags behind in almost all the develop-ment indicators. In keeping with proce-dure, the Parliamentary Standing Com-mittee on the Chittagong Hill Tracts Ministry will further scrutinise the bill. It has the authority to bring any changes it seems � t to the proposed law.

The standing committee will refer its report back to the House after � nal-ising its the recommendations. l

36 fake freedom � ghters' certi� cates cancelledn Mohosinul Karim

The Liberation War A� airs Ministry cancelled freedom � ghters certi� cates of 39 o� cials as they were proved false in the investigation.

A liberation war a� air ministry ga-zette noti� cation issued on April 6 said the temporary freedom � ghters certif-icates that were issued to the o� cials were proved false in the investigation of the department of the national secu-rity intelligence.

It was also proved that those o� cials who have taken temporary certi� cates from the ministry are not real freedom � ghters. As a result, the certi� cates is-sued to those o� cials were cancelled.

The certi� cates of former district judge Sadikur Rahman Talukder, Raipur Sub-Registrar O� ce’s assistant Golam Mostafa, Project Director of LGED Ataur Rahman Khan, Rajshahi Krishi Unnayan Bank’s Deputy Manager Abul Kashem, Bangladesh Krishi Bank’s Principal Of-� cer Sheikh Jan Mohammad, Director of Rural Electri� cation Board SM Saidur Rahman Chowdhury, senior outdoor assistants of Mongla Port Authority Sha-habuddin Chowdhury and Sadek Ali, BIWTA’s Auto-gage Operator Ohiduz-zaman Ahad and senior public servant AKM Mirza Alam were cancelled.

Certi� cates of Gazipur’s former dis-trict food controller Mojibar Rahman,

Kishoreganj Sadar’s Dr Altabur Rah-man, auditor of Magura Md Moksed Ali, Assistant Commissioner of Chit-tagong Customs House Kazi Abdul Ba-sit, KPCL’s former senior clerk Kohinur Miah, former public servant Sheikh Mohammad Rawshan Ali, � sheries of-� cer Zoarder Anwarul Haque, o� ce assistant of small irrigation project of Bhola Mosharef Hossain, employee of Bangabandhu Hall of Agriculture Uni-versity of Mymensingh Mo� zul Islam, o� ce assistant of regional labour o� ce of Chittagong Tazul Islam Khan, Public Works Department’s Work Assistant Nazrul Islam, Assistant Foreman Jainal Abedin and Administrative O� cer of small irrigation project of Barishal Amir Hossain were also cancelled.

The authorities also cancelled the certi� cates of Faridpur Nagarkanda’s Assistant Teacher SM Iman Uddin, Bangladesh Railway’s Abdul Kaiyum Amin, Dinajpur Chirir Bandar’s head-master Debendra Nath Roy, Netrokona Purbodhola’s headmaster Siraz Miah, Headmaster of Chandpur Faridganj Sir-azul Islam, Police’s former sub-inspec-tor Soaliman Ali, former sub-inspector Shamsur Rahman, Constable Amir Ali, Security Habilder of AFCCL KM Bablu, Khagrachari Ramgarh’s Shah Md Wa-liullah, Barguna Betagi’s Abdul Aziz, Khulna Kaira’s Abdul Malek and Jamal-pur Dewanganj’s Abdul Aziz. l

Moudud apologises for Goyeshwar’s commentn Tribune Report

BNP Standing Committee member Moudud Ahmed has apologised to the High Court for his fellow Goyeshwar Chandra Roy’s “contemptuous” com-ment about the court.

As Moudud went to the bench of Justice Quazi Reza-Ul Hoque and Jus-tice ABM Altaf Hossain with a writ pe-tition yesterday, the bench raised the issue of Goyeshwar who on Sunday said “all courts including the Supreme Court are in the pocket of Mujib Coat.”

Moudud then apologised for Goyesh-war’s remark, Deputy Attorney General Biswojit Roy told the Dhaka Tribune.

A junior colleague of Moudud also con� rmed the incident but said it was “informal.”

Goyeshwar at a programme on Sun-day said: “Judge Court, High Court and Supreme Court – all courts are now im-prisoned in the pocket of Mujib Coat. If

it is not possible to tear this pocket, no-body will get justice. The judge’s con-science will not be revived.”

He alleged that the judges do not hear arguments, “rather they wait for a signal. When the signal comes, the judges have to pen down the judge-ment in line with the signal.”

The same bench on its own motion on Monday asked Goyeshwar to appear before it on April 20 to explain his re-marks. It also summoned Doctors’ As-sociation of Bangladesh Vice-President M Salam and Secretary General AZM Zahid Hossain as Goyeshwar had made the comment at a human chain organ-ised by the pro-BNP doctors' platform.

The bench also issued a contempt rule against the three asking as to why they should not be punished for contempt of court. The three alleged contem-nors have to reply to the rule in writing through a� davits within two weeks to explain their positions if they had any. l

Rab arrests 2 recruiting agency owners for fraud, human tra� ckingn Kailash Sarkar

The Rapid Action Battalion yesterday arrested the owners of two recruit-ing agencies suspected of tra� cking people to the Middle East and holding them hostage overseas for ransom.

The arrested suspects, identi� ed as Abdul Zabbar Khan, 47, owner of “Samira Tours and Travels”, and SMA Mannan, 37, owner of “Zaber Interna-tional”, were picked up from the cap-ital’s Mohammadpur and Paltan areas respectively, RAB 2 o� cials told a press brie� ng at their Agargaon o� ce yester-day evening.

The men are suspected to be mem-bers of a human tra� cking gang, send-ing people abroad, mostly to Middle Eastern countries, with false jobs and forged visas and passports.

They are also accused of “selling” people as slaves in countries like Iraq,

or keeping them hostage by seizing their passports and then collecting ran-som money from their families in Ban-gladesh.

The RAB o� cials said more than 300 people had fallen victims to their cheating and other inhuman activities.

“Due to the gang’s cheating and forgeries, a few hundred innocent Ban-gladeshis were arrested abroad and ex-perienced untold su� erings in deten-tion in foreign countries,” Additional Superintendent of Police Raihan Uddin Khan, operation o� cer of RAB 2, said.

The o� cer said the suspected gang members used to send people abroad through their recruiting agencies with fake visas and passports. They were also involved in sending women to Iraq and selling them as the slaves there, he added.

“Zabbar Khan was arrested in Iraq in 2011 for cheating and forgery. He had

gone to Iraq several times using three separate passports,” Raihan Uddin said, adding that Zabbar was blacklist-ed by the Iraqi authorities for his illegal activities.

“This gang sent 300 people to Iraq against visas for only 100 people in 2009. Fifty of the victims were arrest-ed and sent back home when it was proven that they had fake visas, while 50 others had to su� er in jails there,” Raihan said.

Abdul Zabbar, from Faridpur dis-trict, lives in Shyamoli, while Mannan, of Kosba upazila in Brahmanbaria, re-sides at Naya Paltan in the city.

Meanwhile, earlier yesterday, Mo-hammad Barakat Ali, manager of “Samira Tours”, had claimed that Man-nan was picked up in a white microbus outside his Motijheel o� ce on Monday night by some people who identi� ed themselves as RAB personnel. l

Special security for Pahela Baishakh celebrationsn Kailash Sarkar

With the deployment of additional forces of police and RAB, police author-ities have projected a special security plan for Pahela Baishakh, celebration of the Bangla New Year.

Topmost o� cials of police held a meeting at the Police Headquarters yesterday afternoon for the planning.

Chaired by Inspector General of Police Hassan Mahmood Khandker, the meet-ing was attended by AKM Shahidul Ho-que, additional IGP (Administrations), Zaved Patwari, chief of Special Branch, Himayet Hossain, chief of Armed Police Battalion, Mokhlesur Rahman, direc-tor-general of RAB, and Benajir Ahmed, commissioner of Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP), among others.

Control rooms will be set up at the

Police Headquarters, police headquar-ters of all the metropolitans, all ranges and o� ces of the Superintendent of Police (SP) so that the celebration takes place without a hitch, as well as to co-ordinate the security measures in this regard.

Sources in the meeting said the in-spector general had asked all the forces at the meeting to remain alert so that people would be able to celebrate the occasion. He also urged people to help the law enforcers in this regard.

The sources also said RAB helicop-ters would patrol from the sky on the day of, apart from the additional forces - both in uniform and plain cloth.

In addition, extra vigilance will be arranged for in the shopping malls, markets, bus and launch terminals and railway stations. l

Court accepts charge sheet against Oisheen Md Sanaul Islam Tipu

A Dhaka court yesterday accepted the charge sheets pressed against Oishee Rahman and three others in a case re-garding the murder of parents – Special Branch Inspector Mahfuzur Rahman and his wife Swapna Rahman in August last year.

After taking the charges into cogni-sance, Dhaka Metropolitan Magistrate Maruf Hossain sent the case to Metro-politan Sessions Judge’s Court for trial.

Oishee, her boyfriend Mizanur Rah-man Rony, Asaduzzaman Jony and housemaid Khadiza Khatun alias Sumi were present before the court.

On March 9, DB Inspector Abu Al Khair Matubbar, also investigation o� -cer of the case, submitted two separate charge sheets before the Dhaka Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Court.

Of the charge sheets, one was � led against Oishee, Jony and Rony; Sumi was also charged but she will be tried in a juvenile court as she is still under 18.

On August 14 last year, the SB in-spector and his wife were stabbed to death at their rented � at in Chameli-bagh, Malibagh. Police recovered the bodies on August 16. Oishee and Sumi surrendered at the Paltan police station the following day. Later, Oishee gave a confessional statement. l

BNP wants PAGE 1 COLUMN 6the district level leaders from April 10 and before that grassroots leaders will have to sit with joint secretary generals and organising secretaries.

The Nayapaltan central o� cials have already issued letters and phoned district leaders to let them know about their schedules of meetings with cen-tral leaders including the chairperson in Dhaka.

As per the report, the joint secretary generals and organising secretaries re-quested Khaleda Zia to go to Nayapal-tan o� ce once a week but Khaleda Zia refused to do so. l

Public servants may not get salary hike PAGE 1 COLUMN 2According to meeting sources, the idea was that if civil servants could be sure that they would own houses at the end of their jobs, they would not resort to corruption.

After the meeting, former central bank governor Farashuddin told re-porters that it would not be possible for the commission to submit the report by the June deadline. He said the commis-sion had already applied for extension

and hoped to place the report by De-cember 2015.

The 17-member pay commission was formed in November last year to come up with a new pay scale for 12 lakh government employees. l

Fakhrul released PAGE 1 COLUMN 1Earlier on January 20, Fakhrul, along with BNP leaders Mirza Abbas and Ab-dus Salam, were granted eight-week bail by the High Court in a case over the murder of a policeman at Banglamotor and two more cases of arson in Mali-bagh and Poribagh.

Howver, the Appellate Division can-celled the bail orders of � ve BNP lead-ers including the three on March 9.

On March 16, the three leaders were produced before the court, where they sought bail from the appellate division. However, the court rejected the bail plea and ordered them to be sent to jail. l

Student bodies warn Gonojagoron's Imran PAGE 1 COLUMN 4the prestige of the Gonojagoron Mon-cho. We will sit with all Moncho activ-ists from around the country and the pro-Liberation War cultural, social and political organisations [for making a decision].”

He blamed Imran for being too le-nient towards Chhatra League which gave the ruling party’s student front the courage to assault Moncho activ-ists.

He also claimed that Abir and Shishir

– blamed for attacking Moncho activ-ists – had never been associated with the Chhatra League and Jubo League; rather they were activists of the Mon-cho.

In immediate reaction to the press conference, Imran said: “I never de-cided anything for the Moncho on my own. People will always have di� erent views, but it is not always possible to accept them. But that does not mean that we were autocratic.”

Terming the recent turmoil within

the Moncho unexpected, he said: “We have already planned to form a new committee comprising representatives from all the organisations so that we can make future decisions calmly.”

He also said: “I do not consider this a warning from the Gonojagoron Moncho. I was not selected [as the spokesperson] by those � ve organisations. There are hundreds more. But I accept the allegations as a view from my allies and hope to work jointly in future.” l

Cern will train science teachers in Bangladesh PAGE 1 COLUMN 6the political arena and second, it is sort of moral obligation to continue for this not for one year but for long-term,” he said.

The Cern chief said the workshop for teachers was likely to be held at the end of this year. l

Porters and day labourers sleep away in the daytime on the walkway of Sadarghat Launch Terminal in the capital as there are very few launches operating until the evening. The photo was taken yesterday SYED ZAKIR HOSSAIN

Leaders of � ve student organisations hold a press conference at Madhu's Canteen on Dhaka University campus yesterday, raising various allegations against Gonojagoron Moncho spokesperson Imran H Sarker RAJIB DHAR

3NewsDHAKA TRIBUNE Wednesday, April 9, 2014

Study: Only 7 out of 126 RMG trade unions activen Tazlina Zamila Khan

Only seven trade unions in the ready-made garment industry out of 126 reg-istered are actively working to promote the rights of workers, a new study says.

The key impediment for most trade unions not being functional is harass-ment and assaults by the factory man-agement, � nds the study titled “Organ-ising Trade Unions in the RMG Sector 2010-14.”

It states that two trade unions re-ceived registrations in 2011 and 2012, while the number increased to 81 last year, but has come down to 43 this year.

The � ndings of the study – conducted by Solidarity Centre – were revealed yesterday at a social dialogue pro-gramme styled “Industrial Relation and Sustainable Development of RMG Industry in Bangladesh: Role of Na-tional and International Stakeholders.” Bangladesh Institute of Labour Stud-ies (BILS) and Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung (FES) organised the event in the city’s Brac Inn.

Alonzo Glenn Suson, executive di-rector of Solidarity Centre, said around 20% of the workers engaged with the trade unions found it di� cult to oper-ate due to torture by the members of the factory o� cials.

Quoting recent studies of the BILS, speakers said at least 1,063 industrial unrests took place from January 2010 to June 2013. Most of these incidents could have been avoided had there been the practice of bipartite dialogue at the factory level and tripartite dia-logue at national level.

One of the main reasons behind those outbursts was the absence of dis-pute settlement through discussions.

Michael Sommer, president of the International Trade Union Confeder-

ation (ITUC) and chairman of German Confederation of Trade Unions (DGB), said: “Uni� ed trade unions are a must to ensure the workers’ rights. Employ-ers and government need to provide more space for the unions to operate.”

He suggested having a regular so-cial dialogue in every two months rep-resented by the unions to address the problems.

Sommer stressed the need for en-suring safe work places, and equitable and economically sustainable wage growth, reliable cooperation and ac-countability structures between work-ers and employers. “So, Accord should be fully implemented.”

On February 20, the Accord, a platform of 150 European retailers, launched the � rst phase of inspection and inspected over 225 factories for � re and electrical safety and over 180 factories were inspected for structural safety. On the other hand, the Alliance for Workers Safety in Bangladesh had inspected 305 factories and found no faults.

Roy Ramesh Chandra, secretary general of IndustriAll Bangladesh Council, suggested formation of a sep-arate trust fund for the RMG workers. “The owners will pay Tk5 per work-er and the workers will pay the same amount every month. The buyers will give 10 cents. This fund can be used for the betterment of the workers.”

The former Jatiya Sramik League leader said the workers could also sit with the buyers in order to ensure their rights.

Syed Sultan Uddin Ahammed, as-sistant executive director of BILS, said the owners ignored the basic needs of millions of workers’, especially their accommodation and medical facilities.

Mikail Shiper, secretary of Labour and Employment Ministry, said: “The National Crisis Management Commit-tee headed by the labour minister was formed to address the workers’ rights issue.”

Srinivas Reddy, country director of the International Labour Organisation, said the RMG sector was vital for Ban-gladesh to achieve the Millennium De-velopment Goals and reduce poverty. l

ACC: Mosharraf’s wife involved with money launderingn Tribune Report

The Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) has found that Bilkis Akhter Hossain, wife of detained BNP stand-ing committee member Khandaker Mosharraf Hossain, was involved with laundering Tk9.54 crore to the United Kingdom.

ACC deputy director Ahsan Ali told reporters: “Mosharraf has concealed his income related information in the income tax statement � led in Bangla-desh and we have found his wife’s in-volvement with irregularity.”

He made the disclosure after ques-tioning Bilkis Akhter at the ACC head-quarters at Segunbagicha.

However, Bilkis Ahter declined to comment further saying: “I have ap-

peared before the ACC following their notice and have replied to their que-ries.”

ACC director Nasim Anwar on Feb-ruary 6 � led a case against the BNP leader on charge of laundering around Tk9.54crore to the United Kingdom.

According to the case statement, Khandaker Mosharraf illegally amassed over £800,000 (Tk95,395,381) by abuse of power between 2001 and 2006 and concealing information.

The sum has been put into a joint � xed-term deposit account at Lloyds TSB O� shore Private Banking at Guern-sey in the UK. The joint account be-longs to him and his wife.

On March 12, police arrested Khan-dakar Mosharraf at Gulshan in the capi-tal in connection with the case. l

BNP: Unfreeze Khaleda’s bank accounts n Mohammad Al-MasumMolla

The BNP yesterday demanded that party Chairperson Khaleda Zia’s bank accounts be reopened immediately al-leging that those were frozen unjustly.

“In 2007, the then caretaker gov-ernment frozen bank accounts of both Khaleda Zia and Sheikh Hasina. But Sheikh Hasina’s accounts were unfro-zen in 2008 and she is operating her accounts.

Nazrul Islam Khan, standing com-mittee member of the party, said this while addressing a press brie� ng at party’s Nayapaltan headquarters: “We strongly demand the immediate un-

freezing of her bank accounts.”The government evicted Khaleda

Zia from her cantonment residence with a political vengeance, he said.

Nazrul said Khaleda Zia has eight bank accounts and among those there is no money in six bank accounts.

The BNP leader alleged Khaledaa Zia’s bank accounts have remained fro-zen for long seven years.

“From the prime minister to minis-ters and ruling party leaders are mak-ing derogatory remarks on Khaleda Zia which is unfortunate. I have no word to condemn the ruling party leaders’ false and dirty comments on Khaleda Zia’s personal life.” l

Feroz Rashid: JaPa not true oppositionn Kamran Reza Chowdhury

A senior lawmaker of Ershad’s Jatiya Party yesterday resented the fact that his party was not the “true opposition.”

People’s perception of the JaPa is very bad as the electorate do not rate it as the true opposition in parliament, said Kazi Feroz Rashid in an unsched-uled discussion that started minutes after the House started its business at 5:05pm.

Speaker Shirin Sharmin Chaudhury presided over the session.

He demanded that the JaPa be given the responsibilities of some heads of

the parliamentary standing committee.Kazi Feroz Rashid said the result

of the recently-held upazila was a tes-timony to people’s perception of the government-JaPa relation.

“It is regrettable that the JaPa is not given any post of chiefs of the standing committee. We cannot show our face outside,” he said.

He lamented the fact that he was the ninth member of a standing committee while he was telecom minister 25 years ago.

He said the JaPa would extend all out support to the government on some basic issues. “We will praise all good actions of the government and

criticise the bad decisions.”Rustom Ali Farazi, an independent

MP and former JaPa lawmaker,then took the � oor in another unscheduled slot. He also echoed the view of Firoz.

SM Abul Kalam Azad, the lone MP from Bangladesh Nationalist Front, ob-jected to the government decision to give “power corridor” to India which refused Bangladesh the due share of the Teesta river.

“It is not acceptable that we are to meet the demands of India one after another but never get our due share of waters,” he said. l

Witness: Azha r abducted Carmichael College teachersn Udisa Islam

A new prosecution witness in the trial against alleged al-Badr commander of Rangpur ATM Azharul Islam yesterday said the accused had been involved di-rectly in the abduction and killing of Carmichael College teachers during the 1971 Liberation War.

Shobha Kar, sister of martyred Chit-yaranjan Roy, told the war crimes tribunal about the abductions of her brother and three other teachers. She could identify at the time of incident Azhar since they had been classmates, the witness said.

Now living in Kolkata of India, she submitted his deposition as the 19th prosecution witness in the case. De-manding justice for the killings, the witness said the man who had planned and killed the intellectuals of the coun-try should be punished.

After her deposition, the defence counsel started questioning her and

the tribunal 1 adjourned the trial until tomorrow.

Shobha said she used to stay on the col-lege premises with her brother who was a teacher of mathematics department.

“At midnight on April 30 of 1971, some Pakistani Army personnel came to our house and picked my brother up with two other colleagues – Sunil Baran Chakrabarty and Ram Krishna Adhikari. For some reason, Ram Krish-na was at our house.

“When the abductors took them on a truck, we saw through the window that some Bangalees were helping them. I identi� ed Azhar then because he was my classmate.”

The witness said the next day Ratan Das, the cook of Kala Chand who was a teacher of chemistry, told her that Azhar had also abducted his master. He also saw the abduction of Manjusree, wife of Kala Chand, and Sunil Baran.

Shobha said: “Later my brother’s

student Salauddin informed us that all of them had been killed near Damdam Bridge of Rangpur town when the lower halves of their bodies were kept under the ground and all of them were blind folded.”

Azhar, a senior Jamaat-e-Islami lead-er, was indicted on November 12 last year on six charges of crimes against hu-manity including genocide in 1971.

Meanwhile, the same tribunal yester-day deferred the proceedings of the case against war crimes accused Mobarak Hos-sain upon a defence plea until April 17.

The defence counsels earlier sought time several times. The tribunal yester-day said it was accepting the plea for the last time. If the defence failed to produce their last witness, the prose-cution would begin their closing argu-ments in the case.

At the tribunal 2, the prosecution yesterday paced the 23rd witness, Ani-sur Rahman, in the case against war crimes accused Mir Kashem Ali, an

alleged al-Badr commander in Chit-tagong during the Liberation War who operated torture camps in the port city.

The witness works at the investi-gation agency as an inspector. He is in charge of the agency’s library from where the investigation o� cer seized some documents.

After his deposition and cross-ex-amination, the tribunal set today for placing the investigation o� cer, also the prosecution’s last witness.

The same tribunal yesterday re-corded cross-examination of the � rst prosecution witness in the case against war crimes accused Maulana Abdus Subhan. Witness ATM Shahiduzzaman Nasim on Monday described the killing of three members of his family in 1971 when the accused had been present at the scene with a sword in his hand.

The tribunal 2 set today for plac-ing the second witness against the ac-cused, a Jamaat nayeb-e-ameer. l

HC allows two more weeks to ensure widespread use of Banglan Tribune Report

The High Court yesterday gave two more weeks to the government to en-sure the usage of Bengali in the names of mass media, number plates for vehi-cles and all sign boards.

It also asked the government to en-sure use of Bangla in every sphere of life except the embassies and foreign institutions.

The bench comprising JusticeQuazi Reza-Ul Hoque and JusticeABM Altaf Hossain passed theorder following a petition � led by the government.

On February 17, the High Court bench passed an order to ensureall-out use of Bangla upon a petition of Supreme Court lawyer Eunus Ali Akond.

The court also directed the govern-ment to comply with it within its allot-ted time.

As the order was not implement-ed, Akond lodged a contempt of court petition with the HC on April 6against six secretaries of cabinetdivision, and law, home, culturala� airs, information, and education ministries. l

‘Bangladesh to be a middle-income country soon’n BSS

US Ambassador Dan Mozena said here today that Bangladesh would soon emerge as a middle- income country.

The envoy was on a tour of Joypur-hat where he visited the country’s big-gest sugar mill, Joypurhat Sugar Mills.

Explaining his optimism, he said that the people of Bangladesh have the merit and skill to make their country an economic tiger soon.

The local administration including Zilla Parishad administrator, S M Sulay-man Ali, the mayor of the local munic-ipality, president of the local chamber of commerce, the deputy commission-er and superintendent of police held a meeting with the Ambassador at the local Circuit House. l

Apparel workers vandalise a factory at Chittagong EPZ yesterday to press for their various demands DHAKA TRIBUNE

The Democratic Left Alliance begins road march towards Teesta Barrage from the National Press Club in the capital yesterday demanding proper water sharing RAJIB DHAR

At least 1,063 incidents of industrial unrest took place during the period between January 2010 and June 2013

News4 DHAKA TRIBUNE Wednesday, April 9, 2014

Hall-Mark bosses face another case n Md Sanaul Islam Tipu

The Sonali Bank authorities yesterday � led a fresh case against Hall-Mark Group Chairman Jasmine Islam and Managing Director Tanvir Mahmud for realising Tk60.44 crore on behalf of Design Wear Limited and High Need Limited that swindled the hefty money from the bank through forgery.

In the case, the couple and the two entities of the group have been made defendants for defaulting the amount.

Abdus Salam, executive o� cer of the state-owned bank’s Ruposhi Bangla Hotel branch, lodged the case with Ar-tha Rin Adalat 1 (money loan court) of Dhaka. Judge Md Rabiuzzaman took the case into cognisance and ordered the de-fendants to submit written statements before it by April 12 through counsels.

With this, the bank has � led 12 cases against Hall-Mark Group for realising more than Tk161.82 crore.

Hall-Mark alone took away Tk2,686 crore from the bank on forged doc-uments between 2010 and 2012. The scam shook the entire country when it came to light in May 2012.

The Anti-Corruption Commission � led 11 cases against 27 persons tied to Hall-Mark and the bank on Octo-ber 4, 2012. The ACC on October 7 last year pressed charges against 25 of the accused. Of them, seven persons, in-cluding Tanvir, are now in jail while Jasmine is on bail. Seventeen others are absconding. l

SAMIUL MURDER

Key accused Bakku’s bail cancelled n Tribune Report

The High Court (HC) yesterday can-celled the bail of Md Shamsuzzaman Arif alias Bakku, the prime accused in the case of murder of Samiul Azim Wa� , a six-year-old boy.

An HC bench comprising Justice Ni-zamul Huq and Justice Zahangir Hos-sain passed the order.

Deputy Attorney General Amit Taluk-der said the bench on February 16 grant-

ed bail to Bakku and issued a rule, ask-ing the authorities concerned as to why Bakku should not be granted permanent bail. The court yesterday cancelled his bail after quashing the rule, he said.

According to the case statement, vic-tim’s mother Humaira Akter Ayesha and her lover Bakku killed Samiul as he wit-nessed them being intimate. His body was recovered from near his house in the capital’s Adabar on June 24, 2010.

On February 1 in 2011, a Dhaka court

framed charges against the duo and the trial started after seven days with the testimony of KR Azam, father of the minor boy. So far, nine prosecution witnesses have given depositions in the case.

Azam recently told the Dhaka Tri-bune that he received death threat from Bakku after he was released on bail from jail. The accused also threatened the victim’s father not to bring witnesses anymore to the court. l

Government lacks accurate data on migrant workers n Rabiul Islam

The government has no accurate data on the migrant workers who are now working in di� erent countries, includ-ing Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Oman, Singapore, Ku-wait and Malaysia.

As a result, experts say, it is not pos-sible to project the foreign currencies to be remitted by the migrant workers.

They have observed that it is also necessary to collect accurate data on the migrant workers with a view to making policy for migration sector.

For example, they said, statistics are a must if the government wants to pro-vide the migrant workers with proper services.

Just on the basis of assumption, the expatriates’ welfare and overseas em-ployment ministry claims that nearly one crore migrants are now working abroad.

According to Bureau of Manpow-er, Employment and Training (BMET) data, 8,813,070 migrant workers have gone abroad till March 2014 since 1976. It means these workers got clearance from BMET.

During the period, a total of 2,630,580 migrants have gone to KSA while 2,308,433 to UAE, 479,814 to Kuwait, 869,921 to Oman, 284,235 to Qatar, 278,623 to Bahrain, 100,545 to Lebanon, 118,896 to Libya, 706,954 to Malaysia and 498,623 migrants to Sin-gapore. These are the major labour im-porting countries.

O� cials concerned said migrant workers usually go abroad on a two-year contract.

A large number of workers return home every year after the expiry of their contracts, they said, adding that the government does not collect data on returnees.

Apart from returnees, a good num-ber of migrants who become illegal due to overstay are deported every year, but the government has no statistics.

According to BMET, 250,000 mi-grants were deported from di� erent countries since 2009. Of the total, around 36,000 migrant workers were evacuated from Libya during civil war in 2011.

Refugee and Migratory Movements Research Unit (RMMRU) founding chair Tasneem Siddiqui said the gov-ernment has no mechanism to keep information on returnees.

It is very important to keep accurate statistics for the migrants, she said, adding: “If we want to evacuate the migrants during any crisis situation like Libya, data is a must.”

“Now we cannot project the remit-tances to be remitted by the migrants as we don’t know how many workers are working abroad at the moment,” Tasneem told the Dhaka Tribune re-cently.

A senior o� cial at the expatriates’ welfare ministry said data is necessary if the government wants to provide the returnees with proper service.

“Around 8,700,000 workers are now working abroad,” Expatriates’ Welfare Secretary Khondaker Showkat Hossain told the Dhaka Tribune yesterday.

When asked about a large number of returnees, he replied in the negative.

Talking to this correspondent at her o� ce on Sunday, BMET Director Gen-eral Begum Shamsun Nahar admitted that there is no accurate data on mi-grant workers.

“We are trying to keep data on re-turnees and we would get accurate data on our migrants.”

She also informed that out of BMET clearance, a large number of workers have gone abroad. l

Rajuk gets new chairman n Mohosinul Karim

The government yesterday appointed a new chairman for Rajdhani Unnayan Kartripakkha (Rajuk) and reinstated the former chairman of Insurance Develop-ment & Regulatory Authority (IDRA) – both for three years.

Former chairman of National Hous-ing Authority GM Jainal Abedin Bhuiyan has been made the new chairman of the city’s development regulator while for-mer IDRA chairman M Shefaque Ahmed was reappointed, according to separate orders of the public administration min-istry. The orders will be e� ective from their joining date. The o� cials will have to disconnect all relations with any oth-er companies or organisations.

Former bureaucrat Jainal Abedin, who is now on post-retirement leave (PRL) as an additional secretary, will re-place Nurul Huda.

The tenure of contractual appoint-

ment of Huda, a retired civil engineer who worked for the public works de-partment, expires on April 20. Earlier, the government rejected Huda’s resig-nation several times and extended his contracts three times. He has been the Rajuk chairman for the last four years.

Meanwhile, the IDRA turned into a guardian-less entity after the end of three-year contract of Shefaque on Jan-uary 26. Later, the government issued a circular bestowing the charges of the chairman to Md Fazlul Karim, the lone existing member of the authority.

The regulator requires at least three members out of its � ve posts, includ-ing the chairman, to hold a commission meeting, according to the IDRA Act.

The government established the IDRA in January 2011, replacing the De-partment of Insurance, to develop the insurance industry, by enacting an act in the parliament. Shefaque was the founder chairmen of the regulator. l

‘WiFi bus’ set to ply city streetsn Muhammad Zahidul Islam

The government is set to introduce special buses equipped with third gen-eration wireless internet connectivity for commuters in the capital.

Under the Access to Information (a2i) program under the Prime Min-ister’s O� ce, around 20 buses of the state-owned Bangladesh Road Trans-port Corporation (BRTC) equipped with the facility will be introduced along the Motijheel-Uttara route.

Commuters with WiFi enabled de-vices, such as smartphones, laptops or tablet computers, will be able to use the service while travelling on the buses.

Commerce Minister Obaidul  Quad-er and State Minister for ICT Zunaid

Ahmed  Palak are expected to inaugu-rate the service tomorrow at the capi-tal’s Farmgate area.

Source said, the a2i programme will be providing at least four 3G wireless routers of state-owned mobile phone operator Teletalk in each of the buses, which will enable around 40 passenger to use the service simultaneously.

“Even if the buses travel at 55 to 60 km per hour, there will be no dis-ruption in the service,” Naimuzzaman Mukta, people’s perspective specialist of a2i programme, told the Dhaka Tri-bune yesterday.

He added that currently at least 10% passengers used smartphones and would be able to use the internet services to spend their time more productively. l

Engineer gunned down in capitaln Ashif Islam Shaon

A young textile engineer was shot dead by unidenti� ed criminals in the Kolaba-gan area of the capital early yesterday.

The victim, Sadbin Hossain, 25, had recently joined an apparel factory as a textile engineer in Savar after complet-ing his studies.

Quoting the deceased’s relatives, police sources said Sadbin was return-ing to his Green Road home around 12:45am on a motorcycle, when some miscreants in a car intercepted his ve-hicle near Labaid Hospital and shot

him indiscriminately. Nearby pedestri-ans took Sadbin to the hospital where duty doctors declared him dead.

Police later sent his body to the Dhaka Medical College morgue for an autopsy. A case has been � led accusing a man named Jahangir Azim, who had allegedly been threatening to kill Sad-bin as the textile engineer refused to pay extortion to Jahangir.

Kolabagan police station OC Md Iqbal said Azim might be involved in the murder and they were trying their best to arrest him along with the other criminals. l

Oman to recruit 35 doctors and 50 nurses from Bangladesh n Rabiul Islam

Oman will recruit a total of 35 doctors and 50 nurses from Bangladesh in the next one month for a health centre located at an industrial area near the capital, Muscat.

Bangladesh Overseas Employment Services Ltd (Boesl), a government sponsored recruiting agency, would handle the recruitment process.

“We would process the recruitment as interested doctors and nurses do not want to go through private recruiting agencies, which charge huge amounts of money for processing the visas,” Za-

hirul Islam, general manager of Boesl told the Dhaka Tribune yesterday.

The medical personnel would be employed at the Rusayl Health Centre, a multi-specialty hospital at Rusayl In-dustrial Estate, 45km from Muscat.

Interested doctors and nurses have to apply to the agency by April 15, and interviews will take place on April 20.

Each selected candidate would only have to pay Tk60,000 as service charges, and no other fees, Zahirul said.

There are 25 posts for MBBS doctors with monthly salaries of US$2,100 and other facilities, while 10 aviation med-

icine specialists for treating aircrews will be paid $2,600 each.

A total 25 male nurses and 25 fe-male nurses would also be recruited for monthly salaries of $760 and $730 respectively.

“If we send the doctors and nurses successfully, we would get more re-quests,” Zahirul hoped.

Oman is one of the destinations for migrant workers from Bangladesh. In the � rst three months of this year, the Persian Gulf nation recruited 27,137 Bangladeshi workers, according to the Bureau of Manpower, Employment and Training. l

Ship-breaking yard catches � re in Ctgn CU Correspondent

A ship-breaking yard at Kumira in Chit-tagong’s Sitakunda upazila caught � re yesterday afternoon.

However, no causality was reported in the incident, according to the Fire Service and Civil Defence sources.

Abdul Harun Pasha, senior station o� cer at Kumira � re station, said a � re had broken out at BBC Ship-Breaking Yard at Ghatghar area around 6:30pm.

“On receiving information, � re � ghters of Kumia � re station rushed to the spot and doused the blaze after one hour,” he said, adding that reason for the � re was yet to be known.

Kamal Hossain, assistant sub-inspector at Sitakunda police Station, said a team of police had inspected the site.

The extent of damages caused by the � re was yet to be determined. l

Muggers shoot bKash agent, snatch Tk10 lakhn Kailash Sarkar

Pistol-wielding muggers on motorcycles opened � re on a sales agent of a mobile banking service and made o� with Tk10 lakh in broad daylight in the capital’s Mirpur area yesterday, leaving him and a passer-by with bullet wounds.

The wounded victims, Abul Kalam Mollah, 28, a sales agent for “bKash”, and Kabir Hossain, 25, the driver of a private car, were admitted to the Dha-ka Medical College and Hospital.

Abul Kalam was hit with two bullets in his chest and hand, while Kabir was shot in the shoulder, hospital sources said.

Witnesses and police said several

armed men, riding on two or three mo-torbikes, waylaid Abul’s motorcycle in front of Al Helal Hospital at Kazipara around 1pm while he was on his way to a Brac Bank branch from his o� ce in Pallabi.

“The armed criminals � rst tried to take away the bag with the money from Abul. But when he tried to resist them, they started shooting, snatched the bag and sped away,” Sub-inspec-tor Fazlur Rahman of DMCH police outpost said, adding: “Kabir, who was driving through the area at the time, was hit by a stray bullet.”

Bystanders and local residents � rst rushed the injured men to a nearby clinic. They were later moved to the

DMCH for better treatment.Saiful Islam, a cousin of Abul Kalam,

said the criminals probably followed Ka-lam from his o� ce, “AID Distributors”, and carried out the attack at Kazipara.

“When the pedestrians and locals chased after the criminals, they � red in-discriminately,” said Saiful.

A subsidiary of Brac Bank, bKash Ltd provides mobile � nancial services, enabling people to transfer money over their mobile phones across the country.

In another incident in the city, a gang of muggers at Goranin Khilga-on stabbed a police constable and snatched gold jewellery from his wife around 6:30am yesterday as the couple was returning to their Chawkbazar res-

idence in a rickshaw. The victim, Nazrul Islam, 38, posted

at Chawk Bazar police station, was ad-mitted to the DMCH with stab wounds in his hands, legs and face.

His wife, Israt Jahan Mitu, said Naz-rul was stabbed as he resisted the mug-gers.

“When the rickshaw reached Goran, a gang of four to � ve muggers stopped us and snatched away my gold neck-lace and ring. As my husband tried to resist them, they stabbed him indis-criminately,” Israt Jahan said.

Inspector Sirajul Islam, o� cer in charge of Khilgaon police station, said they were trying to apprehend the criminals. l

BGB personnel pose with smuggled Indian sarees, worth around Tk1.37 crore, seized in Comilla yesterday DHAKA TRIBUNE

In a recent photo, a farmer is seen using a locally made irrigation system to cultivate paddy on a piece of land where once used to be the Fokinni River in the Bagchha village in Rajshahi’s Bagmara upazila DHAKA TRIBUNE

TWOKI MURDER

Twoki Moncho: Highest government authorities interfering in probe n Tribune Report

The highest tier of the government was intervening in the probe of Twoki’s murder because members of an in� u-ential family close to the government were found to be involved with the crime, claimed Santrash Nirmul Two-ki Moncho, a platform to ensure jus-tice for the murder of the Narayanganj teenager.

“Analysing the investigation and tri-al process, it is normal to think that the highest authority of the government was intervening into the investigation and trial process,” Twoki’s father Ra� ur Rabbi alleged at a press brie� ng yester-day.

Two days after going missing, Tanvir Mohammad Twoki, 17, was found dead on March 8 last year on the bank of Shi-talakkhya River. Twoki was allegedly murdered because of his father’s role as the member secretary of the election conducting committee of Salina Hayat

Ivy, who defeated rival Shamim Osman in the Narayanganj City Corporation election.

In yesterday’s press brie� ng, activ-ists of Twoki Moncho also alleged that Narayanganj has become a den of mur-der, extortions and crimes after Sham-im Osman and Nasim Osman became lawmakers.

“After they [Shamim Osman and Na-sim Osman] became MPs in an unop-posed election, on the one hand they are threatening the activists of Twoki Moncho and on the other hand they are intervening the investigation and trial process of Twoki killing,” Halim Azad, member secretary of the Moncho said in a written statement.

Speaking at the press brie� ng, noted cultural personality Kamal Lohani said despite assurance from the premier, the killers were yet to be brought to jus-tice even though 13 months had passed since the killing.

He added that although the prime

minister showed generosity in other issues, people were not satis� ed with her role in addressing the Twoki murder issue.

“She [prime minister] had said she needed Shamim Osman for her party…. Can she not make some compromise for an innocent teenager like Twoki? Is

she not a mother?” Lohani asked. He said that if the killers of Two-

ki were not punished, one day people would seek accountability from the government.

Manzurul Ahsan Khan, adviser to the Communist Party of Bangladesh,

said the failure to punish Twoki’s mur-derers was sending a message to other criminals that murderers did not have to face punishment.

He said the government must take strict action against all criminals irre-spective of their partisan loyalty. l

5NewsDHAKA TRIBUNE Wednesday, April 9, 2014

PRAYER TIMES Fajar 4:27am Sunrise 5:41am Zohr 12:00am Asr 3:28pm Magrib 6:17pm Esha 7:33pm

Source: IslamicFinder.org

Source: Accuweather/UNB

F O R E C A S T F O R T O D A Y

Dhaka 35 25Chittagong 32 25Rajshahi 40 23Rangpur 36 23Khulna 36 24Barisal 34 25Sylhet 33 21Cox’s Bazar 32 25

D H A K ATODAY TOMORROW

SUN SETS 6:18PM SUN RISES 5:42AM

YESTERDAY’S HIGH AND LOW37.4ºC 21.2ºC

Rajshahi Srimangal

WEATHER

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 9

RAIN LIKELY

Cities not ready to manage migration, reveals an Oxfam study n Ahmed Zayeef

Migration from villages to cities con-tributes rapid urban growth in Bangla-desh that poses serious threats to urban disaster since the cities are growing vi-olating urban development principles and standards, says a new study.

The study conducted by Oxfam states that while the rural people, af-fected by joblessness, migrate to the cities for better living, a large section of them have poorer living.

The cities are not prepared to better manage them.

The international NGO has revealed the study � ndings yesterday at a work-shop on urban disaster risk reduction based on the disaster vulnerabilities of Dhaka, Rangpur,  Khulna, Mymens-ingh, Sirajganj, Mongla Port, Kurigram and Durgapur.

The workshop took place at Spectra Convention Centre in the city.

According to the study, over 4.4 crore people which is 29.1% of the total population of now are now living in the urban areas.

It was only 15% in 1981 and 23% in 2001.

Within the next decade, the number could rise to 6.5 crore, as of the UN pro-jection, says the study.

Analysing last 10 years’ poverty in-cidence gap between rural and urban areas, the study says: “The poverty in-

cidences in disaster-affected or adja-cent urban areas increased than rural areas, but in non-affected areas, the urban poverty has reduced in last 5 years.”

Citing the example of  Khul-na  and  Barisal  divisions where urban poverty has increased rapidly after the cyclones in 2007 and 2009, the study states that such natural disasters are pushing people to the urban areas.

“Such trend will go up. So, if we do not handle rural-urban migration in a planned way, vulnerabilities in the cities will be serious threats,” AKM Ma-munur Rashid, a disaster risk reduction specialist, said while presenting the study.

He said the existing urban land-use planning did not consider urban haz-ards in their planning and guidelines.

Only the recent Detailed Area Plan (DAP) of  Dhaka  city has considered � ood and water-logging issues, while the building code is considered be-cause of earthquake and � re hazard, he said.

“However, implementation of the DAP and the building code still remains a big challenge to implement for the city,” he added.

Disaster Management Minister Mo-fazzal Hossain Chowdhury Maya said presently more than 90% of the minis-try’s allocation was spent for humani-tarian assistance, “but reducing risks is

now becoming more important.” He assured of settling these issues

in consultation with other ministries concerned.

Prof Mahbuba Nasreen, Prof AQM Mahbub and Prof Dr ASM Maksud Ka-

mal, Department of Disaster Manage-ment Director General Mohammed Abdul Wazed, European Commission representative Abdul Awal and Oxfam Country Director Snehal Soneji also spoke at the function. l

RU BCL postpones inde� nite strike n RU Correspondent

Bangladesh Chhatra League (BCL) Rajshahi University unit yesterday postponed its inde� nite strike on the campus till April 29 demanding the im-mediate arrest of Rustom Ali Akond’s killers, a BCL leader who was alleged-ly killed by Islami Chhatra Shibir (ICS) operatives in his dormitory room last Friday.

BCL leaders also threatened tougher action if their demands were not met by April 29, at a press conference held at the university central cafeteria at 2pm.

BCL RU unit President Mizanur Rah-man Rana said they had postponed their inde� nite strike for the sake of students after discussing it with the university authorities, police o� cials and the central BCL committee.

BCL yesterday observed its strike for the fourth consecutive day since Satur-day, while no classes and examinations were held during the strike on the cam-pus.

BCL RU unit General Secretary Touhid-al-Hossain Tuhin said if their six-point demands, including the ar-rest of ICS RU unit President Ashraful Alam Emon, were not met by April 29, they would declare tougher measures on campus.

Other demands by the BCL include � nancial assistance for Rustom Ali’s bereaved family, banning Shibir’s pol-itics on campus, suspending all Shibir

cadres involved in earlier attacks on BCL men including Faruk Hossain who was allegedly killed by Shibir activists on February 8, 2010; ensuring security of students on campus and holding an election for RU Central Students Union (RUCSU).

Rustom was a fourth year student of Political Science and acting general secretary of BCL Shaheed Shuhrawardy Hall unit. He was shot dead in his room last Friday.  He was also a candidate for the post of president in the upcoming hall unit council, slated to be held on April 10.

Students of the Political Science de-partment held a mourning ceremony and a discussion at the department in the morning and demanded justice for Rustom as soon as possible.

BCL also held a mass signature cam-paign in front of the central library in support of their demands yesterday morning. 

Sharmin Akhter, a magistrate of Ra-jshahi Chief Metropolitan Magistrate court yesterday granted a one-day re-mand for two Shibir men detained last Sunday. Police had asked for seven days of remand, Ziaur Rahman, o� -cer-in-charge of DB, said.

The detainees were ICS Dashmari unit Finance Secretary Sanaullah Jacky and Khurshed Alam, an ICS activist.

“There was no more arrest in con-nection with the murder and police were trying to arrest the masterminds of the Rustom murder,” he also said. l

Youth held for uploading photo showing beating female classmate n Ashif Islam Shaon

Police have arrested a teenage boy who allegedly uploaded photos and a video on Facebook showing him beating his female classmate.

According to the police, one of the accused’s friends recorded the video and took the pictures during the inci-dent.

The teenager was arrested from in front of Purbachal City on Sunday night and was produced before a Dhaka court on Monday.

Mashroof Hossain, assistant commissioner in the cantonment zone of Dhaka Metropolitan Police, told the Dhaka Tribune that a Facebook page titled “Moja losss?” posted the photos of the boy slapping the girl, aged around 16, in December last year and administrators of the page sought help from its followers to � nd out the boy.

A few days later, they published the video as well.

“The video showed that the teen-age boy, who was wearing school uniform, slapped the girl on a road. Someone was recording the video,” he said.

“During investigation, we came to know that the boy and his friends re-corded the video and took snaps of the incident. The girl, who came from a poor family, was previously a good

friend of his and the boys planned to harrass her as she had been avoiding the boy. They spread the video on the Internet, and ‘Moja losss?’ picked it up,” he said.

“The video came to our notice a few days back and consulting with high of-� cials, we decided to nab the boy. With the help of the Facebook page’s admin panel members, we traced him. We also spoke with a few locals who personally knew the boy,” he added.

During primary interrogation, the teen admitted to his involvement and said he was wrong.

He had slapped the girl on October 2 last year.

The incident came to the concern of their school teachers and the mat-ter was settled in an arbitration by the school committee, he said.

The victim’s family � led a case un-der Section 10 of Women and Children Repression Prevention Act with Khilk-het police station on Monday in this connection.

When asked whether the o� ence of uploading objectionable photos and videos should go under the Informa-tion and Communication Technology Act, Mashroof said under the act an ac-cused can be awarded up to seven-year imprisonment and Tk1 crore � ne, which is huge for a teenager.

“The plainti� considered his age,” he said. l

Demonstration continues over Saad killing n Our Correspondent, Mymensingh

Hundreds of agitating students contin-ued staging demonstrations for the 8th consecutive day yesterday, protesting the killing of Saad Ibne Momtaz, a stu-dent of Fisheries Faculty of Bangladesh Agricultural University.

The students also organised a cul-tural programme including recitation of poetry and verses written remem-bering Saad.

The agitating students held a rally at the altar of Bijoy’71 monument on the campus in the afternoon in favour of their demands, including arrest of Saad’s killers, and to make their names public, cancellation of their student-ship and permanent expulsion of the accused from the university. 

The programmes included protest

procession, ‘mass signature collec-tion campaign’, and formation of hu-man chain, candle lighting on Bijoy’71 premises and drawing paintings on the campus.

The students have been continuing di� erent programmes protesting the death of Saad since April 1.

All academic activities remained suspended since the incident, the BAU sources said.

Saad, 21, a � nal year student of Fish-eries Faculty of BAU and organising secretary of BCL Ashraful Haque Hall unit, was killed in an attack by friends who are also BCL men on April 1.

Meanwhile, police received post-mortem report from Mymensingh Medical College and Hospital regarding the death of Saad yesterday. Quoting the report, o� cer-in-charge of Kotwali

Police Station Golam Sarwar said, Saad died of due to liver collapse and brain hemorrhage following merciless beating.

Earlier on Monday, teachers of Fish-eries Science Faculty of BAU at a press conference expressed solidarity with the demands placed by the general students. The teachers also expressed no-con� dence over the six-member probe committee formed to investigate the killing of Saad.

A six-member probe body formed headed by Prof Dr Mohsin Ali of Fisher-ies Faculty of BAU to investigate into the killing of Saad will submit its report at the meeting tonight, campus sources said.

Earlier, BAU authority served show cause notices on Sujoy and Rukon asking them to reply by April 7 but they replied the notices, informed the proctor. l

Chittagong DB detains drug peddlers, seizes illegal rickshaw chargers n Tarek Mahmud, Chittagong

The Detective Branch of Chittagong Metropolitan Police yesterday evening nabbed � ve drug peddlers and � ve oth-ers with 165 battery-run rickshaw char-gers from several shanties at Motijhar-na area of port city.

“Acting on a tip-o� , a DB team con-ducted a drive at the area and nabbed � ve noted drug peddlers who were smuggling drugs into the port city for

a long time,” CMP Detective Branch Ad-ditional Deputy Commissioner Babul Akhter told the Dhaka Tribune.

Meanwhile, detectives also arrested � ve persons involved in charging bat-tery-run rickshaws illegally, he added. They also found 165 chargers from their possession.

The arrestees and the recovered items were handed over to Khulshi police station and two separate cases were lodged with the police station. l

One held with stolen fabric in Chittagong n Tarek Mahmud, Chittagong

Detective Branch (DB) in Chittagong Metropolitan Police (CMP) early yester-day arrested an employee of a covered van company with 752 pieces of fabric of shirts stolen from Chittagong city’s Boropol area.

Babul Akhter, additional deputy commissioner of DB in CMP, said a DB team had nabbed the employee, Mo-hammad Rahim, from the area with the stolen fabric around 5:00am after halt-ing the covered van while it was com-ing from the capital city to the port city with the facrics.

He also said the covered van com-pany, Taher Company, brought 312 car-tons of fabric of shirt from a readymade garments factory of Beximco Group for exporting those to the USA.

Rahim stole the pieces of fabric from the cartons and it would hurt the coun-try’s goodwill, the additional deputy commissioner said.

The intelligence agency suspected that the covered van company might be behind the stealing of fabric worth Tk20 lakh while they are investigating the matter, added the additional com-missioner.

The arrestee and recovered fabrics were handed over to Halishahar police station and a case was lodged with the police station in this connection. l

Washing factory � ned in Gazipur for pollutionn Our correspondent, Gazipur

The Department of Environment (DoE) yesterday � ned Tk 12 lakh to a washing plant in Gazipur for polluting the envi-ronment.

DoE Assistant Director Mohammad Ha� jur Rahman said the owner of Five Ocean Washing Limited was � ned after a magistrate court found out that he had shut down the factory’s e� uent treatment plant (ETP) and had been dumping hazardous chemicals on a nearby canal. l

Ra� ur Rabbi, father of Twoki, addresses a press conference at the National Press Club in the city yesterday RAJIB DHAR

Potatoes smuggled with help from border guards Hundreds of Lalmonirhat border families dependent on smugglingn Our Correspondent, Lalmonirhat

The smuggling of potatoes to India through Mogholhat border in Lal-monirhat Sadar upazila is going strong because of negligence of Border Guard Bangladesh.

According to sources, at least 1,000 sacks of potatoes (one sack contains 80 kg) are smuggled to India everyday where 200 local people are engaged in the business.

Border people alleged that the BGB men and other law enforcing agencies were involved in the smuggling.

In anonymity, boatman at Kashem Ali Boat Ghat at Nagortari char village said: “Potatoes are smuggled to India from Bangladesh dawn to dusk every day.”

“At least 200 people living at di� erent bordering villages are involved carrying the smuggled goods to India by bicycle and they use boat for crossing the Dharla River,” he said.

Nurnabi Islam, a smuggler at Na-gortari char village said he had got Tk40 for transporting one sack of po-tato from Mogholhat Bazar to Gidaldah Bazar in India.

“I transport two sacks in a trip and I can do four trips from dawn to dusk every day,” he said.

“At least 300 families in the area de-pend on smuggling to make a living,” said transporter Karim Miah of Sole-man Tanti char village.

“We transport potatoes from Bang-ladesh to India with the vigilance of Indian Border Security Force.

They never obstruct us and they assist to load potatoes in the Indian truck,” said a transporter in the condi-tion of name not to be published.

“Border Guard Bangladesh at Mog-holhat company camp get Tk10 against each sack of potatoes,” he added.

Many people including Abdul Hanif, Ha� zar Rahman, Taherul Islam in the border village alleged the price of potato had increased sharply in the local markets as the potatoes were smuggled.

Bangladesh could earn revenue if these potatoes were exported to India in legal way.

But unabated smuggling is depriv-ing revenue to the government, they said.

A group of smugglers and BGB men were earning windfall pro� t in smuggling potatoes to India, they added.

Bordering sources said, a kg of po-tatoes was being sold at Tk 16 in India while smugglers purchase a sack for Tk

9 in Bangladesh. After bearing all expenditures, the

smugglers make a pro� t a Tk 3 against each kg of potato.

The local farmers get fair prices but the consumers have to face a price hike.

Smuggler Mazibar Rahman said lo-cal farmers get fair prices and hundreds of families earned their livelihood by smuggling as they do not have other option to main their livelihood.

Commander of Mogholhat BGB

camp Nayek Subedar Shamsul Alam said: “BGB’s vigilance was lax on pota-to-smuggling to India for the interest of the farmers.”

The BGB did not enjoy bene� t in this regard, he said. l

6 NationDHAKA TRIBUNE Wednesday, April 9, 2014

Sindurmoti fair held in Lalmonirhatn Our Correspondent, Lalmonirhat

The entire Sindurmoti village under Lalmonirhat Sadar upazila wore a festive look yesterday as a daylong Sindurmoti fair was held with the participation of both Bangladeshi and Indian devotees.

During the fair, devotees prayed at a temple and took bath in Sindur-motipond as they believe that water of Sindurmoti pond would bring peace and purity to their life.

Tight security has been taken sur-rounding the fair venue to ensure safe-ty for the pilgrims, said Aslam Khan, additional SP inLalmonirhat.

The convener of the Sindurmoti Fair Celebration Committee Atul Chan-draRoy said the historical Sindurmoti fair had begun about 300 years back.

“People from both Hindu and Muslim communitiesof the villagehelp the district administration to celebrate the fair in peacefuland festive manner every year,” he said, adding that the historical Sindurmoti pond is going to turn into a tourism spot in Rangpur region.

Debendra Nath Roy, 59, who came from district town to have bath in the pond, said: “I have been attending the Sindurmoti fair for the last 32 yearsto get peace and purity in my life.”

“In my childhood I came to the fair with my parents. We really get men-tal satisfaction after taking bath in the pond,” said another devotee Asutosh Saha, 55.

The Deputy Commissioner of the district Habibur Rahman said Sindur-moti was heritage and religious site of Hindu community.

As a large number of Hindu devo-tees came from di� erent places to join the fair, the district administration took tight security in and around the fair venue. l

Rural Magura � nally gets OMS rice n Our Correspondent, Magura

People living in the rural areas of Magu-ra are � nally going to enjoy the bene� ts of open market sale (OMS) of rice.

This is the extention of the OMS pro-gramme for rice launched on February 2 by Magura district food o� ce, which had been selling rice in the district’s municipal area only.

Following the constant demand for the facility by the rural population, the government body decided to stretch out the programme to the upazilas, starting yesterday.

Sources at the district food o� ce said they had started selling rice under OMS in three upazilas: Shalikha, Moham-madpur and Sreepur. Under the OMS programme, everyone would be able to purchase 5kg rice every day at Tk24 a kg.

Abdul Kuddus, a day labourer from Durgapur village under Sreepur upazila, said: “I buy 5kg rice every day. Before, I had to spend Tk190 for that rice, but now I can get it at Tk120 because of OMS. We are very happy because of OMS rice.”

Golam Rabbani, a rickshaw van puller from Ghama village under Mo-hammadpur upazila, said: “We were de-

prived of the OMS rice as it was available only in the municipalities earlier. It was not possible for me to go all the way to Magura, which is 35km away from my home, to get OMS rice spending Tk80 as conveyance. Now, I can easily purchase the rice from the upazila headquarter, which is only 3km from my house.”

When contacted, Abdul Kadir, Magura district food controller (act-ing), said: “We have started selling rice under OMS in the upazila level. We are getting good response in this regard as rural people are showing high interest here.” l

Upazila chairman sent to jail n Our Correspondent, Barisal

A Pirojpur court rejecting bail prayer yes-terday ordered to send the newly elected BNP-backed chairman of Nazirpur upa-zila jail for violence during hartal.

Local sources said the BNP-backed candidate Nazrul Islam Khan contested in Nazirpur upazila on February 27 for chair-man post when he was detained in jail.

Nazrul was elected chairman from jail by defeating AL-backed candidate Abdul Malek.

After released on bail, he took oath as Nazirpur upazila chairman at the of-

� ce of Barisal divisional commissioner Barisal on March 25.

As per direction of the High Court he appeared before a court yesterday.

Satyabrata Shikdar, judicial magis-trate of Pirojpur, however, rejecting the bail prayer ordered the newly elected chairman Nazrul Islam Khan to send jail.

Nazrul is one of the 88 accused in another case lodged with Nazirpur police station by Nazirpur upazila AL president Abdul Jabbar against politi-cal violence during the BNP-led oppo-sition alliance enforced hartal on Octo-ber 28, 2013. l

Man attempts suicide after killing wife, sonn Our Correspondent, Khulna

A man took poison after murdering his wife and son at Kazimosa village in Pai-kgachha upazila early yesterday.

O� cer-in-Charge of Paikgacha po-lice station Kazi Kamal Hossain said Dipak Das had chopped his wife Anima Das,35, and son Sajib Das,7, to death with a sharp weapon at one stage of a brawl around 3:30am, leaving them dead on the spot.

Later, he took poison in a bid to end

his life. Neighbours found him on his yard in the morning and informed po-lice about the matter.

Police arrested Dipakand took him to upazila health complex under their custody. Police also recovered the bod-ies and sent those to Khulna Medical College Hospital morgue for autopsy.

The OC quoting neighbouring peo-ple said Dipak had been frustrated for a long time because of economic hard-ship. The couple had often locked into heated quarrels over the issue. l

33 illegal Malaysia goers held from Bay of Bengal n Our correspondent, Cox’s Bazar

Members of Bangladesh Coast Guard in a drive arrested 33 people from the Bay of Bengal near Saint Martin in Teknaf upazila here yesterday while they were brought to Malaysia illegally.

However, details of the detainees could not be con� rmed immediately.

Being tipped-o� , a patrol team of coast guard conducted a drive in south-eastern area of the bay three nautical miles o� Saint Martin Island around 4pm and arrested the 33 from a Malaysia-bound � shing boat, said Lieutenant colonel Harun-ur Rashid, station commander of Teknaf Coast Guard.

During the drive, � ve crew members were detained from the boat.

A case would be � led in this regard against the alleged brokers, crew and owner of the boat, the commander added. l

Highway patrol attacked by robbers, one shotn Our Correspondent, Dinajpur

A robber was shot by Kotwali police in Basherhaat, Dinajpur when robbers attacked highway patrol police on the Dinajpur-Rangpur highway at 2am yes-terday.

Police shot the robber, named Ab-dul Khalek, in the leg when the robbers tried to steal weapons and a motorcycle from the patrol police.

They also recovered eight sharp weapons and ropes used for robbery from the scene. Khalek was admitted to Dinajpur Medical College Hospital for treatment.

Altaf Hossain, inspector at the Kotwali police station, said a group of 15-20 rob-bers had set up a barricade with ropes on the highway for robbery.

When they attacked the highway patrol, Sub-inspector Abdul Aziz PPM and Assistant Sub-inspector Shariful Alam received minor injuries after fall-ing from a running bike.

Hailing from Dinajpur’s Boroil vil-lage, Khalek is the leader of an inter-district robbery group. There are 10 cases � led with Kotwali police stations accusing him of murder, robberies and more, all under investigation.

He is currently being interrogated for information on his accomplices. l

Mud-made school a danger to studentsn Our Correspondent, Natore

A school made of mud at Dahia village in Singra upazila here has been run-ning for 42 years, posing a security risk to the lives of students during the rainy season.

The tin-shed school named Dahia PGD High School has over 300 boys and girls, which was established in 1973 with the initiative of locals and came under MPO (Monthly Pay Order) in 2002.

Sources at the school said the school has remained in this vulnerable situation

for long due to government fund crunch.Arif, a class-VIII student, and class-X

student Fahima said they were not able to sit in their classrooms during any kind of rain or stormy weather as water enters there through the walls.

The clay-made walls start trembling in storms and that is why they have to leave the school during such times, they claimed.

Fahima also termed their common room un� t to use specially during tif-� n period, saying they did not � nd any solution even after repeated appeals to the headmaster and other teachers.

Headmaster of the school Wazed Ali and assistant headmaster Bazlur Rahman blamed the higher authorities concerned for the problems despite frequent appeals to improve the condi-tion of the school.

Khoyer Uddin, president of the man-aging committee of the school, con-� rmed the matter, saying he informed the problems to the local MP several times, but his e� ort was in vain.

Locals and guardians of the school urged the government to allot ade-quate money to turning the school into brick-made one. l

300 trucks stranded at Ilisha ferry ghatn Our Correspondent, Bhola

Over three hundred watermelon-laden trucks have remained strand-ed at Ilisha ferry ghat on the Barisal-Bhola- Lakhsmipur route over the Meghna river in the district for the last few days due to ferry shortage.

The farmers carry goods to many parts of the country including the capital city through the ferry ghat .

According to sources, only two K-type smaller ferries are now on service on the route.

But they are plying slowly caus-ing long tailback.

This has caused great su� erings to traders, truck drivers and em-ployees who have to spend more than what they earn to manage their daily meals.

Perishable goods, includ-ing fruits and vegetables already started to rot, truck drivers said.

Because of this phenomenon, wa-termelon farmers are going to incur losses Tk 10 crore as their fruits ru-

ined due to tailback. Many farmers were admitted

to hospitals following heart attack as fear of incurring losses griped them.

When contacted, the ferry mas-ter Tajul Islam said the problem could not be solved only with the two small ferries.

He was not con� rmed when the vehicles could reach their destina-tion.

He demanded more ferries to solve the problem. l

Bordering people carry potatoes to India through Mogholhat border in Lalmonirhat Sadar yesterday DHAKA TRIBUNE

The photo taken yesterday shows that some watermelon-laden trucks get stranded at Elisha ferry ghat on the Barisal-Bhola- Lakhsmipur route because of ferry shortage DHAKA TRIBUNE

When they attacked the highway patrol, two police personnel received minor injuries

The mosque on the complex of the Moyez estate COURTESY

7Feature Wednesday, April 9, 2014DHAKA TRIBUNE

n Chowdhury Abd-Allah Quaseed

In the years after the partition, in 1950, the house played host to the National Science and Industrial fair once again, and the chief guest of the event was

the governor general of combined Pakistan, Khawja Nazimuddin, who was accompanied by many important cabinet members.

This would surely be an event that house would detail about, as it would about the 1951 All Pakistan Literary conference arranged by all three sons of Moyezuddin jointly, which brought together literary elites from all prov-inces of Pakistan, and was chaired by the illustrious Dr Muhammad Shahidullah.

The house could further tell of how the meetings deciding the nomina-tions for the 1954 Jukto Front Elec-tions were also held over the 42 person sitting capacity dining table of the home, as the 2nd son of Chowdhury Yusuf Ali Mohon Mia was heading the nomination committee, followed by narration of all the winners of that sweeping election of Jukto Front being invited for a celebratory feast with guests that had included Bongobond-hu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and Suhrawardy as well. The house would also surely mention being used as the venue for the 1962 All Pakistan Social Welfare Conference.

The house, if it could speak, could tell of all the times that people such as Maulana Tomizuddin Khan (central cabinet minister of Pakistan and Speaker of Central Parliament), Humayun Kabir (a central cabinet minister of India from the days of Nehru), Bongobondhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, Sher-e-Bangla Fazlul Hoque and Suhrawardy (both provincial chief ministers and or governors of Bengal/East Pakistan at various times, and Prime Minister Mohammad Ali and eminent leader Maulana Bhashani would come as frequent guests to the house and discuss so many political strategies. Some of them also stayed at the house on a number of occasions. Surely the house wouldn’t forget to mention the visit of President Ayub Khan who came soon after taking control of Pakistan as its chief martial law administrator.

The house could also talk about Poet Jasimuddin reading out his early manuscripts here before going for publication; of Abbasuddin (famous folk singer) performing live for a large audience; about Su� Motahar (� rst Bangla sonnet writer) who composed several of his best sonnets seated in the dining hall of this very home. And surely the house would talk about the excitement when as recent as in the 1980s, the greatest writer of contem-porary Bangla literature, Humayun Ahmed came with one of the grand-children of Moyezuddin and stayed for a weekend.

The house could also depict how Moyezuddin had wedded Halima Begum, weighing her on a pan balance against 55kg of gold as her den mohor; about the wedding of Moyezuddin’s sons and daughters, where up to 10,000 guests were made to dine under canopies illuminated by giant gas lamps; of many other weddings that took place with members of other aristocratic families of the time, bringing in guests from Nawab fami-lies of Dhaka, Comilla, Boalmari, and from the families of the Zamindars of Dagonbhuiya, Talma, Gerda, and from the family of Haji Sharituallah of Bahadurpur, and many more.

The stories would not be complete without talking about the � reworks, musical performances, even circuses, taking place within the home-grounds.

The house could talk about the en-tourages that would accompany the Maharajas of Ullapara, Muktagacha, Bhawal, Dighapatia and Bordhoman, when they would come for meetings with Chowdhury Moyezuddin or to pay in their tributes to him for the estates that they held jointly with him. Annals about the long lines of people entering through the high arched gateway to deposit the in kind items of the annual tributes coming in from far � ung corners of Bengal across which Moyezuddin’s estates were scattered, would also gain the interest of listeners.

Gold, as strange as it may sound, was indeed so abundant, that once a discarded rusted iron safe had been found lying near the pond, inside one drawer of which several gold bars were discovered. The story of 7 pitchers of gold coins being buried underground

in one of the family’s estate o� ces near the river being washed away in � ood is a story that may sound incred-ible, and yet is true, and would surely not have been omitted. Yes, this was a strange home where fantasies merged with reality.

The house could also tell of when Moyezuddin would gather his army of 20,000, and people of the town in the grounds lying across the road from the house, which used to be open land back then, and infuse them with � ery motivational speeches for which he was renowned; and of the times when he would ride into battles and skirmishes with his troops.

The mosque standing in the grounds would tell how Moyezuddin would arrange to protect, on the way back, all those who came to pray and how he would give incentives to for having the courage to come and pray in a town where Muslims at the time were a marginalised, and often oppressed, minority. The mosque would tell of how it was the � rst mosque of the town and the place where the � rst Jumma was o� ered and the � rst azaan was recited.

Stories of how the Saints of Jaunpur and Enayetpur would come and preach the Su� version of Islam from these very colonnaded verandas would be nice to hear as well. The house could narrate about the qul khawani Chow-dhury Moyezuddin on December 26, 1923, when 200 oxen were sacri� ced to feed the quarter of a million guests who had gathered to o� er dua for the salvation of his soul. And how that led the way to starting of the practice of Eid-al-Azha in Faridpur town.

The house wouldn’t forget to state how the home was equally welcoming to all Hindus and people of other reli-gions too, who formed the majority of Moyezuddin’s work force and manage-ment team as well, making the home, and all it stood for, an outstanding example of secularism.

The house could testify that it was not one of those typical zamindar palaces – all somber and grim as por-trayed in the stereotypical stories and novels. It was a house which was full of life and where every day was like a festival. There would be numerous an-ecdotes to share about 27 of Moyezud-din’s grandchildren living and growing up here, with over a dozen more grandchildren through his daughter staying here half the time, making the house like a constant playground.

The house would sadly remember that it used to be called the house that never slept, for even at the oddest hours of the night, at least a few dozen of the family members or sta� would be awake, swimming or boating in the pond, or enjoying an all night barbecue, not to mention the ever vigilant contingent of sentries, patrolling about, many of whom were former soldiers of the famous Gurkha regiment and some guards from fara-way Abyssinia, feared by all for their formidable size and physique.

The house would recount the ceremonies held to mark the starting of schooling of the children, which in-

cluded the feeding of honey with gold dust, a combination called mokord-hoch and the ceremonial coronation of sorts every 3 years, when the title of Motwali or chief administrator of the estate would be handed from one son of Moyezuddin to the other. The house would surely include in its narratives about the dozens of friends and the private tutors of all the grandchildren o Moyezuddin, thronging the premises all afternoon every day.

The house would talk of the enormous kitchen that rivaled the size of that of a hotel’s, where a team of cooks and assistants would make 4 or 5 meals a day, for over 200 people, and an additional feast for visitors, guests, way farers, and peasants. The house would speak of how life in it was noisy. How in addition to all the activities, there would always be people listening to the gramophones and radios, and family members trying their skills on the piano in the drawing room.

It would tell how the kids would often organise elaborate fancy dress parties and dramas where they would garb themselves as legendary characters of history. And about how dexterous in sports most of the members of the family were, and of the tons of cups and trophies won by the sons and grand-children of Moyezuddin for tennis, golf, hockey, badminton, cycling, cricket and athletics. Some family members, even played on the national team in the 1960s, managing to hold their position among the dominant line up of then West Pakistani players and many a times the national cricket or hockey teams came and stayed in Moyez Manzil ac-cepting the hospitality of the family.

This house would talk about how it was the � rst house to have electricity in Faridpur in 1933, and how it was the venue for so many entertaining poet’s duels where they would argue and quarrel in rhymes, and of times when di� erent groups of family members were going for picnics and hunts or river cruises in the family’s exclusive steamships and houseboats almost every other weekend. The house would share, that family members and guests would frequently challenge each other in shooting competitions using various kinds of ri� es or even ancient muskets of which many shelves and cabinets were adorned. The house would talk about the many times when British o� cers of the government of high importance had visited, and how they had become

awestruck at the grandeur and splen-dor of the life style.

But the house would also share memories of tragedies, like of the times when Moyezuddin died, and his sons, and their wives, one by one over the years, each time plunging the house into woe and mourning by the hundreds of thousands of people gathering over a few days, to attend their funerals and burials.

It would talk of times of anguish,

such as of all the times that Lal Mia the eldest son of Moyezuddin, was taken away as a prisoner many a times, from the grounds of the house, by the British government for his anti colo-nial political activities. It would also tell you about the horrors of the time when the Pakistani government in one of its repressive endeavors attempted to seal the house and con� scate all its belongings, stripping the house bare. The house would tell you how the great leader Suhrawardy himself defended the family in court and after the victory, apparently everything was returned, but many things were dam-aged beyond repair, and many were returned only on paper.

The house would also share with you, the memories of anxious uncer-tainty during the war of independence of 1971, when everyone had to aban-don the home, and trudge through knee deep mud to faraway places seeking refuge from the carnage. The house would share with us all the pain it su� ered as it helplessly watched while so many of the beautiful an-tiques were so daftly taken away or

damaged. The house would also tell with pride, how as narrated by Foyez, the sub sector commander of Faridpur, of how the front lawn of the house was used as a venue by the liberation forces to call the enemy to surrender in the eve of 16th December, 1971.

Nevertheless, if indeed the house could share its emotions and speak, it would surely weep today seeing its present plight and contrasting it with its own glorious experiences of the past. It would recount with shame how some members of the family had so many of the carved designs on the walls chiseled o� , how so many of the descendants of the great lord made extensions or renovations at some place or the other using garish modern designs that contrast with the traditional architecture. The house would lament how the descendants of Moyezuddin sold, or gave away so many of the furniture and artifacts or carried them o� to their new homes in Dhaka, leaving the Moyez Manzil all denuded and bare.

It would not be able to contain within its brick and stone heart, the woe of seeing that almost no one lives at this home, except for some family members visiting weekly and some occasionally. The house would call out for help to stop the descendants of the great lord who made it, from selling away fragments of the open lands around the house, on which new purchasers have begun to construct horrifying multi storied monstrosities. Indeed the house would weep and wish for help.

But sorrow, joys, pride and shame, all combined, if indeed the house could speak, it would tell the story of this land, and it would be a story that generations of those who love the history of the country and of Bengal, would love to hear recounted to them again and again. l

Chowdhury Abd-Allah Quaseed is the founder of a non-partisan democracy promoting youth focused organisation called Force of Tomorrow, and the creator of a number of development oriented TV programmes, a columnist, and an HR professional in a leading local organisation.

If the house could speakThe concluding part of the story on a house that holds a treasure trove of stories, history and anecdotes in its region

The house would call out for help to stop the descendants of the great lord who made it, from selling away fragments of the open lands around the house, on which new purchasers have begun to construct horrifying multi storied monstrosities

Gold, as strange as it may sound, was indeed so abundant, that once a discarded rusted iron safe had been found lying near the pond, inside one drawer of which several gold bars were discovered

An early 1940s photograph showing the original form of the mansion COURTESY

Wednesday, April 9, 2014DHAKA TRIBUNE World8

Progress in electrical stimulus for paralysisn AFP, Paris

Scientists yesterday reported progress in a technique to stimulate the lower spinal cord in paraplegics to help them recover lost nerve function.

Cautiously tested on a single patient three years ago, the technique has been trialled on three other young men who had been paraplegic for at least two years after road accidents, they said.

After the patients were given an implant to stimulate nerve bundles in the lower spine, they were able to voluntarily � ex their knees and shift their hips, ankles and toes, the team reported in a published study.

The four were not able to walk but could bear some weight independently -- a key phase towards this goal -- and experi-enced a “dramatic” improvement in well-being, they added.

Claudia Angeli of the University of Louis-ville’s Kentucky Spinal Cord Injury Research Center (KSCIRC) said two of the men had been diagnosed not only as paralysed in the legs, but also lacking lower-body sensation, with no chance of recovery.

“This is groundbreaking for the entire � eld and o� ers a new outlook that the spinal cord, even after a severe injury, has great potential for functional recovery,” Angeli said in a press release.

Paralysis comes from damage to the

spinal cord down which the brain sends electrical signals along nerve � bres to in-struct limb movement.

Decades of experimental e� ort have been devoted to reconnecting severed � bres through surgery or regrowing them through drugs or stem cells.

The new research takes a di� erent route, exploring the idea that there are ways paralysed people can move without reconnecting the nerve link between the brain and lower extremities.

It delivers tiny electrical signals to networks in the lumbosacral spinal cord that are relatively autonomous -- they can follow through the commands for weight-bearing and coordinated stepping without input from the brain.

“We have uncovered a fundamentally new intervention strategy that can dramat-ically a� ect recovery of voluntary move-ment in individuals with complete paralysis, even years after injury,” said Susan Harke-ma, a University of Louisville professor who was involved in the � rst study, in 2011.

“The belief that no recovery is possible and complete paralysis is permanent has been challenged.”

The implant went hand-in-hand with rehabilitative therapy, which aimed at getting the spinal network to learn and improve nerve functions with less stimula-tion over time. l

UN warns of drought crisis in Syrian AFP, Geneva

The UN’s food aid agency warned yes-terday that Syria was facing a drought that could put millions of people’s lives at risk, compounding the impact of years of war.

“WFP is concerned about the impact of a looming drought hitting the north-west of the country – mainly Aleppo, Idlib, and Hama – with rainfall less than half of the long-term average and potentially major impacts on the next cereal harvest,” said World Food Pro-gramme spokeswoman Elisabeth Byrs.

“This could put the lives of millions at risk if the drought continues,” she told reporters.

Byrs said there were huge concerns about the drought’s impact on Syrian agriculture, given that irrigation sys-tems and farm machines have already been hit by the war. In addition to fears for the cereal sector, there are also wor-ries over the impact of water shortages on livestock farming.

“All this comes together to give a picture of a situation that isn’t going to get better,” Byrs said. l

Russia wants Ukraine’s east represented in talks to resolve crisisn AFP, Moscow

Moscow said yesterday it was ready to take part in talks with Brussels and Washington over the future of Ukraine but insisted the ex-Soviet country’s Russian-speaking east and south be represented in the negotiations.

“Indeed we are ready to consider a multi-party format in which the Euro-peans, the United States, Russia and the Ukrainian sides are represented,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told reporters.

“We are in favour of Ukraine’s south and east being represented in such talks.”

Russia’s top diplomat suggested that

some of the candidates set to run in May 25 snap presidential elections and repre-senting Ukraine’s pro-Moscow east and south could take part in the talks.

On Monday, Washington said it wants within the next 10 days to see four-way talks between Washington, Russia, Ukraine and the European Union to � nd a way to calm tensions in the east of Ukraine.

Over the past few days, pro-Krem-lin activists have seized government buildings in several cities in Ukraine’s east, declaring independence and vow-ing to vote on splitting from Ukraine.

Russia has argued that the only way to calm tensions would be for Kiev

authorities to conduct constitutional reforms to give the Russian-speaking regions more independence through federalisation.

Lavrov lamented that the “consti-tutional reform was being prepared in secret” and said Russia wanted to see a draft of Ukraine’s new constitution before the crisis talks. He dismissed Western accusations of Moscow bank-rolling the unrest in Ukraine’s east. “I will leave these statements on the con-science of our American partners.”

Russia has accused Washington of fomenting the pro-Western popular up-rising that ousted Moscow-backed Pres-ident Viktor Yanukovych in February. l

Ukraine clears protesters in eastern cities, stando� elsewheren Reuters, Kiev/Donetsk

Police detained 70 pro-Moscow protest-ers occupying a regional administration building in  eastern  Ukraine  overnight, but others held out in a stando� in two further cities in what Kiev says is a Rus-sian-led plan to dismember the country.

Ukraine  says the seizure of public buildings in its mainly Russian-speak-ing industrial heartland on Sunday night is a replay of events in  Crimea, the  Black Seapeninsula  Moscow  an-nexed last month.

Interior Minister  Arsen Avakov  said protesters in the town of Kharkiv had been cleared in a lightning, 18 minute “anti-terrorist” operation, pinning re-sponsibility for the building’s occupa-tion on Russian leader  Vladimir Pu-tin and Ukraine’s ousted Moscow-backed president Viktor Yanukovich.

“All this (in Kharkiv) was inspired and � nanced by the Putin-Yanukovich group,” said Avakov.

NATO warned Moscow yesterday of “grave consequences” to its relation-ship with the West if it intervened fur-ther in Ukraine.

But Russian Foreign Minister  Ser-gei Lavrov  dismissed U.S. accusa-tions that  Moscow  was destabilis-ing Ukraine, saying the situation could improve only if the interests of Russian speakers were taken into account. {ID:nL6N0N01NW]

The pro-Russian protesters have been demanding that referendums be held on whether to join Russia like the vote, dismissed by the Kiev and West as illegal, that endorsed  Crimea’s re-turn to rule by Moscow.

An aide to Avakov said police went

in when the Kharkiv protesters failed to give themselves up and surrender their arms. No shots were � red by the police, although some had been from the other side and a grenade was thrown, he said. One police o� cer was badly wounded and some others less seriously hurt.

The stando� however continued in the mining centre of Donetsk - Yanu-kovich’s home base - where a group of pro-Russian deputies inside the main regional authority building on Monday declared a separatist republic.

Ukraine has been in turmoil since late last year when Yanukovich rejected closer relations with the  European Union  and tilted the former Soviet republic back towards  Moscow. That provoked mass protests in which more than 100 people were killed by police and which drove Yanukovich from of-� ce in February, leading to Kiev’s loss of control in Crimea.

Police say that in a third protest in the city of Luhansk pro-Russia activists inside the main state security building have seized weapons.

There was no clear sign that further police operations were imminent in these two cities. “We hope the build-ings occupied in Donetsk and Lu-hansk will soon be freed,” acting presi-

dent Oleksander Turchinov said.Numbers of protesters involved

appear to be small and Ukrainian na-tionalists, who believe the operations are being coordinated from  Russia, say protesters occupying the buildings have been helped by the inaction of corrupt local police.

In Donetsk, steel-and-energy ty-coon  Rinat Akhmetov,  Ukraine’s rich-est man, is mediating with the pro-testers, but he may have complicated the plans of the authorities by publicly urging authorities not to use force as a solution.

But authorities may anyway have decided not to tempt action by  Mos-cow and hold back and wait for the pro-tests to � zzle out.

The West has expressed concern about what it says has been a build-up of Russian forces along the border with  Ukraine.  Moscow  has said the troops are merely taking part in exer-cises but NATO Secretary-General  An-ders Fogh Rasmussen urged caution.

“If  Russia  were to intervene further in  Ukraine  it would be a historic mis-take,” he told a news conference in Paris. “It would have grave consequences for our relationship with Russia and would further isolate Russia internationally.”

Lavrov denied responsibility for the trouble in Russian-speaking areas of Ukraine. “One should not seek to put the blame on someone else,” he told a new conference in Moscow.

“We are deeply convinced ... that the situation cannot be calmed down and changed into national dialogue if the Ukrainian authorities go on ignor-ing the interests of the southeastern regions of the country.” l

Pro-Russian activists who seized the main administration building in the eastern Ukrainian city of Donetsk deploy a � ag of the so-called Donetsk Republic and hold a Russian � ag AFP

‘If Russia were to intervene further in Ukraine it would be a historic mistake’

A member of Iraq’s security forces stands guard during a religious gathering in the central Shiite shrine city of Najaf. Attacks in Iraq left 12 people dead yesterday while security forces said they killed 25 militants near Baghdad amid worries insurgents are encroaching on the capital weeks ahead of elections AFP

Israel, Palestinians still at odds as US reviews peace pushn AFP, Ramallah

Israeli and Palestinian negotiators re-mained at odds yesterday on how to salvage teetering peace talks as Wash-ington prepared to review the scale of its involvement in the troubled process.

The two sides met US envoy Martin Indyk late on Monday and are to meet him again on Wednesday, a Palestinian source told AFP.

But amid growing US frustration at the reluctance of either side to com-promise, Secretary of State John Kerry was to discuss with President Barack Obama whether to continue investing the same amount of time and political capital in a peace e� ort being under-mined by the actions of both sides.

“There are still di� erences between the Israeli and Palestinian positions, and the Americans are making great e� orts to overcome the di� culties,” a Palestin-ian source close to the talks told AFP.

A US o� cial con� rmed the lat-est meeting. “Gaps remain but both sides are committed to narrowing the

gaps,” he said.Senior US o� cials have rejected

the idea that Obama intends to pull the plug on the peace push, saying he deeply appreciates the intensive shut-tle diplomacy Kerry has invested in it over the past 15 months.

Despite Kerry’s e� orts, the talks have made no apparent headway since they resumed in July with the stated goal of agreeing a framework peace deal by April 30.

With recriminations and tit-for-tat moves multiplying on both sides, the prospects of their continuing beyond that date look increasingly unlikely.

At the end of March, Israel refused to release a � nal batch of Arab prison-ers the Palestinians had been expecting to be freed under the terms of the talks resumption.

In response, the Palestinians re-neged on their own undertaking to refrain from pursuing alternative ave-nues for recognition of their promised state, applying last week to adhere to 15 international treaties. l

EU court rules against requirement to keep data of telecom usersn Reuters, Brussels

The European Union’s highest court ruled on Tuesday that an EU directive requiring telecoms companies to store the communications data of EU citi-zens for up to two years was invalid.

“The Court of Justice declares the Data Retention Directive to be invalid,” the court said in a statement.

The data-retention directive was in-troduced in March 2006 after bombings

on public transport in Madrid and Lon-don. The aim was to give the authorities better tools to investigate and prosecute organised crime and terrorism.

It required telecoms service provid-ers to keep tra� c and location data as well as other information needed to identify the user, but not the content of the communication. The records were to be kept from six to 24 months.

Austrian and Irish courts asked the European Court of Justice to rule if the

law was in line with the Charter of Fun-damental Rights of the EU. The law also caused a public outcry in Germany.

“The Court takes the view that, by requiring the retention of those data and by allowing the competent nation-al authorities to access those data, the directive interferes in a particularly serious manner with the fundamental rights to respect for private life and to the protection of personal data,” the court said. l

Germany outlaws ‘Hezbollah fundraising group’n AFP, Berlin

German authorities banned a group yesterday accused of raising money for the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah and staged raids across the country on homes and o� ces used by the organi-sation.

Around 150 police o� cers searched premises across six states and con-� scated cash, computers and around 40 boxes of � les.

Two bank accounts with a total of around 60,000 euros were frozen but

no arrests were made, the German in-terior ministry said.

The ministry said it had outlawed the “Waisenkinderprojekt Libanon” (Orphan Children Project Lebanon) with immediate e� ect.

“The name of the group masks its actual purpose,” ministry state secre-tary Emily Haber said in a statement.

She said the organisation based in the western city of Essen had raised 3.3 million euros ($4.5 million) in do-nations between 2007 and 2013 for the Lebanese Shahid Foundation, an “inte-

gral” part of Hezbollah.It said the funds were used to recruit

� ghters “to combat Israel, also with terrorist measures” and compensate the families of suicide bombers.

The European Union in July last year also listed Hezbollah’s military wing as a terrorist organisation.

Hezbollah, which brands itself a re-sistance movement against Israel, was formed in 1982 by Iran’s Revolutionary Guards and was the principal actor in ending Israel’s occupation of southern Lebanon in 2000. l

Turkey PM renews pledge to crackdown on rivalsn AFP, Ankara

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, emerging triumphant from last weekend’s local polls, renewed his pledge of war against rivals he blames for illegal wiretaps and graft claims tar-geting his allies.

“All the culprits will go before the law,” Erdogan said in his party’s � rst par-liamentary meeting since last Sunday’s elections that gave the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) sweeping wins. “We will not forgive these kinds of vile acts, this treason. Our people have given us a mandate to � ght them.”

His remarks came just after Turk-ish authorities yesterday raided sev-eral homes in the southern city of Ad-ana and detained eight police o� cers over the wiretapping scandal that has rocked the country for weeks.

Erdogan has accused the associates of Fethullah Gulen, a Turkish cleric living in self-exile in the United States, of forming a “parallel state” within the Turkish establishment and instigating a graft probe that ensnared key govern-ment allies in mid-December.

The scandal has played out with a spate of wiretaps and social media leaks implicating Erdogan in graft and exposing high-level security talks weighing military action in Syria. l

VIOLENCE AGAIN

9Wednesday, April 9, 2014DHAKA TRIBUNE World Afghan election provokes more than 3,000 complaintsn Reuters, Kabul

Afghan authorities have received more than 3,000 reports of violations from last weekend’s presidential election, ex-ceeding the tally following a 2009 vote that was marred by widespread fraud.

But just half the 3,103 complaints registered so far will be investigated, a complaints commission spokesman said, since the rest were reported by telephone and lacked the required sup-porting evidence.

The three frontrunners have all com-plained of fraud in the April 5 vote meant to usher in Afghanistan’s � rst democrat-ic transfer of power, as incumbent  Ha-mid Karzaiprepares to step down after more than 12 years as head of state.

Midnight on Monday was the dead-line for reporting fraud and any irregu-larities, but the � nal � gure is expected to rise as reports � ow into Kabul along with ballot boxes from around the country.

A � nal tally could take days to be-come available, since observers, vot-ers and other parties all had means to lodge complaints at polling stations.

“As soon as we get them, it is clear the � nal number is going to increase,” said  Nader Mohseni, spokesman for the  Independent Election Complaints Commission. “We cannot ignore the fact that during the elections, there were in-stances of fraud and electoral violations.”

More than 2,000 complaints were investigated during the 2009 elections, which were tarnished by fraud that led to more than a million votes being scrapped.

Complaints against election commis-sion sta� made up 772 of the 1,573 com-plaints backed by documents this time round, with another 573 aimed at pro-vincial council candidates, while presi-dential hopefuls faced 228 complaints.

Afghanistan held provincial council elections the same day. l

Beleaguered Thai PM pleads for justice, fair treatmentn Reuters, Bangkok

With legal cases against her mount-ing, embattled Thai Prime Minis-ter  Yingluck Shinawatra  pleaded yesterday for fair and proper treat-ment from the  national anti-cor-ruption commission  and  Thailand’s Constitutional Court.

Thailand’s political crisis looks set to enter a new, potentially turbulent phase as Yingluck faces at least two legal cases that could see her removed from o� ce in coming weeks, a move that is likely to jolt her supporters in to action and bring the country closer, some fear, to civil strife.

“I ask that the  Constitutional Court  and National Anti-Corruption Commision use fair treatment when they deliberate the cases against me. I ask for the same treatment that past political o� ce holders have received,” Yingluck told reporters in Bangkok yesterday.

Her supporters have accused the Constitutional Court of bias in fre-quently ruling against the government. They also question the speed with which the  National Anti-Corruption Commission  (NACC) has pursued her over a failed government rice subsidy scheme. The scheme has run up huge losses and left hundreds of thousands of farmers unpaid.

Yingluck has been charged with dereliction of duty in overseeing the cash-draining scheme that helped bring her to power in 2011 on a wave of support from rural voters.

Should the commission forward the case to the Senate for possible im-peachment, Yingluck, who is nominal-ly head of the  National Rice Commit-tee, would be suspended from o� cial duties. Any decision could take weeks.

Last week the  Constitutional Court  accepted a new case against Yingluck over her removal of the na-tional security chief three years ago. She has been given 15 days to mount a defence. l

Elusive ‘pings’ keep MH370 search in limbon AFP, Perth

Ships listening for undersea signals from Flight MH370 have failed to detect any more “pings” and will spend several more days trying to pinpoint a crash site before a mini-sub is launched to scour the seabed, searchers said yesterday.

Exactly one month since the Boeing 777 vanished with 239 people on board, optimism over the earlier signals in the Indian Ocean dimmed, with time run-ning out to detect further signals as the batteries in beacons on the jet’s black box data recorders reach their expiry date.

“We need to continue (listening) for several days to the point at which there is absolutely no doubt that the pinger batteries will have expired,” said search chief Angus Houston.

A day earlier, Houston had labelled “very encouraging” the signals picked up by a specialised US Navy device towed deep underwater by the Austra-lian vessel Ocean Shield.

If the transmissions can be recap-tured and con� rmed as emanating from the Malaysia Airlines plane’s data recorders, technicians are poised to deploy a submersible drone, the Blue-� n-21, far o� western Australia.

The US-made device uses sonar to scan the sea� oor for possible crash debris. The plane mysteriously van-ished March 8, diverting en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing for reasons unknown. The search is focused on a 600-kilometre (370-mile) arc of the re-mote southern Indian Ocean.

The Ocean Shield is criss-crossing an area where satellite data indicates the plane may have gone down, trying to home in on the signals.

‘Many, many, many days’ “If we go down there now and do the visual search it will take many, many, many days because it’s very slow, very painstaking work to scour the ocean � oor,” Houston said.

If the Blue� n-21 detects something, it can resurface and be sent back down with a video camera to seek visual evi-dence of a crash.

Families of MH370 passengers in Bei-jing marked the one-month anniversary with a tearful candlelit vigil Tuesday, still in agonising suspense as they await evidence of the fate of their loved ones.

“We’ve been waiting and holding on here for already 31 days,” said Steve Wang, one of the relatives.

About two-thirds of the 239 people on board were Chinese.

Selamat Omar, a Malaysian whose 29-year-old son Khairul was on board, held on to improbable hopes that he might still be alive.

“Until they can � nd the black box or the wreckage I will hold on to the belief that the passengers are safe,” he said.

Taking it to the limitBut a daunting task lies ahead, espe-cially if the pings cannot be reacquired to narrow the search area.

The 4.5-kilometre (nearly three-mile) depth of the ocean � oor is the absolute operating limit for a Blue� n-21, which is designed for deep-sea surveying.

Ocean Shield, which earlier picked up two series of pulses, one lasting two hours and 20 minutes and the other 13 minutes, is operating at the northern end of the de� ned search area. The Chi-nese ship Haixun 01 and Britain’s HMS Echo are working the southern end. l

MH370 hunt to be most expensive in aviation history n Reuters, Sydney

The hunt for missing Malaysian Airlines Flight MH370 is on track to cost hun-dreds of millions of dollars, becoming the most expensive search in aviation history with 26 countries contributing planes, ships, submarines and satel-lites to the international e� ort.

A month into the search for the jet, estimates compiled by Reuters show that at least $44 million has already been spent on the deployment of military ships and aircraft in the Indian Ocean and South China Sea by Australia, China, the United States and Vietnam. The � g-ure is based on defence force statistics

on available hourly costs of various as-sets, estimates by defence analysts and costs reported by the Pentagon.

The � gure for the � rst month of the search is already about equal to the of-� cial 32 million euros spent in searches lasting several months spread over a two-year time frame for Air France’s Flight AF447, which crashed into the Mid-At-lantic in 2009. Just as salvage experts said the actual costs for the Air France operation could have been three or four times higher than the o� cial � gure, the bill for the current search is expected to run into hundreds of millions of dollars.

The $44 million estimate for MH370 does not cover all the defence assets

being used by countries including Brit-ain, France, New Zealand and South Korea, nor numerous other costs such as civilian aircraft, accommodation for hundreds of personnel and expenses for intelligence analysts worldwide.

Angus Houston, the retired Air Chief Marshal in charge of the Australian-led international search, said on Friday he would give an overall estimate of the cost at a later date. “It’s a lot of money.” Malay-sian government source, who declined to be identi� ed as he was not authorised to speak to the media, said the entire search and recovery for MH370 could be at least double the money spent to recover the black box from Air France’s AF447. l

Paci� sts rally against Japan’s plan to soften commitment to paci� smn AFP, Tokyo

Some 3,000 people rallied yesterday in a Tokyo park against government plans to soften Japan’s constitutional com-mitment to paci� sm and give its mili-tary a more active role.

The protest came after a national opinion poll showed growing public op-position to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s push to bolster his nation’s military.

He has argued that Japan needs to reinterpret its post-war paci� st consti-tution to permit “collective defence” -- coming to the aid of an ally under attack.

That is not allowed under current readings of Article 9 of the US-imposed document, which says Japan forever

renounces the use of force as a means of settling international disputes.

Previous governments have held that this means Japan’s military may only open � re if � red upon, even if that entails leaving US counterparts in dan-ger on the same battle� eld.

“By exercising the collective self-de-fence, Japan will directly participate in a war,” Nobel Literature laureate Kenz-aburo Oe told the rally.

“I’m afraid that Japan’s spirit is ap-proaching the most dangerous stage over the past 100 years,” Oe said before the demonstrators were due to march in central Tokyo.

The liberal Asahi Shimbun reported that a poll of more than 2,000 adults

nationwide showed 63 percent oppose the concept of collective defence.

That was up from 56 percent last year and more than double the 29 per-cent who support the idea.

The percentage of those against re-vising Article 9 rose to 64 percent from 52 percent, the paper said in the poll published Monday.

Abe’s drive to strengthen the mili-tary provokes disquiet in China and on the Korean peninsula, where memo-ries linger of Tokyo’s brutal expansion-ism last century.

However, his position is welcomed in Washington, where there have long been calls for Japan to pull its own weight in a very one-sided security alliance. l

Gloves o� as BJP woos the Hindu vote in northern Indian Reuters, India

India’s main opposition party, tipped to form the next government, appears to be returning to its Hindu nationalist roots at the start of a � ve-week general election, raking up divisive issues and using strong language in an area hit by religious riots.

Criss-crossing the country for months before the � rst phase of voting began on Monday, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its candidate for prime minister, Na-rendra Modi, had mainly campaigned on a ticket of better governance, economic development and job creation.

But just hours after voting started, the election commission demanded an explanation from Modi’s chief aide Amit Shah, accusing him of incendiary

speeches in towns where dozens of people, mostly Muslims, were killed in Hindu-Muslim riots last year.

“It is not anyone’s hobby to riot. When justice is not done to all the par-ties and the action is one-sided action, then the public is forced to come out in the streets,” Shah said in the town of Muza� arnagar in Uttar Pradesh state last week, according to a transcript pro-vided by the commission.

In a series of speeches in the area, Shah also said voters should reject parties that put up Muslim candidates. He said Muslims in the area had raped, killed and humiliated Hindus.

Shah did not respond to requests for comment, but the BJP has said he was within his rights to ask people to  ex-press their anger through the ballot box.

India’s 1.2 billion people include 150 million Muslims, who form a sizeable minority in Uttar Pradesh, the coun-try’s most populous state and a key electoral battleground.

The riots in Muza� arnagar last year started with a minor scu� e, which were exacerbated by in� ammato-ry speeches by several  local politi-cians, news reports have said.

Although sectarian rioting is on the decline in India, it is still hit by spasms of Hindu-Muslim violence. Hundreds of thousands of people were killed when colonial India was divided in 1947 into Hindu-majority India and Pa-kistan, an Islamic state.

Elections in India are also times of heightened tensions because  political parties often pitch for votes on the ba-

sis of religious identity.On Monday, the BJP released its

election manifesto, promising to build a temple on the site of a mosque torn down by Hindu zealots more than two decades ago, reopening one of the most divisive issues in the country. The par-ty also said it remained committed to withdrawing the special autonomous status for Jammu and Kashmir, India’s only Muslim-majority state.

Darker sideOpinion polls have said Modi is favorite to form the next government after re-sults are announced on May 16, thanks to a strong campaign highlighting his economic competence in running the western state of Gujarat for 13 years.

But critics say he has a darker side

and accuse him of failing to stop the killing of Muslims in riots in Gujarat in 2002. Modi has denied the accusations and the Supreme Court has said there is not enough evidence to prosecute him.

A survey released by respected pollsters CSDS last week showed the BJP and its allies winning the largest number of seats but falling short of a majority. The decision to play on reli-gious sentiments may be a last-minute attempt to woo some blocs of Hindu voters, analysts said.

Shah is a controversial � gure, who was charged in 2010 with the extra-ju-dicial killing of Muslims accused of ter-rorism when he was the interior min-ister in Gujarat. But the BJP said the charges are trumped up at the behest of the Congress party. l

Arvind Kejriwal slapped againn Agencies

Arvind Kejriwal was slapped yesterday by a man during a roadshow in Sultan-puri area of north west Delhi in second such attack in four days. The AAP leader immediately held BJP responsible for it.

The man identi� ed as Lali, an au-torickshaw driver, � rst garlanded Ke-jriwal and then slapped him following which the attacker was thrashed by AAP supporters. AAP leader Manish Sisodia tweeted that Kejriwal was in-jured in his eye. Kejriwal’s spectacles fell on the ground following the attack.

The 38-year-old attacker, a resident of Aman Vihar in Outer Delhi, has ac-cused Kejriwal of not ful� lling prom-ises made to the auto-drivers. He was later detained by the police.

“I do not understand why some people resort to violence for becoming the Prime Minister. If you think we will keep quite after being attacked, you are wrong. We will � ght this battle till the last breath,” Kejriwal said. Later in a tweet, Kejriwal said, “I am just think-ing - why am i being repeatedly at-tacked? Who r the masterminds? What do they want? What do they achieve?”

The AAP leader headed for Rajghat after the attack which has been con-demned by both BJP and Congress. l

Sonia declines to show US court her passportn Agencies

Claiming that the government of India denied her permission to disclose her travel records contained in her pass-port, Congress President Sonia Gandhi has refused to provide a copy of her passport to the US court and has in-stead given up her plea contesting the personal jurisdiction of the court in a rights violation case � led against her in US.

The Federal Court for the Eastern District of New York on 20 March or-dered Sonia Gandhi to give a copy of her passport “to corroborate her oth-erwise-unsupported declaration stat-ing that the defendant was not in the United States at the time of service of summons - September 2 to 9, 2013.”

Sonia said: “In matters of disclo-sure of my travels which are con-tained in the passport document, the Government of India has informed me that they would not permit such a disclosure.

Sonia Gandhi is facing a riots viola-tion case � led by US based rights group Sikhs For Justice and two survivors of the massacre. l

A fragment from a narrative relief depicting Rishis from Myanmar, part of the exhibit ‘Lost Kingdoms: Hindu-Buddhist Sculpture of Early Southeast Asia, 5th to 8th Century,’ is seen at a preview at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. The exhibition will be presented at the Metropolitan Museum of Art from April 14 to July 27 AFP

A Chinese relative of passengers on the missing Malaysia Airlines � ight MH370 cries as she prays at the vigil in Beijing. Family members of the passengers held a tearful vigil in the early hours of Tuesday to mark one month since contact with the plane was lost AFP

‘LOST KINGDOMS’

Obaidul: Auto-rickshaw fare won’t be hikedApril 2

Saad Hassan Hasib What did they mean by “they will not harass passengers” when they do it daily?

Unless they all stick to meter rates, none of this makes any difference. Especially as the communications minister did not comment on the issue.

Nazmul Khair Who cares about that so-called fare? Every-body has to pay as per the drivers’ demand. The minimum fare is Tk100 for 2 km, which is ridiculous. Seems as if these CNGs can be used by only the well-o� or those who have a healthy income with other bene� ts. For the rest of us, travelling by CNG auto rickshaw is a dream in general, and a nightmare during emergencies.

Who gained what?April 2

zia hashanNice writing and analysis.

DBThe AL, I believe, won fraudulently. It seems that democracy and democratic elections in our country are facing a bad loss. Who knows if this will ever change. Doesn’t seem like it.

Zia’s presidency: Tarique’s claim surprises UKApril 2If Mr Alam’s account is true, it only reveals the state minister’s shockingly amateurish conduct in his meeting with the “delegation” from the UK. As for the supposed “arrest warrant” against Tare-que Rahman in the future, this is only proof of the unrelenting political victimisation of the Zia family.

Ronnie

US irked by Bangladesh’s stance on CrimeaApril 1It’s better for Bangladesh to remain “neutral.”

Mir Ahmed AB Siddiquee

SC stays Rana Plaza owner’s bailApril 2Well done your lordships! You are in harmony with popular sentiments.

WaliulHaqueKhondker

EC blames � eld level o� cers for failure in containing polls violenceApril 2Buck passing? What actions has the EC taken against those returning o� cials (ROs) thus far? It was a 5-stage election and the EC had more than enough of its own o� cers to act as return-ing o� cers but at the AL leader’s instructions, they opted to recruit civil servants as ROs to facilitate rigging while its discredited chief � ed.

Indigo

Obaidul: This poll was fairer than everApril 2Fairer? I used to think this minister was reason-able, but his comment on the upazila polls has shattered that image. He is just like every other politician for whom party matters more than the country.

deep purple blue

Employment after graduationApril 2

MikeyI agree with the fact the people of our country definitely need to change their mentality when it comes to judging a person by his/her employment status. The social pressure makes the fresh graduates unable to think out of the box. The young people need to have faith in their abilities to figure out their own unique career paths.

Zero-Agenda Mikey: Add to that the rigid social construct (at least for this country) of only certain jobs/em-ployment being deemed “acceptable,” and you get your answers to why most graduates � nd themselves trapped in the box you speak of.

Take an objective approach to tari� sAs before any budget, there are con� icting interests for the

government to balance.For instance, domestic fridge manufacturers are calling

for higher duties on imported fridges, while fridge retailers are calling for a reduction.

We believe it is essential for the government to take an objective approach towards tari� reforms, and for it to generally support reducing all tari� s, in line with the goal of reducing trade barriers and encouraging free trade.

The interests of consumers are best protected by the government facilitating a free and fair market for goods and services. As domestic manufacturers of fridges are already successfully managing to increase their production, while demand for imported fridges is currently decreasing, there isn’t a strong case to protect local refrigerator manufacturers by increasing import duties on fridges.

Indeed, there are many products on which reducing import duties could actually meaningfully help local manufacturers and consumers. The Bangladesh Electrical Merchandise Manufacturers Association’s request for lowering duty on raw materials for making switch and sockets would be a good example.

Similarly, the government’s promise in February to allow duty-free imports for � re and building safety equipment would clearly help to reduce costs for the RMG sector, as it undertakes the remediation and relocation of garment factories.

Lower duties on the import of raw materials for manufacturing and export industries should generally be encouraged. Tari� reforms should be kept in a downward direction and targeted to make sense for consumers and producers alike.

BRTA must uphold tra� c laws for all

The Bangladesh Road Transport Authority (BRTA) acknowledges that there are at least 88,000 un� t motor vehicles plying the roads of Dhaka city.

Besides, auto-rickshaws, cars, buses and trucks which require � tness certi� cates from the BRTA, there are also an unknown number of two-wheeler motorbikes which are yet to come under mandatory rules to have � tness certi� cates.

A culture of unregulated road tra� c is taking an immeasurable toll on the environment, and adding to safety concerns in our already congested metropolis. Although, out of the 8 lakh vehicles legally registered in the capital, only around 10% is estimated to consist of un� t vehicles, safety risks for all drivers and pedestrians are worsened by lax enforcement of driving and safety regulations.

The BRTA is entrusted with the task of registering vehicles and providing and monitoring � tness certi� cates to motor vehicles. It must do more to stop un� t and uncerti� cated motor vehicles from causing damage and adding to congestion.

While the government was right to recently raise the issue of foreign missions, which have been violating rules on the use of vehicles procured under tax-free facilities this move only addressed a fraction of the vehicles on the road, which are currently violating the law.

Police and government should work better with the BRTA to enforce rules and standards consistently. Tightening up the conduct of the BRTA and freeing it from corruption or undue in� uence is vitally urgent. The police and BRTA need to be tougher in enforcing standards for everyone.

Editorial10

www.dhakatribune.com

DHAKA TRIBUNE Wednesday, April 9, 2014

LETTER OF THE DAY

CALVIN AND HOBBES

PEANUTS

Letters to the Editor

Be HeardWrite to us at: Dhaka Tribune

FR Tower, 8/C PanthapathSukrabad, Dhaka-1207

Email us at: letters.dt@dhakatribune.com

Send us your Op-Ed articles:opinion.dt@dhakatribune.com

Visit our website: www.dhakatribune.com

Come join our Facebook community: https://www.facebook.com/DhakaTribune

Unregulated road tra� c is taking an immeasurable toll

Consumers are best protected by the government facilitating a free and fair market

Rural garment villages good for the nationApril 7

The government is providing 500 acres of land at Baushia, Munshiganj to set up a garments village. In light of this news, I would like to ask the government to revive the decision of setting up garment and knit factories throughout rural areas in Bangladesh. A huge number of unskilled and unemployed men and women throughout the nation will then get to work in factories near their homes, without having to travel to Dhaka or rent a room there. The money they save could be put towards ful� lling other needs. The shortage of workers in the garment and knitting factories will be solved in this way.

The garment and knit industries are major foreign currency earners and have contributed to enhancing gross domestic product as well as per capita income. But the industry has tremendous potential to devel-op further and garments villages are the next obvious step.

Md Ashraf Hossain

Crossword

Sudoku

CROSSWORD YESTERDAY’S SOLUTIONS

ACROSS1 Flower (5)5 Slow of understanding (4)8 Dwellings (6)9 Danger (5)10 Dumb (4)11 Singer (5)12 Obscure (3)15 Tidings (4)18 Growl angrily (5)21 Corded fabric (3)22 Building cover (4)24 Labour (4)25 Stratum (5)28 Nullify (6)29 Prejudice (4)30 Looks after (5)

DOWN1 Two-footed animals (6)2 Rowing implement (3)3 Date of death (4)4 Burrowing animal (4)5 Wicked spirit (5)6 Taker of excessive interest (6)7 Strong alkaline solution (3)13 At home (2)14 Yachting station (6)16 Us (2)17 Glittering particles (6)19 Acting parts (5)20 Behold! (2)23 Horizontally level (4)24 Bath (3)26 Consumed (3)27 Japanese monetary unit (3)

How to solve Sudoku:Fill in the blank spaces with the numbers 1 – 9. Every row, column and 3 x 3 box must contain all nine digits with no num-ber repeating.

SUDOKU

11Op-Ed Wednesday, April 9, 2014DHAKA TRIBUNE

n Mohammad Ali Sattar

It is election time for the larg-est democracy in the world. This time it happens to be the largest elections ever held in any country, with a record number of

voters set to exercise their right to cast their ballots.

The mind-boggling arrangements, pre and post-polls situation, the ever changing colours of the parties in the fray, and the unpredictability of the political players make the scene rather interesting. Although the largest de-mocracy is not necessarily a believer in a “practicing” democracy, it heats up the political atmosphere of the region and the world.

Since India has apparently been a rising power in the region, the party in power bears quite an importance in global forums.

But a democratic and secular India, so far an ideology painfully forwarded by the Congress party, is now tilting towards those who are strong believers of the communalism and dogmatism of Hindutva.

With the rise of regional parties over the last 60 years, India has wit-nessed a huge change in its political dynamics. The regional parties with strong local in� uence have been wielding in� uence over the centre. The once powerful Congress (still the only recognised party with a national character by far) has been forced for some decades to form an alliance gov-ernment in the centre.

So, the political agenda of the nation is no more under Congress’ dictation. It has gone into the hands

of small parties spread all over the country.

Moreover, Congress has been su� er-ing from a leadership crisis since the death of Indira Gandhi in 1984. Rajiv could not pull o� any major stunts and did not live long enough to further his plans. The biggest national party of the largest democracy had to turn to an Italian lady to help steer the party through the rough waters of Indian politics.

Don’t forget that Indian politics is dotted with veterans of all classes and strict traditionalists. They have secularists with stronger conviction than the hardcore Rama devotees. Sadhus and gurus also make consider-able in� uential groups. And there’s the minority Muslim population who also play a very dominant role in deciding the Muslim ballots.

So it’s not an easy ride in this sce-nario. People like Kejriwal, Anna Haz-are, and Mahadev sometimes emerge as stunts. But they soon melt out and remain as sideliners.

With Congress waning, the BJP stands upright. Its buoyant leadership now believes that Narendra Modi is

the eventual candidate, and is the only choice for the Indians. But interest-ingly, Modi doesn’t enjoy the backing of many of his own colleagues in the party. Advani, the veteran who dreamt of being the prime minister all his life, could not digest that Modi had been chosen as the candidate for the BJP. And many have to say that Modi doesn’t even belong in the BJP in the � rst place. They say BJP is the horse on which Modi is riding to reach Delhi.

From the recent pre-poll counts, BJP appears to be the front-runner and still the most likely to win the majority in the Lok Sabha elections. If that hap-pens, Modi could be ready to be the next prime minister of India.

Asserting himself as a strong believ-er of Hindutva, and promising to ful� l pledges to Hindus in particular bear an uncomfortable tone. Anyone who has been directly involved in the Gujarat massacre of Muslims, and a support-er of the Babri Mosque demolition should be looked upon with concern. His beliefs will be re� ected in the party manifesto and the will spill into the national and international policy of India for the next � ve years if he

becomes the prime minister.Modi had to � ght his way up. From

a small background to the threshold of power, he had to cross many hurdles. Once ditched by the West, Modi now stands tall with hope and circumstanc-es tilted in his favour.

With Modi at the centre, there will certainly be a huge change in Indian internal policies. There will be more political and social moves from the government than in the economic front. However, things won’t be as easy as they seem now. If Modi takes refuge in the smaller parties for a co-alition government, then he might be a little restrained in taking unilateral decisions.

What do the neighbours stand to gain or lose in this transfer of power in India? Bangladesh never gained any-thing positive from the Congress-led government. We have been beset with problems from river water-sharing to border killings.

Maybe the Mujib-Indira days were looked upon as a symbol of friendship and sacri� ce from both sides. But those times are long gone. Things have not improved; rather they have worsened the entire time that Congress was power. With a di� erent party in the centre, we might expect some changes in their approach and we should look for better and more respectable treatment from India. It doesn’t really make any di� erence to Bangladesh if a secular or a communal party is in power in India, as long as we get a fair deal. l

Mohammad Ali Sattar is a journalist and DT columnist.

Does it make a di� erence?

n Shams Quader

Trends, styles, and � avours-of-the-month come and go. When considering the internet savvy,

globally connected, and multicultural youth of Bangladesh, trends, from fashionable to downright random, swoop in and fade away. Whether it’s a new themed café, � ash mobs, gangnam style, smartphones, internet memes – one never knows which trends will stick and which ones won’t.

Every so often, there comes a trend which is practical, relevant, envi-ronment-friendly, and healthy. I am of course talking about the cycling movement which has gripped Dhaka city youth over the past year.

This is not news to anyone who dares to live in our beloved capital. Tra� c jams in Dhaka city has been a major problem over the past decade. Even though the recent introduction of some � yovers and other infrastructural devel-opments give testament to the govern-ment’s acknowledgment of this massive problem, the amount of planning, manpower, and funds needed to reduce tra� c jams signi� cantly in Dhaka city is no simple matter. With huge amounts of time and resources being wasted due to these tra� c jams and associated issues of pollution, an alternative and less complicated solution did not seem likely in the near future.

Along came Mozammel Hoque, an

active life promoter and the founder of a cycling group called BDCyclists. As he shared in TEDxDhaka 2013, Mozam-mel was tired of spending about six hours daily on the road due to tra� c congestion.

He could not a� ord to waste so much time during commutes, so he started cycling to his destinations. Pretty soon, some of his friends and colleagues followed, and in 2011, he founded BDCyclists, a cycling commu-nity dedicated to promoting cycling in Dhaka city.

Their main objective was to help ease pollution and tra� c congestion through cycling, and they aimed to convert 5% of the car-owning crowd of Dhaka city to cycle commuters. People � rst took notice of this community when they organised the Independence Day Group Ride in Dhaka, where more than a thousand cyclists took part.

This cycling trend really took o� . Cycling has been huge in many Eu-

ropean cities (such as Brussels, Paris, and Amsterdam) as well as in some crowded cities of Asia (like Seoul, Beijing, and Tokyo). Even though it became a trend more recently in Dhaka city, the movement caught on fast with more and more college and university students, along with young professionals, choosing to cycle instead of taking rickshaws, CNGs or cars. Specialised bicycle and accesso-ry stores opened up all over the city, along with cafes for bikers, Facebook groups, and apps.

The trend caught on fast. Cyclist community members’ enthusiasm may often be mistaken for cult-like behaviour because of the way they try to in� uence their friends to buy a cycle and join them on their rides. They do seem annoying when groups of cyclists ride through the middle of a main road, queuing up tra� c behind them. But instead of scowling at them, this movement should be nurtured and supported.

There are no speci� c tra� c rules for cyclists. Cyclists use their common sense and stick to the sides when riding on main roads. They often wear helmets, elbow pads, and knee pads and pimp their rides with back and front re� ector lights and a front light.

But they do so more for their own safety rather than for following street laws and regulations. For the safety of the cyclists, and for everyone else on the roads, there should be some prop-

er guidelines or laws regarding cycling, especially on the main roads.

New cyclists should be mentored on the common rules of cycling and the necessary safety precautions. Since cyclists usually ride in groups, which is fun as well as safe given the many dangers that lurk in the streets of this city, the most experienced members of these groups should take the responsi-bility of mentoring newbies.

Bicycle parking stands should be introduced at multiple relevant areas of the city. If bus stands are covered with big company ads, why can’t cycle stands be established through the same model?

Cycling is good for health. The youth of Dhaka city do not usually get a lot of exercise with the lack of outdoor sports facilities, and many of them do not have the time or means to join gyms or dojos.

Therefore, cycling becomes a means for working out while commuting. The practice is also good for the environ-ment, because cycling produces no pol-lution. Given the high pollution levels of this city, any e� ort to reduce it should be acknowledged and celebrated.

Cycling as an alternative way of transportation actively reduces tra� c congestion on the roads. As long as cyclists ride safely with common sense, they can easily and quickly commute to their workplace, classroom, or any destination in close proximity.

Cycling has been a common prac-tice in the rural areas of Bangladesh, as well as in some of the other cities besides Dhaka. But this new trend, which arguably began with BDCyclists, is a movement where the youth of Dhaka city who would have normally travelled via rickshaws, CNGs, buses or cars, are taking up bicycling and are doing so in groups while networking with other like-minded citizens. In a country where the youth are always in constant struggle to cope with various problems, this cycling movement is a sign of hope, proving once again that no matter what the country throws at them, the youth of Bangladesh will always persevere. l

Shams Quader is an academic of media and cultural studies.

n Simon Leitch

The past few months have seen a slow-burn crisis of political legitimacy in Ukraine explode

into protests, a coup, military occupa-tion, territorial annexation, sanctions, war threats, and talk of a new Cold War. From Estonia to Transnistria, rumours now abound that more Russian takeovers are imminent and, given that the Western response to the crisis has been negligible, these fears are justi� able. But how likely is a new Russian annexation, and what could be done about it?

First, it would be best to reiterate a point that I have made elsewhere – Russia was con� dent its actions in seizing Crimea would not cause a war, and it executed its “Crimean maneu-ver” at the time it did because events were � uid and Ukraine and Europe were taken by surprise. Whilst Russia ran the risk of sanctions, it correctly judged that these would be minor because Europeans don’t care enough about Ukraine to pay more on their electricity bills, lose lucrative invest-ments in Russia, or stop receiving Russian money through European � nance hubs.

For a taste of Europe’s attitude to the “crisis” you only have to look at the actions of France – they are still going to sell Russia 1.37bn euros worth of warships alone over the next few years, and have an equally large market in military technology sales. These are not the actions of a particu-larly concerned European power, and we can pull out similar examples of parochial interests across every major European state. We might also say that the USA will be just as half-heart-ed about sanctions and won’t bear the costs alone, whilst it should be obvious that no one is interested in a general war with Russia.

This European-American tolerance of Russian moves could be interpret-ed as a green light for more Russia annexations, but there are limits to European tolerance. Russia recognises this, which is why it went so far to deny it was even occupying Crimea and then put so much stock into the referendum.

Putin’s Russia was treading as lightly as is possible for the metaphorical Rus-sian bear. Simply put, Russia’s concern is this: If sanctions are expanded their impact might not worry Putin’s regime immediately but it will cause trouble for Russia over the next few years.

If Russia seizes more territory soon it must be in Eastern Ukraine, but unlike in Crimea it will not be easy for Russian forces to cross the border and

gain de facto control whilst denying its forces are on the ground. If they were to take Eastern Ukraine it might involve some shooting, which is something Russia would wish to avoid. They gained Crimea because it was easy, because there wouldn’t be shoot-ing, and because it contains Russia’s most important Black Sea base.

Eastern Ukraine doesn’t stack up to such lofty criteria. Although some government reports in the USA and elsewhere indicate that Russian troops could snatch territory in Estonia or Transnistria this would be qualita-tively di� erent and Russia would be running a much higher risk of serious sanctions whilst it is hard to see what it would gain.

All this said, Russia could take more territory in the future if they wish to discount the costs of sanctions and believe that NATO would do nothing more than protest. If this is what happens, it will be the end of NATO’s eastern expansion and possibly result in a contraction. Conversely, if Russia pushes into more territory, and NATO begins even a limited military re-sponse, that forces Russia to relinquish at least some of its gains it will almost certainly result in the expansion of NATO.

It will be interesting to see whether the Ukraine issue makes NATO and the West more or less pro-Ukrainian. Clearly, NATO states don’t feel too strongly about Ukraine, but being humiliated by Russia might reinvig-orate their interest. There is also one consequence of Russia’s seizure of Crimea that no one is talking about. Now that there will be no more Crime-an Russian voters in� uencing elections in Ukraine, there might be a more permanently anti-Russian � avor to the Ukrainian legislature. Likewise, if Russia takes over eastern Ukraine, the resulting rump state of Ukraine will have a decidedly di� erent electoral character than it does today.

Right now, Russian interests and power are expressed through pro-Rus-sians within Ukraine and they act as a democratic handbrake on anti-Russian policy. Paradoxically, should Russia seize more territory in Ukraine it might be risking a big part of its regional in-� uence. If I were in Putin’s shoes right now I would be happy with things the way they are. Crimea in the pocket, NATO humiliated, and Ukraine politi-cally divided – it’s a good week’s worth of work for the Kremlin. l

Simon Leitch is the Editor in Chief, Foreign Policy and International A� airs, for Alochonaa. This article was previously published in Alochonaa.com.

That’s all, folks

Whilst Russia ran the risk of sanctions, it correctly judged that these would be minor

If sanctions are expanded, it will cause trouble for Russia over the next few years

It doesn’t really make any di� erence to Bangladesh if a secular or a communal party is in power in India

Cyclist community members’ enthusiasm may often be mistaken for cult-like behaviour

Ticket to ride

Whether communal or secular, we deserve better AFP

MAHMUD HOSSAIN OPU

n Entertainment Desk

Drama series Maago Tomar Jonyo di-rected by Mahfuz Ahmed will air to-night at 9:20pm on ATN Bangla. The drama is a sequel of Tomar Doyay Bha-lo Achhi Maa which was an acclaimed and popular drama series.

Written by Prosun Rahman, the dra-ma series features popular soap actors such as, Doli Johur, Tanvin Sweety, Runa Khan, Nova Firoz, Orsha, Mita Nur, Dihan, Tamalika Karmaker, Bhabna, Mir Sabbir, Fazlul Rahman Babu, Maznun Mizan and many others.

A group of youngsters are sent abroad by their parents, who sold almost all their belongings in order to � nance their move. But, when the group reach their destination, they � nd that in reality, life abroad is tougher than what they assumed it to be. Their far-fetched dreams of earning a lot of money and becoming rich in a short time seem super� cial and more out of reach as they start to

work and earn a measly amount. But alas, they do not lose hope in the face of adversity and keep on with their optimistic thoughts. They hope to save their earnings for their family and also ex-pects to earn more as time passes and return home to the awaiting arms of their mothers. The families also wait for the return of their children, but it seemed to be a long wait.

Little did this band of workers know the mea-sly savings that they sent home contributed to the overall development of the country. The drama series will focus on the lives and stories of these hardworking expatriates.

EntertainmentDHAKA TRIBUNE Wednesday, April 9, 201412

Prova stars in Ghomta tonight n Entertainment Desk

A new drama series Ghomta will be aired tonight at 8:15pm on Banglavision. Written by Rizwan Khan

and directed by Kaisar Ahmed, the drama features Chanchal Chowdhury, Prova, Dipa Khondokar,

Anisur Rahman Milon, Runa Khan, Dolly Zohur, Wahida Mollik Joli among others.

Ghomta portrays the family relationships and stigmas that are an integral part of our

societies. It shows how a girl is forced to conform to the norms of her in-laws home and what happens if she tries to hold her own ground. The story opens with Runa who gets married to Nasim, a man from a well-o� family. She immediately starts to have problems with her mother-in-law, a conservative and controlling woman. When she faces pressure about covering her head and living her life according to her mother-in-laws wish, she leaves her husband and goes back to live with her parents. Mehanwhile, Prova plays the role of Runa's sister-in-law in the dra-ma and is pursued by Milon's family, who wants a girl with a rich family back-ground for their son.

Preparing to welcome Boishakh with a thousand voicesn Afose Jahan Chaaity

Shurer Dhara, one of the leading mu-sic schools of the country is prepar-ing to welcome Pohela Boishakh – the � rst day of the Bangla calendar – with thousand voices at the open premises of Bangabandhu International Confer-ence Center at the early morning on April 14. The programme titled Hajar-o Konthe Koti Bangali’r Borsho Boron will start at 5:30am and continue till 9am.

Noted Rabindra Sangeet exponent and principal of Shurer Dhara, Rezwa-na Chowdhury Bannya will preside the programme. Shurer Dhara gave an open circulation to recruit singers from all over the country. Singers from di� erent organisations will perform in the pro-gramme, who were selected through a special selection process. The celebra-tion programme will start with a Rabin-dra Sangeet titled Otho Otho Re which will be performed by Rezwana Chow-dhury Bannya and a thousand singers. They will also perform many other tracks including popular folk song Age Ki Shundor Din Kataitam.

Founding member of Shurer Dha-ra, Dipak Paul informed the Dhaka Tribune: “Rehearsals are in full swing

with a thousand singers including stu-dents and graduates of Shurer Dhara. We are accepting celebrated singers, Subir Nandi, Shakila Zafar and Fahmi-da Nabi to perform at the celebration programme as well.”

Shurer Dhara is also preparing for their Chaitra Sangkranti’s (the last day of the Bengali calendar) celebration preparation. With the slogan of Dosh-er Kotha Desher Gaan, the programme will begin at 6pm on April 13 and con-tinue till 12am.

The Chaitra Sangkranti celebration programme will feature the rich history of Bengal. Seven steps of the liberation of Bangladesh including the Language Movement of 1952, the Mass-upheav-al of 1969, the Liberation War of 1971 and others will be presented through songs. Two hundred and � fty students from Shurer Dhara will perform at the Chaitra Sangkranti.

The programme will start with a chorus performance titled Sarthok Jonom Mago Jonmechhi Ei Deshe and will end with the performance of Ohe Doyamoy and Bertho Praner Aborjona Puriye. Rezwana Chowdhury Bannya will also preside the Chaitra Sangkranti celebration programme.

Shawkat Osman rememberedn Hasan Mansoor Chatak

Kothashilpi Shawkat Osman Smriti Parishad arranged a con-ference paying tribute to the eminent writer on April 8 at the Seminar Room of the Public Li-brary in the capital.

The programme opened with the screening of a short � lm titled Ucche Srobar Ucch-abilash directed by Nesar Os-man, son of Shawkat Osman. It focuses on the right of the day-labourers through the symbolic representation of a horse toiling a carriage. As Osman’s writings feature the downtrodden, particularly the disadvantaged community in our country, the � lm tries to portray the miseries, struggle and varied social dilemmas of the community of the country and beyond.

Later, distinguished perso-nas including Masud Ahmed, the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of Bangladesh, Ranjit Kumar Biswas, secretary to the Cultural A� airs Ministry,

Mousuf Ahmed, CEO of Cy-bernet, spoke on the occasion. Tagore exponent and Language Movement veteran, Ahmed Ra� q, presided over the pro-gramme.

Masud Ahmed said: “Os-man’s writings largely highlight messages against fundamen-talism, communalism and ex-

tremism. The writer was not-ed for his political convictions and social perceptions of his works.”

Ranjit Kumar Biswas said: “Osman tried to break the chain of social and political discrimi-nation through his writings. He also tried his best to keep the people of the country united in turbulent times.”

Ahmed Ra� q said: “Osman’s writings carry messages against fundamentalism and narrate stories of the oppressed. Ben-gali nationalism and individ-uality are also noticeable sub-jects in his writings.”

Shawkat Osman’s real name was Sheikh Azizur Rahman. He was one of the leading Bengali litterateurs of the last century. He wrote many novels, short stories, poems, drama, stories and books for children. He re-ceived many awards and acco-lades including Adamji Sahitya Award in 1962, Bangla Acad-emy Award in 1966, Ekushey Padak in 1983 and the Indepen-dence Day Award in 1997.

SAARC artists’ camp begins n Entertainment Desk

The fourth SAARC artists’ camp 2014 titled Solidarity With Nature - A South Asian Perspective will be inaugurated today at the Nilachal, Bandarban. This is the � rst time the programme will take place in Bangladesh. The camp has been jointly organised by the Ministry of Cultural A� airs and Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy and supported by SAARC cultural centre.

In order to bring the people of South Asia closer and to project distinct cultural identity, this year, around forty eight well known artists from 8 countries will participate in the pro-gramme. Twelve artists from Bangladesh are to participate in the camp. Along with a num-ber of high level o� cials, the camp will be graced by Cultural A� airs Minister Asaduzzaman Noor.

On the concluding ceremony on April 11, an exhibition will be held displaying the out-come of the art camp at the National Art Gallery, Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy. Addi-tionally, a 30 feet canvas will be displayed where artists from the SAARC countries has jointly painted. It will be inaugurated today and will be on display till April 12 at the Na-tional Art Gallery, BSA. The exposition will be inaugurated by eminent artist Samarjit Roy Chowdhury.

The creative expressions on canvass of the SAARC Artist Camp was � rst held in 2011 and then 2012 in Colombo, Sri Lanka. The following year, the camp was held at the beautiful islands of Maldives. The camp caters to give young artists an opportunity to exhibit their paintings under the common bond they share as artists from the SAARC region.

Anil Kapoor to launch entertainment company in Dubain Entertainment Desk

Sonam Kapoor’s dad is expanding his businessAnil Kapoor will be launching his new entertainment com-pany, called Antila Ventures, in Dubai. The Bollywood actor told in an interview that the new � rm will contain di� erent verticals, ranging from content creation, � lm making, state-of-art studio, talent management and acquisition to digital media as his gateway to international markets. While ex-plaining his reason for choosing Dubai, the producer said today’s landscape is such that no company can be called a global one if it does not have its presence in Dubai. Dubai is a market for all kind of entertainment which attracts seri-ous investors and only well-structured companies can sur-vive in such an energetic market, he added. Looks like after taking Hollywood and telly land by storm Anil is ready to rock Dubai’s � lm circuits.

n Entertainment Desk

After getting Oscar nomination for 12 Years a Slave, Chiwetel Ejiofor is now the frontrunner to play the villain opposite Daniel Craig in the next James Bond movie.

Sam Mendes is directing the as-yet-untitled Bond 24, which was written by Skyfall scribe John Logan. Craig will return to don the tux-edo, while Ralph Fiennes, Naomie Harris and Ben Whishaw are set to reprise their roles as his boss Mally Moneypenny and gadget guru Q, respectively.

While Ejiofor does not have an o� cial o� er yet and is not in formal talks, he is being eyed for the coveted role and is widely presumed to be the frontrunner amongst the other actors under consideration. Barbara Broccoli and Michael Wilson are producing the movie, which is expect-ed to be in production from November through April 2015. The � lm-makers will soon begin casting two key female roles, including a new Bond girl and a Scandinavian with a troubled past who will serve as a brief love interest for Bond.

Ejiofor recently wrapped Z for Zachariah and will soon begin � lming John Hillcoat's star-studded thriller Triple Nine.

John Abraham plays a killing machine in Rocky Handsomen Entertainment Desk

John Abraham revealed some inter-esting information about his next home production, Rocky Hand-some.

The actor who made a strong ac-tion image through the � lm Force, described Rocky Handsome as “Force to the power of 10.” He add-ed: “This time Nishi (director Nishi-kant Kamath) wants a lean killing machine.”

The � lm is an o� cial remake of South Korea’s highest grossing � lm of 2010 ,The Man From Nowhere. The stylised action-thriller follows the journey of a lone crusader, played by Won Bin, who goes on a murderous rampage against the drug ma� a when the only person he cares for, a seven-year-old girl, is taken from him, along with her mother.

While the original, one of the most critically acclaimed action � lms to come out of South Korea in the last decade, was a gritty piece of cinema, the Bollywood version will be more commercial and will have some song and dance thrown in.

Rocky Handsome rolls in May in Goa and the producers locked Feb-ruary 6, 2015, as the release date. The � lm co-stars Shruti Haasan. l

Maago Tomar Jonyo portrays the struggle of expatriates

Chiwetel Ejiofor to play villain in next James Bond movieChiwetel Ejiofor to play villain in next James Bond movie

The o� cial poster of Ananta Jalil’s upcoming full-packed action � ick Most Welcome 2 has been released recently

Kailash Kher andAli Azmat to perform in Dhakan Entertainment Desk

A tri-nation concert featuring ace singers from India, Bangladesh and Paki-stan—Kailash Kher, Ayub Bachchu and Ali Azmat—is going to be held on April 11 at the Army Stadium in Dhaka.

Grameenphone has organised the concert. The � rst � ve thousand regis-tered Star clients of the company from Dhaka, Chittagong, Sylhet, Rajshahi, Jessore, Comilla, Rangpur, Bagura, Khulna, Barisal, Dinajpur and Mymensingh will get the chance to experience the concert.

Last year Grameenphone successfully organised a similar concert which featured James (Bangladesh), Sonu Nigam (India) and Shaqat Amant Ali (Pa-kistan).

13DHAKA TRIBUNEWednesday, April 9, 2014

Sport 1514 Sri Lanka party marred by player dispute

United wait on Rooney for Bayern clash

15 Don’t crucify Yuvraj for T20 � nal � op: Sachin

Did you know?Last season, Spurs set

a new record of 72 points for a team

� nishing outside the top four, smashing the

previous high of 67

BEST S BATTING BOWLING

MOST RUNS319 Virat Kohli 231 Tom Cooper 224 Stephan Myburgh 200 Rohit Sharma 187 JP Duminy

MOST WICKETS Imran Tahir 12 Ahsan Malik 12 Ravichandran Ashwin 11 Samuel Badree 11 Amit Mishra 10

BEST FIGURES Rangana Herath 5/3 Ahsan Malik 5/19 Ravichandran Ashwin 4/11 Samuel Badree 4/15 Dale Steyn 4/17

LOWEST ECONOMY Mirwais Ashraf 3.50 Sunil Narine 4.60 Rangana Herath 4.60 Ravi Bopara 4.66 Sachithra Senanayake 4.88

BEST AVERAGES Sikandar Raza 7.50 Rangana Herath 8.83 Samuel Badree 10.27 Jimmy Neesham 10.33 Asadullah Shareef 10.50

BEST STRIKE RATES Imran Tahir 10.00 Nadeem Ahmed 10.50 Samuel Badree 10.90 Andre Russell 11.16 Rangana Herath 11.50

MOST DOT BALLS Ravichandran Ashwin 74 Tim van der Gugten 74 Al-Amin Hossain 67 Shakib al Hasan 65 Bhuvneshwar Kumar 64

MOST SIXES13 Stephan Myburgh 12 Glenn Maxwell 10 Virat Kohli 10 Tom Cooper 9 Shakib Al Hasan

HIGHEST SCORES116* Alex Hales 111* Ahmed Shehzad 94 Umar Akmal 89 Mahela Jayawardene 86* JP Duminy

BEST STRIKE RATES210.00 Glenn Maxwell 174.57 Dwayne Bravo 163.29 AB de Villiers 162.35 Ahmed Shehzad 158.09 Alex Hales

HIGHEST AVERAGES106.33 Virat Kohli 101.00 Darren Sammy 75.00 Elton Chigumbura 62.33 JP Duminy 57.75 Tom Cooper

MOST FOURS26 Stephan Myburgh 24 Virat Kohli 22 Tom Cooper 22 Anamul Haque 21 Hashim Amla

Mathew Mendy and Abdullah Al Mamun, the two goal scorers of Soccer Club Feni rejoice their victory over Brothers Union at Bangabandhu National Stadium COURTESY

Abahani-MSC renew rivalry today

Traditional crowd pullers Abahani and Mohammedan lock horns in the second semi� nal of the Mod-humoti Bank Indepen-

dence Cup in di� erent surroundings at the Bangabandhu National Stadium at 5:00pm today.

Gone are those days when a high vol-ume of adrenaline rushed among the fans of the two arch rivals who packed the stands to extend full support to their favourite teams. The rivalry though has not lost its edge and the players wear-ing the club jerseys still put their best to come out as the winners, consequen-tially turning the encounters � ercely competitive. Today’s meeting between the perennial foes will be the fourth in the season and the Sky Blues hold the upper hand by winning two while the matched ended in a draw.

An extra signi� cance will be out there as both the teams have never won the title of the tournament commemo-

rating the independence of the country and will be eager to make it to the � nal.

With holders Sheikh Russel KC, fa-vourite Sheikh Jamal KC and former champions Muktijoddha Sangsad al-ready out of the tournament it is a glorious opportunity for the giants to reach their � rst � nal of the season. The winners will meet Feni Soccer in the � -nal. Abahani has not crossed the semi-� nals of any tournament after 2011 while Mohammedan has won the title of the Super Cup last year.

Abahani’s Iranian coach Ali Akbar Pourmoslemi is ready for the high volt-age encounter and said, “Whenever Abahani and Mohammedan plays it draws the attention of football arena, I am hopeful of playing a good brand of football and win the match.

“In the previous matches Abahani had some problem with my � nishing but with the arrival of the Portuguese forward Suares I think the problem is resolved, I am very happy to see Suares score two goals in his debut match. I am con� dent that Abahani will play the best football and go through the � -

nal. There is no room for complacency as we have beaten Sheikh Jamal in the quarter� nal, this is a new match in a new day,” said Pourmoslemi.

Abahani’s regular custodian Sha-hidul Alam Sohel will resume his posi-tion after recovering from a viral fever while mid� elder Abdul Baten Majum-dar Komol is also � t to play.

Mohammedan’s Portuguese coach Jose Rui Capella Batista echoed his coun-terpart and showed equal con� dent. “We have included some new players and the team is in a better position, Abahani had been playing good football but I think it will be a competitive match.”

Mid� elder Zongo Ousseni and tall defender Ubom Henry had added new life in Mohammedans attack as it is expected to be a battle between Abah-ani’s foreign trio forwards and Moham-medan defenders.

However, the Sky Blues’ backline remains vulnerable with a couple of un� t players and Ghanaian Samad Yussif is their only hope to thwart the Mohammedan attacks which might cost them poorly. l

Feni storm into � rst ever � nal

Soccer Club Feni’s dream ride in the Modhumoti Bank Independence Cup continued as they stormed into the

� nal for the � rst time in history after two late strikes steered them into a 2-0 victory over Brothers Union at the Bangabandhu National Stadium yesterday.

After a goalless � rst half, Gambia national team captain Mathew Mendy put Feni Soccer Club ahead in the 81st minute before substitute defender Abdullah Al Mamun doubled the lead four minutes later to seal a historic � nal berth for the club. They will now face the winner of today’s semi� nal between two traditional giants of Dhaka football - Abahani Limited and Mohammedan Sporting Club in the � nal on April 12.

This is the � rst time Feni Soccer Club have progressed as far as the � nal of a professional football tournament. Their previous best achievement was in their debut season in 2009 when they made it to the Federation Cup semi� nal but lost to Mohammedan.

Soccer Club adopted a ‘safety � rst’ strategy as they concentrated more on defending rather than scoring. Deploying � ve defenders including two new Gambian signings Mathew Mendy and Landing Darboe in front of goalie Nehal clearly illustrate that they focus was on strengthening their defense. However, the omnipresent threat of the Gambian duo from set pieces just outside Brothers’ D posed a constant worry for Brothers’ defenders.

It’d be fair to say that Brothers Union had a better � rst half and controlled the mid� eld most of the time but they lacked that all important killer instincts in front of the goal unfortunately which ultimately cost them a place in the � nal. Brothers made their � rst promising attack in the 11th minute when Jewel Rana fed Simon with a

short pass but the Nigerian mid� elder failed to take full control and saw his tame e� ort easily blocked by Ramjan Ali Mollah. Jewel Rana was again the architect of another promising attack in the 30th minute when from his assist, Simon’s shot de� ected o� a Feni defender for a corner.

However, it was Feni Soccer Club who created the best chance of the � rst half six minutes later when Nigerian forward Chuka Charles met Ramjan Ali’s corner and the following ball found Feni’s Gambian defender Landing Darboe who reacted quickly with a goal-bound volley, only to be denied at the very last moment when Brothers defender Yousuf cleared o� the line brilliantly to keep the score 0-0.

12 minutes into the second half, Feni keeper Md. Nehal produced a diving save to deny Simon’s e� ort from inside the box. Feni had another opportunity four minutes later when Gambian Mathew Mendy shot wide with an open net at his mercy after a cutback from Chuka Charles from the left � ank found him unmarked.

Mendy, however, made amends for his previous mistake by putting Soccer Club ahead in the 81st minute. The attack started from a Liton throw-in which was followed by Gambian forward Kabba Jobe’s side volley from the edge of the box. Mendy was unmarked at the second bar and he raced forward to head the ball into the net.

Soccer Club then rubbed salt into an already wounded Brothers side when they doubled the lead four minutes later to ensure the victory. Following a long cross, Abdullah Al Mamun outpaced his marker to head straight to the keeper Sabuj Das Rogu, who inexplicably failed to hold onto the ball and Mamun made no mistake to bury home the rebound.

We now will have to wait till the � -nal whistle of the � nal is blown to know whether this merry Feni ride continues any further. l

Shakib leaves for IPL mission

National all-rounder Shakib al Hasan will depart for India today to join his Indian Premier League (IPL) side Kolkata Knight Riders. KKR retained the leading Bangladeshi cricketer, who played two seasons with the team and carried a crucial part in their title winning sixth season, for the seventh edition of the cash-rich Twenty20 tournament. He is also the only Bangladeshi cricketer to be bought by a team in the second edition of Caribbean Premier League (CPL) scheduled to start on July 5.

“I feel honored for being able to play in these leagues and represent my country. It would have been better if few other players from Bangladesh could also play in these tournaments,” said Shakib to a local online news por-tal yesterday. This will be third IPL sea-son for Shakib and he informed of aim-ing to perform better than the previous season.

Shakib featured in the Australian Big Bash League in January before car-rying out national duty with the home series against Sri Lanka, the Asia Cup and the World Twenty20. After com-pleting the IPL mission Shakib will � y to the Caribbean islands in July to play for Barbados Tridents in CPL 2.

Shakib informed coping with di� er-ent conditions and surroundings has never troubled him rather he enjoys the culture and makes new friends.

Shakib also re� ected on the im-portance of the Bangladesh Premier League. Bangladesh’s version of the domestic Twenty20 league was highly criticized for irregularities and match/spot � xing allegations. Since its second edition in February last year, the tour-nament is literally being overlooked by the Bangladesh Cricket Board.

“I think it is important for Bangla-desh’s cricket to have BPL. Every team in the tournament has at least � ve to six international cricketers. This gives the local cricketers – who never played for the national team – a good boost and gain experience from the dressing room,” said Shakib. l

Finally a Test in India?

Bangladesh will � nally play a Test match on the Indian soil this year, dis-closed Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) president Nazmul Hassan to Mail To-day, an Indian daily, on Monday.

It was reported on Mail Today that Bangladesh would play a Test this win-ter against India and the most likely venue is the Eden Gardens in Kolkata.

The BCB boss further informed that an agreement with the BCCI (Board for Control of Cricket in India) to this e� ect could be signed during the ICC meeting.

“We’re trying to con� rm a Test match in India this year. The dates will be given

once we go for the ICC meeting in Dubai,” Nazmul was quoted in Mail Today.

India and Bangladesh have played seven Tests since 2000 - all in Bangladesh. The BCB president hinted that in the com-ing years the frequency of matches be-tween the neighbours will also increase.

“What we are discussing is that we’ll go there [India] this year. And we’ll play a full series in 2015 and 2016, with India coming here one year and we go-ing there the next. We’ve decided that, and most probably we’ll sign a contract after this ICC Board meeting,” he said.

He further stated Kolkata to be a � ne venue for the lone Test as it will attract a lot of Bangladesh spectators. l

Joy unbound for Feni Soccer

Players, o� cials and supporters of Soccer Club, Feni erupted in wild cel-ebrations as their joy knew no bounds after the team cruised to the � nal of the Modhumoti Bank Independence Cup Football with a 2-0 victory over Broth-ers Union at the Bangabandhu National Stadium yesterday afternoon.

They had their cause to celebrate as it was their � rst ever entry into the � nal of a major tournament. They had never advanced beyond the semi� -nals of any major tournament till date and the taste of reaching a � nal was something unprecedented to them. Gambian coach Omar K. Sisse and club

president Tabith Awal were lifted to the shoulders while players were busy to congratulate each other.

However, Omar tried to conceal his emotions during the post-match press-er. “To be frank, I was really scared as Brothers made our life harder than we anticipated. They are a strong team as they defended well and also created some scoring chances but I told my players to keep cool. They did not stick to our plans in the � rst half. But in the second half, I think we played better,” said the Gambian.

Omar was delighted to see his young player Abdullah al Mamun register his name in the score-sheet. “I waited to substitute Bidyut for his experience

but I inserted Mamun who is my favor-ite and it worked. I feel happy,” said a jubilant Omar.

Mathew Mendy, the Gambian who broke the deadlock, said it was not easy in the middle. “We had to work hard and I believe only foreigners can’t win the match without the able support of the locals,” opined Mendy.

Brothers Union coach Syed Naeemud-din lamented his team’s poor display and admitted Feni Soccer Club were the wor-thy winner. “We played bad. Specially in the second half, we could not implement our plans accordingly. Rubel Miah, the mainstay of my attack was absent due to his H.S.C exam and I think my attackers did not rise to the occasion.” l

BFF o� cial assaulted

Asaduzzaman Rony, an o� cial of Bangla-desh Football Federation was assaulted by an unruly Brothers Union supporter during the � rst semi� nal of the Mod-humoti Bank Independence Cup at the Bangbandhu National Stadium yesterday.The incident occurred when a group of Brothers supporters declined to follow the sitting instructions from BFF authorities.

It was reported a supporter named Ha-run jumped over the fence and slapped Asad. The on-duty policemen held the miscreant but later an in� uential political person helped Harun to get free.

BFF general secretary Abu Naeem con� rmed the incident. l

Wednesday, April 9, 2014

Messi to � ght against Chagas diseaseBarcelona’s four-time world player of the year Lionel Messi is a leading sup-

porter of the � ght against the spread of Chagas disease which currently infects six to eight million people. Messi featured in a video, which was released in conjunction with Monday’s World Health Day, which calls for more resources and drugs to combat Chagas disease, which is transmitted by a biting insect and is mainly found in the Americas. “To combat it we need more resources and more medications,” Messi said. –AFP

Worcestershire sign New Zealand duoWorcestershire have signed New Zealand pair Colin Munro and Mitchell

McClenaghan for part of the 2014 season, the English county side announced on Tuesday. Batsman Munro will be Worcestershire’s second overseas player for this season’s domestic Twenty20 competition, alongside Pakistan spin bowler Saeed Ajmal. McClenaghan will replace Ajmal for a six-week period in July and August, when the spinner will be unavailable as he has agreed to play for the Antigua Hawksbills in the Caribbean Premier League. –AFP

Durant scores 38 to pass JordanKevin Durant scored 38 points to pass Michael Jordan with his 41st straight

game of 25-plus, but it wasn’t enough to help Oklahoma City beat Phoenix on Sun-day. Goran Dragic led a half dozen Suns players in double � gures with 26 points as the Phoenix rallied past the Thunder 122-115 to move into sole possession of eighth place in the Western Conference standings. Durant now has at least 25 points in 41 consecutive games to surpass the legendary Jordan, who had 40 back in the 1986-87 season. Durant’s streak is now the third longest in NBA history. –AFP

Athletic maintain European charge

Aritz Aduriz hit a � rst-half double as Athletic Bilbao kept their Champi-ons League ambitions on track with a 2-1 victory at Levante, who only came

to life after the break.Athletic are fourth on 59 points in

Spain’s � nal Champions League spot, six more than Sevilla who thumped Espan-yol 4-1 over the weekend, and nine ahead of sixth-placed Real Sociedad, beaten 4-0 at home by Real Madrid on Saturday.

The Basque side responded well to their defeat by Atletico Madrid in their last match, starting the game at a high tempo and cutting the Levante defence open in the early stages.

A sloppy challenge from Juanfran on

Iker Muniain earned Athletic a penalty which Mikel San Jose sent wide but the visitors were soon ahead anyway.

A shot from Aduriz from the edge of the area de� ected o� Levante defender Simao Mate, wrong-footing Keylor Na-vas, and went into the corner.

It was a lacklustre display from mid-table Levante and on the point of half-time Aduriz netted his 13th goal of the season as he headed home an Ander Herrera cross.

After the restart Levante had more impetus but could only pull one goal back with a Ruben Garcia cross hitting San Jose and looping over keeper Gor-ka Iraizoz and into the net.

“At the end they were pushing for-ward and we were sitting back more,” Athletic coach Ernesto Valverde told reporters.

The three-way battle at the top of La Liga remains � erce with Real three points adrift of leaders Atletico Madrid, who beat Villarreal 1-0 at home on Sat-urday and have 79 points. Barcelona are on 78 points following their 3-1 vic-tory over bottom side Real Betis. l

Atletico’s Costa in � tness battle to face Barca

Atletico Madrid hope to have talismanic striker Diego Costa back � t against Barcelona on Wednesday when the La Liga leaders bid to

pull o� another Spanish surprise by reaching the Champions League semi-� nals.

Spain’s Costa has hit 33 goals for Diego Simeone’s side in a remarkable season for Atletico, where they have come out of the shadows of their more a� uent neighbours Real Madrid and La Liga champions Barca.

They picked up a 1-1 draw in a typi-

cally hard-fought battle at the Camp Nou in the Champions League � rst leg last week, where Costa limped o� with a hamstring strain in the � rst half.

His replacement Diego hit a stun-ning shot from distance to give Atletico a valuable away goal before Neymar grabbed a draw.

Costa has been receiving intensive treatment with the aim of being ready for the home leg and is progressing well. However, with further crucial games ahead, Atletico’s medical sta� are wary of him coming back too soon and aggravating the injury.

Arda Turan is also a doubt with a groin strain and if he does not recover then his place on the right wing would

likely go to Diego with Adrian Lopez possibly replacing Costa.

Adrian came on as a substitute and looked lively during an otherwise tired Atletico display in a 1-0 home win over Villarreal on Saturday that kept them a point clear of Barca at the top of the Spanish championship.

“I am prepared, we are all ready for when we have to play. Any opportunity in this team is important and you have to be ready to take it,” Adrian told re-porters.

“It has been a great season so far and we are all pleased. We have done very well but we need to keep going game by game. Now we are up against Barce-lona in the Champions League and we

will play it as though it were a � nal.“The � rst leg was a good result but the

tie is very open still. We know what Bar-celona are capable of doing and we will have to have a great performance if we are going to qualify for the semi-� nals. We will have to � ght from start to � nish.”

Barcelona were also below their best but beat Real Betis 3-1 at the weekend with two more goals from Lionel Messi and remain on Atletico’s shoulders with the two sides also still to meet at the Camp Nou in La Liga.

Their main injury concerns are at the back where Gerard Pique is missing with a hip injury so Marc Bartra could again deputise with Carles Puyol out long term. l

Spanish press trying to destabilise Neymar: Scolari

The Spanish press are orchestrating a campaign to try and destabilise Barce-lona’s Brazilian star Neymar ahead of this year’s World Cup � nals Brazil coach Felipe Scolari claimed on Monday.

Scolari told a press conference in Lis-bon that stories about 22-year-old Ney-mar’s diving to obtain penalties and con-troversy over his transfer last summer from Santos were all aimed at putting him o� his game as Brazil prepared to host the global football showpiece in June.

“Neymar’s case is really simple, only those who close their eyes can’t see it

clearly for what it is,” said Scolari, who guided Brazil to the 2002 World Cup title.

“Neymar is often criticised by the Spanish press because it has a vested interest that he is not at his best at the World Cup.

“We know that he is good, that he is a star. He was the decisive factor in Barcelona’s games against both Real Madrid and Espanyol.

Scolari said that he was on a mini tour of Europe to reassure some play-ers – believed to include Chelsea’s David Luiz – about their place in the squad for the � nals which he will an-nounce on May 7. l

Spurs give under-� re Sherwood a boost

Tottenham manager Tim Sherwood re-ceived a much-needed boost as Harry Kane’s � rst Premier League

goal inspired a 5-1 rout of struggling Sunderland on Monday.

Sherwood had declined to comment on his future in the hours before kick-o� at White Hart Lane after a report claimed he would be dismissed at the end of the season.

Holland coach Louis van Gaal, Southampton manager Mauricio Po-chettino and Ajax boss Frank de Boer have all been strongly linked with the

Tottenham job.Even this convincing win is unlikely

to save Sherwood, but he looks set to go out � ghting and � ttingly it was a goal from England Under-21 striker Kane that set the tone.

Lee Cattermole had given bottom of the table Sunderland a shock early lead.

But Emmanuel Adebayor equalised and Kane, one of the promising prodi-gies Sherwood championed during his time as the club’s director of youth de-velopment, marked his � rst top-� ight start by putting the hosts ahead after the break before late goals from Chris-tian Eriksen, Adebayor and Gyl� Sig-urdsson sealed the demolition. l

Juventus restore eight-point lead

A brace from Spanish striker Fernando Llor-ente gave Juventus a 2-0 win over Livorno to restore their eight-point lead over Roma and edge

the champions closer to a third consec-utive scudetto on Monday.

Juve have now amassed 84 points and, with six games remaining, remain on target to become the � rst team in Serie A to win the title with 100 points.

Livorno, meanwhile, remain third from bottom, two points adrift of the safety zone.

Following Roma’s win in Sardinia, Llorente had posted a de� ant Twitter message which read: “We either have to win or win.”

But despite a high-octane start the

Bianconeri had to wait 32 minutes be-fore � nally breaching the Livorno de-fence, Llorente turning on to Tevez’s short pass from the left of the area to plant the ball in the roof of Bardi’s net.

Three minutes later Llorente met Pirlo’s corner from the right with a � rm header which squirmed inside Bardi’s near post.

Juve countered after the resulting cor-ner and Tevez was given time to send a 25-metre drive curl just wide of Bardi’s far post.

Milan, meanwhile, soaked up the pressure in a dramatic second half away

to Genoa to prevail 2-1 for a third consec-utive win which maintains their hopes of clinching a Europa League place.

Goals in either half from Adel Ta-arabt and Keisuke Honda, the Japanese star’s � rst in Serie A, gave the Rosso-neri a 2-0 lead by the 56th minute.

But an own goal by goalkeeper Chris-tian Abbiati, following Marco Motta’s 73rd minute strike, reduced the arrears as the hosts piled on the pressure.

Milan rode their luck when both Stefano Sturaro and Motta, whose follow-up was headed o� the goalline by Philippe Mexes, came close to levelling.

However Clarence Seedorf’s men held on and although still in 11th spot the Rossoneri are just � ve points adrift of � fth-placed city rivals Inter in the second and � nal Europa League quali-fying spot. l

United wait on Rooney for Bayern clash

Manchester United’s Wayne Rooney faces a race against time to be � t for Wednesday’s Champions League quarter-� nal, second-

leg at Bayern Munich with the hosts winless in their last three matches.

European champions Bayern suf-fered their � rst Bundesliga defeat for 18 months when they were beaten 1-0 at Augsburg on Saturday following last Tuesday’s 1-1 � rst-leg draw with United at Old Tra� ord.

Centre-back Nemanja Vidic’s head-er put United ahead in the � rst-leg at Old Tra� ord only for Bayern’s Bastian Schweinsteiger equaliser before being sent o� for a second yellow card on the stroke of 90 minutes.

Bayern coach Pep Guardiola has described Wednesday’s second-leg at the Allianz Arena as a matter of “life or death” for holders Munich, who have made no secret of their desire to

become the � rst team to defend the Champions League title.

United’s hopes hinge on Rooney, who missed Saturday’s 4-0 league win at Newcastle United with a badly bruised toe and the 28-year-old’s ab-sence would be a big blow to United’s chances of progressing.

Along with Robin van Persie, who is out with a knee injury, he is the club’s joint-top scorer this season with 17 goals, two of which were in the Cham-pions League.

“If he’s out, it would certainly be a big loss for United,” admitted Bayern centre-back Jerome Boateng, whose job would be to contain the England star.

“Wayne Rooney is the key man for United, he always makes himself avail-able and he goes looking for the ball, he’s always good for a goal.”

United travel to Bavaria with the hosts needing a return to winning ways having struggled for form since secur-ing the Bundesliga title two weeks ago with a record seven games to spare. l

WC dream over for injured Rodriguez

Southampton striker Jay Rodriguez’s hopes of playing for England at this year’s World Cup � nals were dashed Monday when it was announced he would be out for at least six months with a knee injury.

The 24-year-old forward was one of several Saints players in the running for a place in Roy Hodgson’s 23-man squad for Brazil after scoring 17 goals so far this term.

But Rodriguez, who made his Eng-land debut in a friendly against Chile in November, saw his season come to a shuddering halt when he landed awk-wardly during Saturday’s 4-1 defeat by Manchester City and was carried o� on a stretcher at Eastlands. l

RESULTSLevante 1 2 Athletic BilbaoDominguez 66-og Aduriz 15, 44

Malaga 4 1 GranadaCamacho 14, 36, El-Arabi 77Amrabat 50, Juanmi 74

Elche 1 0 GetafeBoakye 90+3

Sevilla 4 1 EspanyolMbia 18, Gameiro 44, 84, Sergio Garcia 46-PRakitic 89

Valladolid 0 0 Valencia

RESULTSJuventus 2 0 LivornoLlorente 32, 35

Genoa 1 2 AC MilanAbbiati 73-og Taarabt 20, Honda 56

Manchester United's English striker Wayne Rooney (C) takes part in a team training session at their Carrington training complex in Manchester, north-west England yesterday, on the eve of their Uefa Champions League second leg quarter-� nal match against Bayern Munich in Germany AFP

AC Milan's forward Keisuke Honda scores a goal during their Italian Serie A match against Genoa at the Luigi Ferraris stadium in Genoa, Italy on Monday AFP

SportDHAKA TRIBUNE14

SportDHAKA TRIBUNE 15Wednesday, April 9, 2014

UEFA Champions League: QF Leg 2

Ten Action12:45AMBayern Munich v Man United

Ten Sports12:45PMAtletico Madrid v Barcelona

Star Sports 46:00PMAFC Cup 2014Churchill Brothers v Persipura Jaya

Star Sports HD11:00AMMasters Tournament 2014

Sony SixNBA 2013-146:00AM Miami v Brooklyn8:30AM LA Lakers v Houston

NCL resumes on SaturdayThe 15th National Cricket League will resume on April 12, con� rmed the Bangladesh Cricket Board yesterday. The � rst-class cricket tournament will recommence with the remaining four matches of round six. Khulna Division will face Dhaka Metropolis at Sheikh Kamal International Cricket Stadium in Cox’s Bazar. Dhaka Division will lock horns with Barisal at Chittagong’s Za-hur Ahmed Chowdhury Stadium while Rajshahi will take on Chittagong at BKSP. At Fatullah Outer Stadium, Sylhet will face Rangpur. After � ve rounds, Dhaka Division is leading the points table with three wins and 51 points. Rajshahi is behind them with 65 points while Sylhet trails the latter by three points. The seventh round games will be played from April 19.

–MUK

Alonso has faith in Ferrari � ghtbackFernando Alonso believes Ferrari can still be title contenders despite the Italian glamour team’s disappointing start to the Formula One season. The Spaniard � nished ninth in Sunday’s Bahrain Grand Prix, one place ahead of team mate Kimi Raikkonen, after fourth places in Australia and Malaysia. Ferrari are � fth in the constructors’ standings. Mercedes have meanwhile streaked into the distance with three pole positions and three wins, including two consecutive one-two � nishes for Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg. There are 16 races remain-ing, with China next up. “Although we did all we could, we can’t be happy with our level of performance and now our sole focus must be on working day and night,” Alonso, a double world champion with Renault, said after Sunday’s race. “The season is in its early stages and I think we can stage a recovery. We have the resources and the potential to do it and it’s all down to us.”

–Reuters

Murray embarks on search for new coachWimbledon champion Andy Murray revealed on Tuesday that he will soon begin his search for a new coach and hopes to have appointed one by the French Open in May. “I’ll de� nitely look at it over the next couple of weeks,” said the world number eight. “I don’t plan on playing much tennis for the next week because I haven’t had much time o� this year.” The 26-year-old Scot ended a two-year collaboration with Ivan Lendl last month and is due to meet with members of his back-room team on Wednesday to discuss plans to appoint a successor. “I’ll de� nitely look into it and see which route I want to go down,” he said. “Once you make a deci-sion on who it is you want to approach, they need to be up for doing it and the amount of time it requires.

–AFP

Hat-trick hero Destro hit with four-game banRoma striker Mattia Destro was handed a four-game ban by league o� cials on Tuesday, ending a dream weekend in which the Italy World Cup hopeful scored a hat-trick for the Giallorossi. Destro claimed all three goals in Roma’s 3-1 away to Cagliari on Sunday but fell victim to trial by television following a request by the disciplinary commission of the Italian Football Federation (FIGC). As Destro tried to tackle Davide Astori from behind, his hand came up to catch the Cagliari defender in the face. Astori was booked for retaliating, but video evi-dence suggested Destro – who escaped a caution – was at fault. A statement by Serie A o� cials a� rmed Destro had been “caught by television” carrying out “an act of violence not seen by the referee” and would be “banned for three games”.

–AFP

DAY’S WATCH

QUICK BYTES

Pakistani street children footballers arrive at the Sindh provincial assembly building to attend a reception in Karachi yesterday. Pakistan's street children footballers returned home to jubilant scenes after clinching the bronze medal in Brazil, with captain Sameer Ahmed hailing the "once in a lifetime" experience AFP

Sooner the better, says McIlroy of Masters win

Rory McIlroy cannot begin to contem-plate a career where he will be ineli-gible to have breakfast in the Masters Champions Locker Room at Augusta National.

McIlroy singled out the likes of Greg Norman and Ernie Els,who have both been denied such an opportunity and then witnessed younger players who grew up idolizing them succeed at Au-gusta.

“It has to be tough because you can look at someone like Greg Norman see-ing Adam win last year,” said McIlroy.

“Then there’s Ernie(Els) and he sees Trevor (Immelman) winning, he sees Charl (Schwartzel) win, and he sees all these young South Africans playing so

well, like Louis (Oosthuizen) going so close in a playo� against Bubba (Wat-son),” said McIlroy.

“It’s why I’m determined at 24 that I don’t want to get to that point when I’m 44.

“So that’s why it would great to win one Masters sooner rather than later. l

Farah faces marathon baptism of � re

Britain’s double Olympic and world champion Mo Farah makes his eagerly-awaited marathon debut in London on Sunday, but has his work cut out with the jump-in distance and competition from top Kenyans and Ethiopians.

Kenya’s elite runners say they have little to fear from the newcomer to the distance, predicting a baptism of � re for Farah as he grapples with uncharted rac-ing territory coupled with seasoned mar-athon veterans setting a punishing pace.

The 32-year-old 5,000 and 10,000m track star spent the better part of the win-ter training in Kenya’s high-altitude Rift Valley region in a bid to raise his game and compete against the world’s best.

Leading the elite � eld is Kenyan Wilson Kipsang, who holds the world record after clocking a spectacular 2:03.23 in Berlin last year and has won London in 2012. Observers of the sport see Farah as being capable of running a time of around 2:06. l

Don’t crucify Yuvraj for T20 � nal � op, says Tendulkar

Batting great Sachin Tendulkar has come out strongly in support of the beleaguered Yuvraj Singh after the left-hander’s poor performance with the bat during India’s loss to Sri Lanka in the World Twenty20 � nal on Sunday.

Yuvraj has been made something of a scapegoat for India’s defeat after he used up 21 deliveries to score 11 runs, which robbed his side of momentum towards the end of their innings.

The 32-year-old, who hit England’s Stuart Broad for six sixes in an over in the 2007 World Twenty20 and was the archi-tect of India’s 50-over World Cup win in 2011, looked a pale shadow of himself, even struggling to rotate the strike.

“It is the unpredictable nature of the game that makes cricket such an excit-ing sport,” Tendulkar, who retired from the game last November, said in a post on his Facebook page.

“As cricketers, we always enjoy the

applause when we succeed but it is the support and encouragement from fans, during tough times, that we appreciate the most.”

Yuvraj was the focal point of all dis-cussions in the cricket-crazy country after the Indian juggernaut in Bangla-

desh came to a screeching halt on Sun-day with a six-wicket hammering by Sri Lanka at the Sher-e-Bangla National Stadium.

There were even reports in the local media that Yuvraj’s house in Chandigarh was pelted with stones by angry fans.

Tendulkar, the most proli� c interna-tional run-scorer and one of the coun-try’s greatest uni� ers, reminded the fans of Yuvraj’s past contributions.

“All of us took pride in the heroics of Yuvi when we won the T20 World Cup in 2007 and his outstanding contribu-tion in the ODI World Cup win in 2011 will always be cherished,” he wrote.

“Last evening (Sunday), Yuvi had a tough day and he can be criticised. But he should not be cruci� ed nor should he be written o� .”

Yuvraj, who has not been part of In-dia’s test and 50-over sides in the recent past, made an emotional return to the game in 2012 after a lengthy � ght with a rare germ cell cancer in his lungs. l

Pakistan was o� ered ‘Big Four’ role: chairman

Pakistan’s cricket chief Najam Sethi has said his predecessor spurned an o� er by India to join the so-called “big three” during a major reorganisation of the game’s administration.

The Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) was initially one of three countries which opposed the revamp of the In-ternational Cricket Council (ICC) ap-proved by members in February.

The move handed the majority of the powers and revenues to the “big three” of the game -- India, Australia and England.

Pakistan and Sri Lanka abstained from voting on the reforms, but since then Sri Lanka have hinted they will sign the draft.

Sethi, who will attend the ICC meeting in Dubai on April 9-10, said Pakistan were o� ered a seat at the table but declined.

“The big three of the ICC had invited

Pakistan to be part of a ‘big four’ plan but the administration under former PCB chairman Zaka Ashraf refused the o� er, to the detriment of the country,” Sethi said as he was preparing to leave late Monday.

“In the cricketing scenario, cur-rently there are eight countries at one side and Pakistan at the other. The ICC doesn’t need Pakistan after the rejec-tion of such a rare o� er.”

Sethi said his main aim now was to revive ties with India.

“A series against India would bring huge revenue to the PCB besides bring-ing peace and prosperity to the region as the cricketing ties have been sus-pended for many years,” said Sethi.

“Until and unless we play with In-dia, we won’t make any money. Every-one is toeing India’s line because play-ing with India makes you money.”

India have not played a full bilateral series with Pakistan since the 2008 ter-ror attacks on Mumbai. l

Petkovic win WTA Family Circle Cup

Andrea Petkovic survived a set point before steamrolling her way to an em-phatic 7-5 6-2 victory over Jana Cepelo-va in the � nal of the Family Circle Cup in South Carolina on Sunday.

Petkovic, on the comeback trail from a string of injuries, used her pow-erful forehand to collect her third WTA title in a match that lasted 79 minutes on the green clay in Charleston.

Petkovic’s career has been ham-pered by knee, back and ankle inju-ries, but she can compete with the best when healthy, as her world ranking of 10th at the end of 2011 proved.

But she did not have it all her own way against Slovakian Cepelova, who had a chance to win the � rst set but � red a forehand groundstroke into the net, a point that proved pivotal. l

Siddikur � red up for Maybank Malaysian Open

Bangladesh star Siddikur Rahman will compete in the Maybank Malaysian Open next week with renewed self-be-lief that he can compete on a level play-ing � eld against the world’s best players.

Following his heroic performance at the recent EurAsia Cup where Team Asia gallantly fought back to earn a tie with Team Europe here, Siddikur, who contributed two points in the memo-rable 10-10 draw, is feeling con� dent ahead of the US$2.75 million show-piece at the Kuala Lumpur Golf and Country Club from April 17-20.

Siddikur formed a formidable four-some partnership with Anirban Lahiri when they earned a vital win to spark Team Asia’s comeback.

The popular Siddikur, who has not � nished outside the top-� ve on the Asian Tour Order of Merit in the last two seasons, will seek to better his tied eighth � nish at the 2011 Malaysian Open.

He was also a dominant � gure in the EurAsia Cup after contributing two points for Team Asia which included an impressive 4 & 3 victory over Ste-phen Callacher in the singles. l

Sri Lanka party marred by player dispute

Sri Lanka’s team � ew home in triumph Tuesday to a huge street party after win-ning the world Twenty20 tournament, but celebrations were marred by con-troversy over the retirements of Mahela Jayawardene and Kumar Sangakkara.

Tens of thousands of fans lined the street from the main international air-port to downtown Colombo, a distance of 35 kilometres (21 miles), causing tra� c chaos across the capital as the heroes passed by in a motorcade.

Sangakkara and Jayawardene, both former skippers, told reporters at the airport there were serious disagree-ments about their retirement from T20 cricket.

Jayawardene said his remarks to a local newspaper, that the tournament may be his � nal T20 appearance, had

been taken as notice of his intention to retire, and based on that he had been criticised by a cricket board o� cial.

“I am disappointed and hurt that an o� cial went public criticising us with-out � rst asking us whether we actually made those remarks,” he told reporters shortly after landing.

“I agree with what he says,” Sangak-kara added.

Both said they had been uncertain whether they would play in the World T20 tournament until a few hours before they were due to leave for Bangladesh.

Sources close to the players said they did not � nalise their employment contracts with the cricket board un-til the eve of their departure, follow-ing disputes between players and the board over pay and conditions.

There was no immediate comment from the cricket board, but an o� cial

had earlier criticised both senior play-ers for allegedly going public about their retirement plans without prior notice to the board.

On the eve of the � nals with India, the board announced a million dollar bonus for the team if it could � nally shed its reputation for “choking” in major tournaments.

Sangakkara was in celebratory mood despite grumbles with the board.

The met o� ce had forecast thunder showers in Colombo, but the weather was holding up as the team was driven at a snail’s pace to meet President Ma-hinda Rajapakse.

Fans waved national � ags and cheered as the team bus escorted by hundreds of motorcycles and cars passed by. It was the biggest street party since government forces crushed Tamil Tiger rebels in May 2009. l

Stadlers to become � rst Masters father-son duo

Craig and Kevin Stadler will become the � rst father and son to play in the same Masters this week, but relations remain complicated between the two following a divorce.

Craig Stadler, the 60-year-old win-ner of the 1982 Masters, divorced Sue, Kevin’s mother, in 2006.

And much of Kevin’s success has involved being known as the son of the PGA veteran known as “Walrus”, who is making his 38th and possibly � nal Masters start as his son is making his � rst.

“This is a very cool thing,” Craig Stadler said. “It’s emotional in a very good way. I was hoping it would hap-pen some day. It’s going to be just a wonderful week. I hope he plays really well and I hope I don’t embarrass my-self.”

The younger Stadler said he had no qualms about appearing side-by-side with his father despite past issues. l

Sri Lankan supporters wave as the country's T20 cricket team travel on an open-top bus during a procession after returning from Bangladesh to Colombo yesterday. Sri Lanka prepared to throw its biggest party since the end of the country's ethnic con� ict after beating India in the � nal of cricket's World T20 tournament in Dhaka AFP

16 Back PageDHAKA TRIBUNE Wednesday, April 9, 2014

Seven more Rana Plaza victims identi� ed n Moniruzzaman Uzzal

Almost a year after the Rana Plaza col-lapse, the National DNA Pro� ling Lab-oratory at the Dhaka Medical College has con� rmed the identities of seven more victims of the disaster, follow-ing the successful cross-matching of DNA samples provided by the victims’relatives.

However, the genders of the newly identi� ed victims could not be known immediately.

Professor Dr Sharif Akhteruzzaman, technical adviser for the DNA lab, con-� rmed the news yesterday and told the Dhaka Tribune that the lab had submit-ted a report on its third phase of DNA tests before the labour ministry on Monday.

In the � rst phase report last Novem-ber, the lab identi� ed 157 victims– 116 women and 41 men; while the second phase report in February this year iden-ti� ed 43 more victims – 33 women and 10 men.

Sources at the national DNA lab said 541 families had provided DNA sam-ples for cross-matching with the 322 unidenti� ed victims, whose bone and teeth were collected as DNA samples.

A high-tech combined DNA index system (codex) software, provided by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation, was used to identify the victims.

The collapse of Rana Plaza on April 24 last year caused the deaths of at least 1,134 people and injured 2,515 more. l

Three policemen sued for embezzling gold barsn Ashif Islam Shaon

Police yesterday � led a case against three policemen, including a sub-in-spector, of Rampura police station for misappropriating gold bars seized at the Shahjalal International Airport.

The accused are SI Manjurul Islam and constables Akash Chowdhury and Wahedul Islam.

Before � ling the case the Detective Branch of police sought written permis-sion from the Anti-Corruption Commis-sion, said Alamgir Hossain, o� cer-in-charge of Rampura police station.

DB Inspector Fazlur Rahman � led the case, also accusing two informants named Rana and Sajib. Police arrested SI Manjurul, Wahid, Akash and Roni on March 31. Sajib is on the run.

The ACC will investigate the case. On March 13, Rampura police seized

a car with 235 gold bars, but the ac-cused claimed they had recovered 70 bars and misappropriated the rest.

After the incident came to light, three policemen were arrested. OC Kri-pa Sindhu Bala was withdrawn from duty after the incident. The DB inves-tigation found that police had links to the gold smugglers.

SI Manjurul and his patrol team, who were on duty at Banasree’s Balurmath area on March 13, chased a microbus on suspicion and later found the vehicle abandoned. They brought the vehicle to the police station and � led a GD.

On March 16, two individuals named Samir Biswas and Jahid Hossain came to the police station to claim the ve-hicle but could not provide any docu-ments to prove their right. Later, police detained them and found that they were gold smugglers and were trans-porting 235 gold bars in the microbus.

On March 18, another case was � led with Rampura police station and was handed over to the DB on March 20.

Upon further interrogation, the de-tainees con� rmed that there were 235 gold bars in the vehicle. The detectives then interrogated SI Manjurul and his patrol team and they confessed to mis-appropriating the gold bars.

One of the arrestees confessed to a court that after the seizure some smug-glers sat in meetings with a high o� cial of the Dhaka Metropolitan Police for negotiation. But the “deal” failed.

As the secret deal failed the smug-glers leaked out the information to an-other police high o� cial. l

Dhaka land use pattern changes rapidly21.81 % agricultural land and water bodies vanish, with residential area increasing by 32.67% in last 7 yearsn Abu Hayat Mahmud

Land use pattern in the capital and its outskirts has rapidly changed due to unplanned urbanisation coupled with � lling up of agricultural land by several thousand real estate companies.

In a span of seven years (2006-2013), agricultural land and water bodies in and around Dhaka reduced by 21.81%, while residential areas increased by 32.67%, according to a study titled Re-gional Development Planning (RDP) conducted by the Rajdhani Unnayan Kartripakkha (Rajuk).

According to the Detailed Area Plan (DAP) Survey 2006, land allocation in and around the capital was: 54.8% agricultural land, 28.16% residential areas,9.57% waterbodies and 1.82% circulation networks. But, in 2013, the � gures stood at 42.49% for agriculture, 7.84%water bodies, 2.44% circulation networks and 37.36% for residential ar-eas, says the RDP study.

Rajukconducted the survey last year for updatingits databasefor the RDP to develop a planning policy framework to promote sustainable development for Dhaka city region. The RDP report will be completed this year.

The RDP covers an area of 1,528 square kilometres, which includes two Dhaka city corporations, Narayanganj and Gazipur city corporations, four municipalities, 72 union parishadsin Dhaka, Narayanganj and Gazipur.A 90 sq-km area of Gazipur City Corporation

and Dhamsonawas proposed as exten-sion to the RDP.

According to the study, the expand-ing residential areas consist restricted areas, public facilities, roads and rail-ways, commercial areas, recreational and other areas.

The study shows that about 4.92% of the agricultural land was sand-� lled.

The report also saysthe intensity of development varies widely, withonly central and southern regions having-higher share of structures.

The northern region hasthe most dispersed development, approximately 23% of total area housing only around 14% structures, whereas the central and southern region have experienced the slowest growth with respect to con-struction of new structures. Besides, northern and eastern regions have ex-perienced the highest growth.

According to the 2006DAP Survey, there were 1,205,446 structures, and the RDP survey has identi� ed 183,508addi-tional structures in the area.

With � nancial assistance from the Asian Development Bank, Rajuk im-plemented the RDP joint venture with Korean companiesSaman Corporation and Han-A Urban Research Institute, and Bangladeshi companiesDevCon-sultants Ltd and Sheltech (Pvt) Ltd.

Sheikh Abdul Mannan, member (planning) of Rajuk, told the Dhaka Trib-une yesterday: “The RDP survey is being conducted to formulate the new DAP. Hopefully, formulating the new DAP will

begin this May and end by 2015.” Askedif the new DAP will consist

strict laws for protecting agricultural land and water bodies in the RDP area, he said steps would be taken as per the new DAP after analysing the RDP data.

Meanwhile, encroachment of water bodies and agricultural land continues unabated asRajuk and Bangladesh In-land Water Transport Authority (BIW-TA)were yet to take proper steps to stop such illegal activities.

Urban planners have alleged that Rajuk only formulates plans and pol-icies, but it could never implement them in reality.

“DAP was not fully successful be-cause a large number of land developers continue to � ll up � ood � ow zones and grab agricultural land and river embank-ments around Dhaka,” ProfessorJamilur Reza Choudhury, who headed the DAP experts team, told the Dhaka Tribune.

“The DAP remains far from being implemented due to negligence of au-thorities concerned and rampant viola-tion of the plan by real estate develop-ers,” he added.

ProfessorSarwarJahanof Buet’s ur-ban and regional planningdepartment said:“Realtors � lled up most designat-ed wetlands and � ood � ow zones in and around Dhaka. If such practices continue, this will lead to waterlogging and destruction of ecology.”

Rajuk Chairman Nurul Huda said they planned to divide the DAP area into eight zones to implement the laws properly.

BIWTA Chairman MdSamsuddo-haKhandakertold the Dhaka Tribune: “We are aware that encroachment is taking place around the river surround-ing Dhaka. Such illegal practice contin-ues as there was an error in the river demarcation.”

The RDP is part of the City Region Development Project, which will be used to formulate arevised Structure Plan to construct a policy framework for the next 20 years (2016-2035). l

Substandard drugs threaten public healthn Moniruzzaman Uzzal

With the country’s � rst ever drug test-ing control laboratory yet to be o� cial-ly inaugurated, the market continues to be � ooded with substandard and adulterated drugs which pose a serious threat to public health.

Following directives from the health ministry, recent drives by the Rapid Action Battalion and mobile courts of the drug administration recovered large amounts of unauthorised fake drugs, including saline and life-saving antibiotics, from di� erent areas in the capital.

Earlier, the parliamentary standing committee on health ministry identi-� ed 62 drug companies as “substand-ard” and later revised the number to 29 companies and recommended banning their production.

Currently the country has more than 250 pharmaceuticals companies that manufacture around 24,000 brand drugs.

Several pharmaceutical industry specialists told the Dhaka Tribune that the remarkable success made by the country’s pharmaceutical compa-nies was being damaged because of a handful of unscrupulous traders who manufactured and supplied fake, un-registered, substandard, adulterated

and smuggled drugs. Random drug samples should be collected from the market and then tested at the Nation-al Control Laboratory to ensure drug quality, they added.

Muktadir Chowdhury, secretary general of Bangladesh Association of Pharmaceuticals Industry, recently said Bangladesh had a bright future in the drug sector, but the country need-ed to ensure that not a single fake or adulterated drug made it to the market.

Although the Directorate General of Drug Administration (DGDA) began testing vaccines and drugs at the con-trol lab on January 1 this year, the Tk25 crore drug testing facility was yet to be o� cially inaugurated. The lab was cur-rently testing only 300-500 samples a month, although it had the capacity to test 10,000 drug samples a year.

Several o� cials of the DGDA, seek-ing anonymity, claimed that the Na-tional Control Laboratory did not have its own budget to administer the labo-ratory activities, while the day-to-day expenses were being provided by the Institute of Public Health (IPH).

Although the laboratory was ful-ly-equipped with modern machines and other testing facilities, there was also a shortage of well-trained man-power, they added.

The health ministry had created

236 new posts for the control lab, but the ministries of establishment and � -nance were yet to give the � nal approv-al for recruiting the manpower.

However, the Dhaka Tribune has learned that in the absence of any individual budget allocation for the control lab, the DGDA authority was conducting its tests by receiving � nancial and other assistance, such as chemicals, reagents and manpower, from di� erent private pharmaceutical companies.

Selim Barami, director (current charge) of the control lab and also a director of the DGDA, admitted that it was “partially true” that the lab re-ceived help from di� erent pharmaceu-tical companies for running a few tests, especially for testing vaccines.

It was not possible to conduct the tests with the limited � nancial alloca-tion from the IPH, as the price of vac-cine’s chemicals and reagents were very expensive, he added.

Separate monthly allocation of at least Tk1 lakh was needed to run the control lab properly, Barami said, add-ing that the vacant posts of 236 em-ployees should be recruited soon.

The DGDA director further claimed that drug test results at the control lab were similar to the standards of top pharmaceutical companies. l

7.5MW solar plant to supply power to grid n Aminur Rahman Rasel, back

from Kaptai, Rangamati

As part of the e� orts to cut carbon emissions under a green energy initi-ative, the Power Development Board (PDB) has decided to set up a 7.5MW solar power plant at Rangamati’s Kaptai Hydro Power Station area, which would be the � rst of its kind to supply power to the national grid.

“We are going to install the plant as part of our renewable energy pro-gramme and we hope the power gener-ated here would help the green energy initiative,” PDB Director (renewable energy and research and development) Md Sha� que Uddin told the Dhaka Tribune yesterday.

A tender for the solar plant would be � oated within a month, while construc-tion was expected to be � nished within seven to eight months once a company was selected for the work, he added.

“The plant would generate power uninterruptedly during day time on availability of sun,” the PDB director said, adding that the Asian Develop-ment Bank had already assured of pro-viding � nancial support for the project.

The power produced from the solar plant will be added to the national grid via a substation of the Kaptai Hydro Power Station. The project – with an es-

timated cost of Tk192.59 crore – would be set up on 22 acres of PDB land.

The PDB has appointed German consultation � rm Fichtner to prepare tender documents.

Meanwhile, the PDB has also decid-ed to set up a separate 3MW solar pow-er plant at Sarishabari in Jamalpur.

Sha� que Uddin said the Sharish-abari project – to be set up on ten acres of PDB land – would be run as an inde-pendent power producer (IPP).

He added that the constructing com-pany would bear the costs under build-own-and-operate (BOO) basis and provide power to the local grid, while the PDB would pay the bill as the lone buyer.

The approximate cost of per unit power would be Tk20, he said.

“For this we have already selected an international company. A contract will be signed within two months,” he added.

On the other hand, the PDB also has plans to set up a 30MW solar park on the banks of Dhorola River in Kurigram as an IPP on BOO basis. Several compa-nies have already submitted tender on March 25 for the project, which would be set up on 118 acres of PDB land.

The PDB is currently producing 2MW power from solar panels installed on rooftops of many of its buildings. l

Now CID to probe rape of a minor girln Nazmus Sakib

The High Court yesterday shifted the charge of investigating the alleged torture and rape of a minor girl to the Criminal Investigation Department.

The CID has also been asked to submit its probe report to the court on May 20.

The High Court bench of Justice Mirza Hussain Haider and Justice Khurshid Alam Sarkar asked the Piro-jpur police super to take the case seri-ously upon a writ petition � led by Ain O Salish Kendra (ASK).

ASK’s lawyer Abonti Nurul told the Dhaka Tribune that the court found in-consistency in the deposition of the girl in the lower court and her complaint to the police, so the High Court entrusted the responsibility for investigation to the CID.

Suspected rapist Abdur Rahman, Assistant Sub-Inspector of Nazirpur police station Mujahidul Islam Miah Zafar who allegedly aided him in the rape, and Ashim Mistri, a teacher at a madrasa where the girl studied, ap-peared before the court yesterday.

Two of them, Rahman and Zafar, were sent back to jail.

Lawyer SM Rezaul Karim stood for Zafar while Deputy Attorney General Al-Amin Sarker moved for the state. l

A potter stacks up earthen toys for drying in the sun at Palpara of Kanchanpur, Brahmanbaria yesterday. Potters in the locality are passing busy days, making toys and other stu� s, ahead of a fair on the occasion of Pahela Baishakh DHAKA TRIBUNE

Editor: Zafar Sobhan, Published and Printed by Kazi Anis Ahmed on behalf of 2A Media Limited at Dainik Shakaler Khabar Publications Limited, 153/7, Tejgaon Industrial Area, Dhaka-1208. Editorial, News & Commercial O� ce: FR Tower, 8/C Panthapath, Shukrabad, Dhaka 1207. Phone: 9132093-94, Advertising: 9132155, Circulation: 9132282, Fax: News-9132192, e-mail: news@dhakatribune.com, info@dhakatribune.com, Website: www.dhakatribune.com

www.dhakatribune.com/business WEDNESDAY, APRIL 9, 2014

B3 Matin Spinning debut upsets investors

B4 5 key challenges a Modi government would face

BGMEA urges brands not to close ordersn Tribune Report

Bangladesh Garment Manufactur-ers and Exporters Association (BG-MEA) urged the Accord buyers not to withdraw orders from factories housed in shared buildings if they are found structurally okay.

It also called for setting a param-eter to decide on a factory’s struc-tural status.

According to the BGMEA, around 40% of factories are housed in shared buildings which employ 1.5m workers, mostly women.

The apex body of apparel sec-tor made the call at a meeting with steering committee of the Accord on Fire and Building Safety in Ban-gladesh yesterday.

Rob Wayss, executive director of Accord Bangladesh operation, Brad

Loewen, chief safety inspector of Accord, Aleix Buquets Gonzalez of Inditex, Philip Chamberlin of C&A, Jnney Faggerlin of H&M, Lisa Fair-clough of Debenham, Jenny Hold-craft of IndustriAll and Christy Ho� man of UNI-Global, among oth-ers, were present at the meeting.

BGMEA President Atiqul Islam presided over the meeting held at the association’s o� ce in Dhaka,

which was also attended by board of directors along with some former BGMEA presidents.

“There should be a parameter, on the basis of which, a factory would be directed to close or sus-pend production,” said Shahidullah Azim, vice president of BGMEA.

He said if a factory lacks only 20% of standards, the situation is not so B 3 COLUMN 4

Luxury hotel construction exempted from taxesDecision taken to promote tourism industry, say o� cialsn Tribune Report

The construction of luxury hotels will enjoy exemption from all taxes except for 5% customs duty on the import of building materials and equipment.

Following appeals for such facility from investors, the government made the positive response considering po-tentiality of Bangladesh’s tourism sec-tor, said o� cial sources.

The National Board of Revenue has already issued a statutory regulatory order in this regard this week.

It said the posh hotels of interna-tional standards will have to pay only 5% customs duty and no other taxes including value added tax (Vat) and supplementary duty for their construc-tions.

O� cials said the exemption will be given only to the franchise of interna-tional chain hotels and local hotels of international standards certi� ed by the tourism ministry.

Facility will be available only after

the companies concerned have quality certi� cates from the ministry.

The ministry will assess the stan-dards before certifying, said the o� -cials.

To get the tax bene� t, the entrepre-neurs will have to show agreement documents signed with international chain luxury hotel companies.

For local luxury hotels of inter-national standards, they will have to submit Vat payment certi� cates and approvals from Board of Investment.

Tax bene� t will remain e� ective only during construction works and until the launch of hotels commercially.

The hotel entrepreneurs will enjoy tax exemption facility in the import of materials like exterior-interior decora-tions, kitchen and cooking equipment, building security equipment, � re-safe-ty tools, electricity substation machin-eries, lighting and health club materials for etc.

In next 2-3 years, 10 new � ve-star hotels in Dhaka and Chittagong will be built in Bangladesh to meet the in-creasing demand.

A number of international hotel chains and local conglomerates will jointly establish the hotels.

During the recent years, the visits of foreign businessmen and hosting of international sporting events like multi-national cricket tournaments have increased.

Taking these factors in consider-ation, the investors want to expand luxury hotel business in the country. l

In next 2-3 years, 10 new � ve-star hotels in Dhaka and Chittagong will be built in Bangladesh to meet the increasing demand

BSEC chief and members to get another termn Asif Showkat Kallol

The government is set to extend on contract the tenures of chairman and four members of Bangladesh Securities and Exchange Commission (BSEC) for another term.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina re-cently approved the proposal for-warded by the Banking and Financial Institutions Division under Finance Ministry, o� cial sources said.

The tenure of the o� cials will be extended up to four years from the date of expiry of their respective con-tracts in line with the BSEC’s new rules amended last year. Before the amend-ment, the tenure was for three years.

The tenure of the incumbent BSEC o� cials, who were appointed after share-market debacle in late 2010, will expire between May and July this year.

The government claimed perfor-mance of the BSEC o� cials is so far sat-isfactory as the market remained sta-ble, but market players say otherwise.

At present, the market is still going through volatility with low volume of trade, re� ecting that investor is yet to recover con� dence lost in the market debacle, they said.

B 3 COLUMN 4

Merchant bankers want loan assistance for a� ected investorsn Tribune Report

Merchant bankers have urged the gov-ernment to allocate a re� nancing scheme worth Tk10,000 crore in the upcoming budget for stock investors, who were badly a� ected by share market scheme in late 2010, at lower interest rate.

“It is now important to allocate the fund in the next budget to infuse con� dence among the a� ected investors and to prop up the market as well,” said Akter H Sannamat, vice-president of Bangladesh Merchant Bankers’ Association (BMBA) at its general meeting held yesterday at a city hotel.

“The central bank can provide the pro-posed re� nancing fund at 5% interest rate to the merchant bankers and then the mer-chant banks and stockbrokers will disburse the fund to the retail investors at 7% rate.”

Presently, an investor gets margin loan at the interest rate of more than 17%, which is very costly for the retail investors.

The BMBA’s came up with the proposal at a time when a Tk900 crore re� nanc-ing scheme got tepid response from the

a� ected stock investors due to tough conditions set by the regulator.

The state-run Investment Corporation of Bangladesh (ICB) received this fund in installment from the central bank at 5% interest rate. Under loan distribution guideline, it will lend to merchant banks and stockbrokers at 7% interest rate. The merchant banks and stockbrokers will then disburse the fund to the retail inves-tors at 9% rate.

BMBA president Tanjil Chowdhury put emphasis on co-ordination among regula-tors concerned to make any decision that might have any signi� cant impact on the stock market. He also sought permission for opening branches of the merchant banks to make the market vibrant.

About debate over IPO with higher premium, he said: Good companies that deserve premium should be given IPO permission.

The BMBA also put forward budget proposals, including reduction of corporate tax to 25.5% from existing 37.5% and tax exemption on margin loan provisioning. l

ANALYST

B2 Stock Wednesday, April 9, 2014DHAKA TRIBUNE

Banks drag stocks down n Tribune Report

Stocks fell yesterday as late selling pressure on banks and fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) compa-nies cut early gains despite contin-ued shining of multinational com-panies.

The market was in the positive territory almost the entire session but sello� s in the wee hour on bank, textile and, fuel and power stocks trimmed gains.

After rising over 25 points in the morning, the benchmark DSEX end-ed at 4,586 with a fall of more than 21 points or 0.7 %. However, the blue chips index DS30 was marginally up 2 points or 0.3% to close at 1,022. The Shariah index DSES saw frac-tional losses of 0.2 points to 1,682.

The Chittagong Stock Exchange Selective Category Index, CSCX, dropped 69 points to 8,872.

Strong buying and selling pres-sure has pushed DSE turnover to Tk626 crore, a jump of almost 24% from the previous session.

IDLC Investments said despite a bullish start, the session ended red as morning hype subsided at the later part. Multinational � rms continued shining, stimulated fur-ther by the corporate declaration of 400% cash dividend by Reckitt Benckiser. However, due to weak performance in other sectors, par-

ticularly mini-cap class, upbeat vibe could not sustain.

Trading of Lafarge Surma Cement and debutant Matin Spinning added to participation span. Thus, turn-over increased by 24% and crossed Tk600 crore after 25 sessions.

Lanka Bangla Securities said the market moved doughtily as multi-national manufacturing and telco stocks continued to see buying in-terest in noon trade with large vol-ume accumulation.

However, heavy sello� s on bank-ing and FMCG stocks capped the gain of the large-cap sector and, in last hour, it heavily came on bench-mark index, pushing it down, it said.

On the economic front, � nance ministry at a meeting expressed that budget de� cit of the current � scal year might go beyond the tar-get of 4.6% of GDP, which might re-sult in crowding out e� ect in bank-ing system, it said.

On the capital market front, bank continued to lose market val-ue, and it went down by 1.4%.

But other major sectors, includ-ing telecommunications, tannery, pharmaceuticals and cement, end-ed in the positive territory.

Zenith Investments said index slowed its pace, yet the high volume turnover indicates the market did not fully lose its strength to resume its bullish pattern for the future. l

News, analysis and recent disclosersFrom TradeServers:FASFIN: The Board of Directors has recommended 5.20% cash dividend for the year ended on December 31, 2013. Date of AGM: 22.05.2014, Time: 9:30 AM, Venue: Hotel Abakash, Mohakhali C/A, Dhaka-1212. Record Date: 22.04.2014. The Company has also reported consolidated EPS of Tk. 0.24, consolidated NAV per share of Tk. 13.84 and consolidated NOCFPS of Tk. (6.53) for the year ended on December 31, 2013.RECKITTBEN: The Board of Directors has recommended � nal 400% cash dividend for the year ended on December 31, 2013. Date of AGM: 06.05.2014, Time: 10:30 AM, Venue: Trust Milonayatan, Shaheed Jahangir Gate, 545 Old Airport Road, Dhaka Cantonment, Dhaka-1206. Record Date: 20.04.2014. The Company has also report-ed EPS of Tk. 27.42, NAV per share of Tk. 91.30 and NOCFPS of Tk. 32.98 for the year ended on December 31, 2013.DHAKABANK: Emerging Credit Rating Limited (ECRL) has assigned the surveil-lance rating of the Company as "AA-" in the long term and ECRL-2 in the Short term along with a stable outlook to the Company based on � nancials of the Company up to

December 31, 2013 and other relevant quali-tative information up to April 08, 2014.

NCCBLMF1: (Q1): As per un-audited quarterly accounts for the 1st quarter ended on 31st March 2014 (Jan'14 to March'14), the fund has reported net pro� t/(loss) of Tk. 40.81 million with earnings per unit of Tk. 0.38 as against Tk. (7.27) million and Tk. (0.07) respectively for the same period of the previous year.GREENDELMF: (Q3): As per un-audited quarterly accounts for the 3rd quarter end-ed on 31st March 2014 (Jan'14 to March'14), the fund has reported net pro� t/(loss) of Tk. 59.06 million with earnings per unit of Tk. 0.39 as against Tk. (84.69) million and Tk. (0.56) respectively for the same period of the previous year. Whereas net pro� t/(loss) was Tk. 92.81 million with earnings per unit of Tk. 0.62 for the period of nine months (July'13 to March'14) ended on 31.03.2014 as against Tk. (40.63) million and Tk. (0.27) respectively for the same period of the previous year.DBH1STMF: (Q3): As per un-audited quar-terly accounts for the 3rd quarter ended on 31st March 2014 (Jan'14 to March'14), the fund has reported net pro� t/(loss) of Tk.

33.92 million with earnings per unit of Tk. 0.28 as against Tk. (77.45) million and Tk. (0.65) respectively for the same period of the previous year. Whereas net pro� t/(loss) was Tk. 72.93 million with earnings per unit of Tk. 0.61 for the period of nine months (July'13 to March'14) ended on 31.03.2014 as against Tk. (60.38) million and Tk. (0.50) respectively for the same period of the previous year.RECKITTBEN: (Q1): As per un-audited quarterly accounts for the 1st quarter ended on 31st March 2014 (Jan'14 to March'14), the Company has reported pro� t after tax of Tk. 48.57 million with EPS of Tk. 10.28 as against Tk. 23.26 million and Tk. 4.92 respectively for the same period of the previous year.ECABLES: The Company will be placed in "A" category from existing "Z" category with e� ect from April 08, 2014 as the Company reported disbursement of cash dividend @ 10% for the year ended on June 30, 2013.From BIASL Desk: Impact after declaration: FASFIN price dropped 0.67%, close at taka 14.70 with PE 10.49. RECKITTBEN price up by 26.32%, close at taka 1406.90 with PE 51.31.

CSE LOSERS

Company Closing (% change)

Aver-age (%

change)

Closing average Closing Daily high Daily low Turnover

in millionLatest

EPSLatest

PE

One Bank -A -16.17 -15.49 14.13 14.00 14.80 13.80 4.664 2.44 5.8Eastland Insur -A -15.20 -12.80 39.59 38.50 40.90 38.50 0.127 3.71 10.7Northern G Insur-A -9.88 -9.88 37.40 37.40 37.40 37.40 0.019 2.00 18.7Delta Brac HFCL-A -9.22 -9.22 58.10 58.10 58.10 58.10 0.029 3.46 16.8Islami Ins.BD-A -9.18 -9.18 27.70 27.70 27.80 27.60 0.028 1.60 17.3Rangpur Foundry -A -8.60 -5.82 106.24 103.10 114.00 103.10 0.266 3.03 35.1National Housing Fin.-B -8.59 -7.97 30.02 29.80 31.00 29.50 0.090 1.39 21.6Rahima Food -Z -8.31 -9.01 41.52 40.80 44.00 40.30 0.498 -1.00 -veNational Life I -A -7.65 -7.65 302.00 302.00 302.00 302.00 0.076 12.46 24.2Rupali InsurA -7.44 -6.46 28.97 28.60 29.10 28.50 0.345 1.98 14.6

DSE LOSERS

Company Closing (% change)

Aver-age (%

change)

Closing average Closing Daily high Daily low Turnover

in millionLatest

EPSLatest

PE

One Bank -A -16.17 -15.83 14.14 14.00 16.00 13.80 32.587 2.44 5.8Eastland Insur -A -15.43 -15.06 39.10 38.90 40.70 38.20 9.782 3.71 10.5Global Insurance -A -13.57 -12.73 24.27 24.20 27.00 23.30 0.364 1.09 22.3Northern Jute -Z -9.24 -9.24 109.00 109.00 109.00 109.00 0.022 -10.24 -veRahima Food -Z -8.92 -8.32 40.90 39.80 43.50 39.50 4.928 -1.00 -veSavar Refractories-Z -8.33 -8.33 55.00 55.00 55.00 55.00 0.006 0.60 91.7Desh Garments -B -7.34 -5.65 110.12 107.30 117.00 106.00 7.433 1.18 93.3GSP Finance-A -6.64 -5.22 21.61 21.10 23.00 20.70 4.946 1.34 16.1Mercantile Bank -A -6.35 -0.73 19.12 17.70 19.50 17.20 137.866 3.00 6.4Kay & Que (BD) -Z -6.32 -6.32 17.80 17.80 17.80 17.80 0.009 -0.89 -ve

CSE TURNOVER LEADERS

Company Volume shares

Value in million

% of total turnover

Daily closing

Price change

Daily opening

Daily high

Daily low

Daily average

Matin Spinning-N 1,260,000 55.79 11.42 41.90 0.00 0.00 53.00 41.70 44.28Grameenphone-A 223,200 55.60 11.38 247.60 2.87 240.70 254.90 241.00 249.12BD Submarine Cable-A 105,900 23.14 4.74 216.80 0.23 216.30 220.00 215.30 218.49Square Pharma -A 78,872 22.44 4.59 279.40 -1.90 284.80 287.60 277.00 284.48Padma Oil Co. -A 57,654 21.22 4.34 361.60 -1.31 366.40 375.00 359.30 368.13Meghna Petroleum -A 68,260 20.00 4.09 291.00 0.38 289.90 295.80 285.00 293.03LafargeS Cement-Z 296,000 16.96 3.47 57.40 9.96 52.20 57.40 55.00 57.28RAK Ceramics-A 260,534 13.83 2.83 51.70 -0.19 51.80 54.60 49.10 53.07BSC-A 21,390 13.56 2.78 636.00 -0.20 637.30 642.00 620.30 634.04Emerald Oil Ind. -N 56,337 12.90 2.64 45.80 -3.78 47.60 48.40 45.50 228.94HeidelbergCement -A 21,400 12.14 2.48 563.30 0.99 557.80 580.00 556.00 567.24Familytex (BD) Ltd.-N 171,500 10.05 2.06 58.70 4.26 56.30 60.00 57.00 58.58Eastern Cables-Z 49,900 9.18 1.88 173.40 2.85 168.60 185.40 173.00 184.02Jamuna Oil -A 37,271 8.79 1.80 233.90 0.04 233.80 238.30 232.60 235.94BEXIMCO Ltd. -A 202,532 5.97 1.22 29.30 -2.01 29.90 30.20 29.20 29.50

DSE TURNOVER LEADERS

Company Volume shares

Value in million

% of total turnover

Daily closing

Price change

Daily opening

Daily high

Daily low

Daily average

Grameenphone-A 2,685,800 668.08 10.66 247.00 2.62 240.70 254.20 241.30 248.74Olympic Ind. -A 2,143,000 487.86 7.79 227.50 0.84 225.60 232.10 206.00 227.65Padma Oil Co. -A 835,773 308.00 4.92 361.60 -1.26 366.20 377.00 350.00 368.52HeidelbergCement -A 511,990 290.42 4.63 564.20 0.79 559.80 580.00 550.00 567.23Meghna Petroleum -A 991,387 289.74 4.62 288.60 -0.48 290.00 295.20 265.00 292.26LafargeS Cement-Z 3,814,520 218.28 3.48 57.30 9.98 52.10 57.30 55.00 57.22Square Pharma -A 717,584 203.39 3.25 279.40 -2.38 286.20 290.00 265.00 283.43Matin Spinning-N 4,380,000 193.52 3.09 41.90 0.00 0.00 50.00 41.60 44.18Familytex (BD) Ltd.-N 2,617,000 152.72 2.44 58.60 6.55 55.00 60.40 56.50 58.36Mercantile Bank -A 7,209,300 137.87 2.20 17.70 -6.35 18.90 19.50 17.20 19.12BD Submarine Cable-A 617,806 135.06 2.16 216.30 0.05 216.20 221.00 197.40 218.61Jamuna Oil -A 507,220 119.40 1.91 233.30 -0.13 233.60 240.00 220.00 235.39Renata Ltd. -A 94,591 101.29 1.62 1051.70 1.36 1037.60 1100.00 1030.00 1070.84BSC-A 151,255 95.85 1.53 636.00 -0.24 637.50 640.00 617.25 633.69Golden Son -A 1,316,373 75.55 1.21 58.20 3.93 56.00 58.70 51.70 57.39

CSE GAINERS

Company Closing (% change)

Aver-age (%

change)

Closing average Closing Daily high Daily low Turnover

in millionLatest

EPSLatest

PE

Reckitt Benckiser -A 18.23 18.23 1388.00 1388.00 1388.00 1388.00 0.069 41.12 33.8LafargeS Cement-Z 9.96 7.41 57.28 57.40 57.40 55.00 16.956 2.19 26.2Paramount Insur-A 9.63 9.89 23.90 23.90 23.90 23.90 0.012 1.51 15.8AB Bank 1st Mutual Fund-A 6.94 6.80 7.70 7.70 7.70 7.70 0.023 0.52 14.8Bata Shoe Ltd. -A 6.33 6.78 1031.30 1042.00 1042.50 1005.00 0.516 52.75 19.6Marico BD Ltd-A 5.18 5.11 1303.00 1303.80 1317.00 1270.00 0.782 46.53 28.0BATBCL -A 5.00 7.92 2638.00 2638.00 2638.00 2638.00 0.264 81.14 32.5Familytex (BD) Ltd.-N 4.26 3.21 58.58 58.70 60.00 57.00 10.047 7.26 8.1Titas Gas TDCLA 4.19 3.22 81.45 82.00 82.30 80.00 2.729 8.50 9.6Samorita Hospital -A 4.12 5.62 108.26 106.20 110.00 106.00 0.433 2.74 39.5

DSE GAINERS

Company Closing (% change)

Aver-age (%

change)

Closing average Closing Daily high Daily low Turnover

in millionLatest

EPSLatest

PE

Reckitt Benckiser -A 26.33 25.77 1,399.51 1,406.90 2,000.00 1,351.10 40.236 41.12 34.0LafargeS Cement-Z 9.98 7.37 57.22 57.30 57.30 55.00 218.283 2.19 26.1ICB AMCL IslamicMF-A 7.73 6.02 22.01 22.30 22.60 20.70 3.565 2.56 8.6Popular Life Insu. -A 6.87 5.15 247.49 250.40 254.60 215.00 27.764 17.00 14.6Familytex (BD) Ltd.-N 6.55 4.72 58.36 58.60 60.40 56.50 152.717 7.26 8.0Bata Shoe Ltd. -A 6.06 8.47 1,033.41 1,038.10 1,041.30 950.00 73.988 52.75 19.6Marico BD Ltd-A 6.01 6.52 1,308.29 1,310.80 1,313.70 1,271.00 27.932 46.53 28.1Linde (BD) Ltd. -A 4.32 6.73 1,048.01 1,038.80 1,058.30 950.00 74.015 48.55 21.6DESCO Ltd. -A 4.04 1.76 65.90 67.00 67.30 62.00 19.426 1.12 58.8Meghna Life Ins. -A 3.96 2.95 141.43 141.60 143.50 136.00 26.533 6.45 21.9

SECTORAL TURNOVER SUMMARY

Sector DSE CSE TotalMillion Taka % change Million Taka % change Million Taka % change

Bank 435.20 6.94 35.08 5.94 470.28 6.86NBFI 184.15 2.94 13.52 2.29 197.67 2.88Investment 76.60 1.22 2.85 0.48 79.45 1.16Engineering 473.85 7.56 38.78 6.56 512.62 7.48Food & Allied 669.01 10.68 36.89 6.24 705.90 10.29Fuel & Power 976.86 15.59 74.58 12.62 1051.44 15.33Jute 5.84 0.09 0.00 5.84 0.09Textile 653.20 10.42 108.64 18.39 761.84 11.11Pharma & Chemical 582.67 9.30 39.27 6.65 621.94 9.07Paper & Packaging 1.95 0.03 29.61 5.01 31.56 0.46Service 72.75 1.16 2.55 0.43 75.31 1.10Leather 166.41 2.66 35.60 6.03 202.01 2.95Ceramic 77.23 1.23 14.48 2.45 91.70 1.34Cement 577.10 9.21 34.27 5.80 611.36 8.92Information Technology 25.47 0.41 5.65 0.96 31.12 0.45General Insurance 59.35 0.95 1.89 0.32 61.24 0.89Life Insurance 182.13 2.91 10.93 1.85 193.05 2.82Telecom 803.14 12.82 78.74 13.33 881.88 12.86Travel & Leisure 49.56 0.79 4.82 0.82 54.37 0.79Miscellaneous 181.72 2.90 22.69 3.84 204.41 2.98Debenture 12.34 0.20 0.00 0.00 12.35 0.18

Daily capital market highlights

DSE Broad Index : 4586.91054 (-) 0.46% ▲

DSE Shariah Index : 1021.85178 (+) 0.21% ▲

DSE - 30 Index : 1682.07570 (-) 0.01% ▲

CSE All Share Index: 14137.8028 (-) 0.52% ▲

CSE - 30 Index : 11882.6542 (-) 0.90% ▲

CSE Selected Index : 8872.6767 (-) 0.77% ▲

DSE key features April 8, 2014Turnover (Million Taka)

6,266.52

Turnover (Volume)

93,350,324

Number of Contract 122,637

Traded Issues 290

Issue Gain (Avg. Price Basis)

65

Issue Loss (Avg. Price Basis)

220

Unchanged Issue (Avg. Price Basis)

5

Market Capital Equity (Billion. Tk.)

2,343.65

Market Capital Equity (Billion US$)

28.41

CSE key features April 8, 2014Turnover (Million Taka) 503.20

Turnover (Volume) 9,280,579

Number of Contract 18,467

Traded Issues 224

Issue Gain (Avg. Price Basis)

48

Issue Loss (Avg. Price Basis)

170

Unchanged Issue (Avg. Price Basis)

5

Market Capital Equity (Billion. Tk.)

2,234.98

Market Capital Equity (Billion US$)

27.09

Prepared exclusively for Dhaka Tribune by Business Information Automation Service Line (BIASL), on the basis of information collected from daily stock quotations and audited reports of the listed companies. High level of caution has been taken to collect and present the above information and data. The publisher will not take any responsibility if any body uses this information and data for his/her investment decision. For any query please email to biasl@bol-online.com or call 01552153562 or go to www.biasl.net

Despite a bullish start, the session ended red as morning hype subsided at the later part

B3BusinessDHAKA TRIBUNE Wednesday, April 9, 2014

Managing Director Shareq Fahim Haque of Hyundai Motors Bangladesh Limited and Noor Mohammed Bhuiyan, managing director and CEO of Guardian Life Insurance Limited recently signed, on behalf of their companies, a contract for group life insurance coverage for the employees of Hyundai Motors Bangladesh Limited

A corporate agreement has been singed yesterday between Union Bank Ltd and Aysha Memorial Specialized Hospital at the bank’s head o� ce. SEVP of Union Bank, SAM Salimullah and director of the hospital, Dr Asish Kumar Chakraborty have signed the agreement

Diamond World yesterday inaugurated its 4th showroom at Ijab Islam Tower in Pallabi, Mirpur, Dhaka. The showroom inaugurate by Achal Agarwal, daughter of the managing director of Diamond World Ltd, Dilip Kumar Agarwal

The inauguration ceremony of Marcel’s exclusive showroom, Khaza Electronics was held recently at Tuker Bazar, Companigonj, Sylhet . Amin Khan, � lm actor inaugurated the showroom at the presence of the company’s executive director (PR and media), Mosharof Hossain Rajib

Annual Marketing and Sales Conference 2014 of ACI Pharma Business held on April 3 at Hotel Sea Palace in Cox’s Bazar. The company’s managing director, Dr Arif Dowla was present at the conference

Engr Farasath Ali (left) and Dr Tou� que Rahman Chowdhury have been re-elected as the chairperson and vice chairperson of NRBCB at the bank’s 18th board meeting held last week

FAR Chemical IPO oversubscribed by 73 times n Tribune Report

The IPO (Initial public o� ering) of FAR Chemical Industries Ltd, a textile chemical manufacturer and a concern of FAR Group, has been oversubscribed by more than 73 times on o� er.

Investors ordered shares worth over Tk878 crore against the o� er of Tk12 crore, according to the Chittagong Stock Exchange.

The company issued 1.2 crore ordinary shares of Tk10 each. The IPO proceeds will be used to purchase capital machin-ery for increasing production capacity and meet the expenses of IPO process.

Located at Comilla EPZ, the compa-ny produces all types of textile chemi-cals needed the Group’s 100% export-oriented textile units. The earnings per share of the company was Tk5.01 and the net asset value per share of Tk15.55 at the end of June 2013, according to its audited � nancial statement. l

Matin Spinning debut upsets investors n Tahmidur Rahman

Matin Spinning Mills Ltd stocks saw a price hike of 13% in its debut yesterday – an increase nowhere close to the de-but prices of other companies recently listed on the stock exchanges.

The price against trend has frustrat-ed the eager investors, analysts said.

The listed mill went against the trend as previously seen several other issues rising up to four times of their latest net asset price due to having ex-cess demand for the stocks.

Investors ordered shares worth over Tk832 crore against the o� er of Tk126 crore, according to the Chittagong Stock Exchange. The over-subscrip-tion, therefore, was more than six times the o� ered value.

“The stock did not deliver in ac-cordance with the over-expectation in the market as we have seen in the recent times. This reaction to the mar-ket, however, seems rational,” said Md Moniruzzaman, managing director of

IDLC Investments Ltd, the issue man-ager.

He said the newly listed company would be attracting investors once it starts making the best out of its plant expansion plans.

The stock closed at Tk41.9 with a traded value of Tk19.3 crore or 3% of

the day’s total turnover at Dhaka Stock Exchange.

The o� ered value for the stocks was set at Tk37 each, including a premium of Tk27.

The IPO proceeds of Tk123 crore will be used to expand its existing plant (Melange Project) and rest of the

amount for meeting expenses of IPO process.

The yarn exporter has made a year-ly pro� t of Tk25.2 crore in 2013 while Tk20.5 crore in 2012 and has sustained its pro� tability during the second half of the current � scal despite economic turbulence.

From July to December last year, the company made pro� ts of Tk12.86 crore, a slight increase from Tk12.8 crore a year earlier, according to its � -nancial statements.

Nevertheless, the company has shown substantial drop in annual sales � gure in 2013 against 2012 and compensated the gap with increase of other income such as foreign currency exchange gain that changed by Tk2.2 crore in 2013.

Matin Spinning Mills, an export-ori-ented cotton-spinning mill from DBL Group, started commercial operation in October 2006. It is the 34th listed company in the textile sector at the Dhaka Stock Exchange. l

Shefaq re-appointed IDRA Chairmann Tribune Report

M Shefaq Ahmed has been re-appoint-ed as Chairman of Insurance Develop-ment and Regulatory Authority (IDRA).

“M Shefaq Ahmed has been ap-pointed as Chairman for contractual three years,” said a statement issued yesterday by the Ministry of Public Ad-ministration.

Previously, he had served as the Chairman of IDRA from January 2011 to January 2014. l

Fund constraint to delay300MW power plantn Tribune Report

Bangladesh Power Development Board (BPDB) could not yet mobilise fund for the 300MW Shahzibazar combined cy-cle power project.

It might cause delays in implementa-tion of the project. To facilitate mobilis-ing the fund, the � nance division on April

2 agreed to issue sovereign guarantee in response to a BPDB plea, o� cials said.

BPDB had signed the turn-key con-tract with Chinese joint venture Guan-dong Power Engineering Corporation and Guandong Electric Power Design Institute for the gas-� red power project on May 20 last year. The estimated cost of the contract is Tk334 crore. l

Oil prices rise on Ukraine fearsn AFP, Singapore

Oil prices rose in Asian trade yesterday on renewed fears about Ukraine after pro-Russian protesters seized govern-ment buildings in the eastern city of Donetsk.

New York’s main contract West Tex-as Intermediate (WTI) for May delivery rose 51 cents to $100.95 a barrel in after-noon trade and Brent North Sea crude for May gained 26 cents to $106.08.

The pro-Kremlin militants on Mon-day declared independence and vowed to hold a vote on joining Russia, fuel-ling concerns that Ukraine will frag-ment after Crimea was absorbed into its giant neighbour last month following a controversial referendum. Since Russia took control of Crimea, several mainly Russian-speaking eastern regions in the ex-Soviet state have seen calls for simi-lar votes by pro-Kremlin groups.

“The returning tensions in Ukraine are de� nitely providing some support to oil prices,” Desmond Chua, market analyst at CMC Markets in Singapore, told AFP.

“Investors are watching closely for clues about Russia’s intentions regard-ing Ukraine,” he added. l

IMF sees rich nations propelling global growth, but risks lingern Reuters

The International Monetary Fund yes-terday predicted the global recovery would strengthen this year and next as output in richer nations picked up, but it warned of rising risks in emerg-ing economies.

In its latest global economic snap-shot, the Washington-based IMF nev-ertheless said better policies were needed in both advanced and emerg-ing nations to avoid a prolonged period of sluggish growth.

Global output should expand 3.6% this year, slightly lower than forecast in January, and grow 3.9% next year, the IMF said in its � agship “World Econom-ic Outlook.” That would make 2015 the strongest year of growth in four years.

But the numbers mask an increas-ing divergence among countries. While less � scal austerity should help un-shackle growth in the United States and Europe, emerging markets are likely to grow more slowly than thought just a few months ago, the IMF said.

Geopolitical risks have also entered the picture because of the con� ict be-tween Russia and Western countries over Ukraine.

“The strengthening of the recovery from the Great Recession in the ad-vanced economies is a welcome de-velopment,” the IMF said. “But growth is not evenly robust across the globe, and more policy e� orts are needed to fully restore con� dence, ensure robust growth, and lower downside risks.”

Despite weather-related weakness at the start of the year, the IMF said the United States should enjoy above-trend growth of 2.8% this year thanks to less severe budget cutting, a re-covering housing market and an easy monetary policy.

It said it did not expect the US Fed-eral Reserve to raise interest rates until the third quarter of next year.

Economic activity in the euro zone should pick up slightly as countries slow the pace of � scal austerity, even though the currency bloc continues to su� er from � nancial fragmentation

and weak credit supply and demand, it said.

The IMF repeated warnings about the very low level of in� ation in the euro zone and said it saw about a 20% chance of growth-sapping de� ation in the region.

“Sustained low in� ation would not likely be conducive to a suitable recov-ery of economic growth,” the IMF said, calling again on the European Central Bank to ease monetary policy.

“We hope they will implement (policies) as soon as they’re technically ready to do so. Sooner is better than later,” IMF chief economist Olivier Blanchard said at a news conference.

De� ation is less of an immediate threat to Japan than it has been in the past, the IMF said, largely because a planned increase in the consumption tax would raise prices.

But it said the tax hike would likely cut into Japan’s growth and warned of a one in � ve chance the world’s third-largest economy could slip into reces-sion this year. l

Yen rises in Asian AFP, Tokyo

The yen rose in Asia Tuesday as the head of the Bank of Japan quashed hopes for an imminent expansion to its stimulus programme, and said the economy would not be severely hurt by a recent sales tax rise.

The dollar slipped to 102.56 yen in late Tokyo afternoon trade from 102.90 yen before the BoJ governor’s comments and 103.09 yen in New York Monday.

The euro also weakened to 141.22 yen from 141.65 yen in US trade., while it rose to $1.3769, from $1.3740.

The dollar has been under pressure after lacklustre US jobs data last week cut expectations of tighter monetary policy from the Federal Reserve.

On Tuesday, BoJ chief Haruhiko Kuroda said the world’s number-three economy was pushing ahead despite fears the tax rise introduced on April 1 will dampen consumer spending and derail a budding recovery.

The tax is seen as crucial to shrinking Japan’s mountainous debt burden but it has fuelled speculation the BoJ will have to add to its stimulus sooner than later.

The last time Japan introduced in a higher sales levy, in 1997, it was fol-lowed by years of de� ation and tepid economic growth that de� ned the country’s protracted slump. l

BGMEA urges brands PAGE 1 COLUMN 4grave that it needs to be asked for sus-pension of production immediately.

“O� course, if the lacking is large in parameters, the factory should be marked as red.”

The association urged the Accord, a platform of Western brands, to keep trust on the manufactures.

According to the meeting sources, the garment owners wanted the Accord in-clude apparel makers’ representative in the steering committee of Accord to re-duce confusions and � nd easy solutions to problems arisen from ongoing inspections.

The garment manufacturers op-posed making the inspection reports public as it “could damage their image.”

“Public disclosure of factory-specif-

ic inspection reports may cause dam-age to our business and reputation of the factories,” said an owner who was present at the meeting.

“That’s why we urged the Accord not to make inspection reports public.”

On February 20, the Accord, a platform of 150 European retailers, launched the � rst phase of inspection and inspected over 275 factories for � re and electrical safety and over 200 facto-ries were inspected for structural safety.

Among the inspected factories, tree buildings were identi� ed as � awed while production of 10 factories sus-pended on structural faults.

On the other hand, the Alliance for Workers Safety in Bangladesh had inspect-ed 305 factories and found no faults. l

BSEC chief and members B 1 COLUMN 1Public Administration Ministry could issue an order regarding the exten-sion of the o� cials any time this week, sources said.

As per the Prime Minister’s propos-al, tenures of the BSEC chairman Prof M Khairul Hossain, commissioners M Helaluddin Nizami and Arif Khan will be extended for four years after expiry of their respective contracts.

Tenure of commissioners M A Salam Sikdar will be extended by two years and six months and Amjad Hossain by three years and 11 months after expiry of their respective contracts.

Finance Minister AMA Muhith com-mented: “The performance of BSEC Chairman Prof M Khairul Hossain and the four members was good as we saw the country’s two bourses remain more or less stable in their time.”

“I want to extend their tenure by an-other term as the chairman and mem-bers’ hard work and directives made the stock markets stable for a time,” said Fi-nance Minister in the proposal to the PM.

The whole BSEC management will be serving the extended period, he said. The government’s new adminis-trative division would clear matters re-lated to their salaries and allowances. l

Ecnec okays 365MW power plantn Tribune Report

The government has approved con-struction of Ghorashal 365MW Com-bined Cycle Power Plant at a cost of Tk2,511 crore.

With this project, a total of four development projects worth Tk2,793 crore were approved at a meeting of the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (Ecnec) at NEC con-ference room yesterday. Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina chaired the meeting.

Of the total cost for Ghorasal power plant project, the government will pro-vide Tk745 crore, implementing organ-isation will lend Tk113 crore and Indus-trial and Commercial Bank of China

Tk1,653 crore. Bangladesh Power Development

Board is entrusted to implement the project by June, 2016.

“Of the total project cost, the govern-ment will provide Tk913.82 crore from the national exchequer and Tk1,766.3 crore would come as project assistance and an organisation concerned will con-tribute Tk113.30 crore,” Planning Com-mission Member Hedayetullah Al Ma-mun told reporters after the meeting.

The Ecnec also approved Establish-ment of Artistic Academy involving TK54 crore in Dhaka to bring the artis-tic children into the mainstream educa-tion system. Directorate of Secondary and Higher Education will implement

the project by December, 2016. Another development project “Es-

tablishment of National Institute of Ad-vanced Practice Nurses in Bangladesh” has also been approved by Ecnec involv-ing Tk128 crore in a bid to enhance the skills of the nurses trainers as well as to groom skilled nurses to enrich the health-care services considering the global grow-ing demand of the nursing profession.

The Institute would be set up in city’s Mugda under the supervision of the Health and Family Welfare Ministry to be constructed by June 2018. Of the total project cost, Koica will provide Tk112.84 crore as grant while the rest of Tk15 crore will come from the national exchequer. l

5 key challenges a Modi government would facen Reuters, Mumbai

From convincing sceptical bond inves-tors that the � scal de� cit can be con-tained to concerns that El Nino will devastate agricultural crops, any new government in India will face urgent and critical challenges with no easy solutions.

Expectations the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its leader Narendra Modi will win elections that started this week with a new approach to In-dia’s economic problems have helped send shares to record highs and the ru-pee to an eight-month peak.

To some investors that optimism is misplaced. Should Modi win the elec-tions, his government will face its � rst credibility test with markets when he delivers a budget by June or July that will need to show the country can real-istically contain its � scal de� cit.

That will be followed by key deci-sions on the current account de� cit, on the relationship with a hawkish Reserve Bank of India, on how much funds to sink into troubled state lend-ers, and on how to get states to pro-mote private investments.

The BJP promised � scal discipline and banking reforms among other pol-icy plans when it announced its elec-tion manifesto on Monday, but gave no details.

Below are � ve key challenges facing a new government, none of them easy to � x.

Delivering a budget that contains the fiscal deficitAny new government will need to � x � nances that are in dire straits, and about to get worse.

To achieve a revised � scal de� cit target of 4.6% of gross domestic prod-uct (GDP) for the year ended in March, the Congress-led government cut spending by $13bn and pushed about $16bn in subsidy costs into the new year.

That austerity could prove hard to sustain. Spending accounts for 11% of India’s GDP, o� ering a critical growth lever. Continuing to defer payments to state-run companies that would com-pensate them for selling fuel, fertiliser and food below market prices, can cre-ate havoc with their � nances and make them rely on borrowings to fund op-erations.

Meanwhile, tax revenues are un-

likely to recover immediately in a weak economy. The government’s tax-to-GDP ratio has slipped to 10.2% from a peak of 12.5% in 2007/08.

The interim budget from Finance Minister P Chidambaram in February was greeted with widespread scepti-cism.

It sought, for example, seek to con-tain the � scal de� cit at 4.1% of GDP in 2014/15, the lowest in seven years, while keeping spending growth at just 10.9% compared to a recent average of about 15%.

Finance ministers in the past six years have sold an ever-growing

amount of debt to bond investors, a so-lution unlikely to please markets as it pushes liabilities to the future.

A realistic and � scally prudent bud-get is also critical given Standard & Poor’s Ratings Services has a negative outlook on its “BBB-minus” rating for India, and has said the policy agenda from a new government will deter-mine whether the country can avert a downgrade to “junk.

Narrowing the current account deficitA sharp narrowing in the current ac-count de� cit, to an expected 2% of GDP from a record high 4.8% in the previ-ous � scal year, was helped by steps to curb gold imports.

Higher duties and other restrictions almost halved gold imports but the moves have been deeply unpopular with Indian households who invest in the yellow metal to protect their sav-ings from in� ation and to provide gifts

at weddings and on other special occa-sions.

Gold smuggling is also suspected to have surged after the measures, cast-ing doubt on the reported data.

The BJP has promised to review gold import duties within three months of coming to power. Getting rid of them may please gold buyers, but not inves-tors, as concerns about the current ac-count de� cit had sent the rupee to a record low in August.

Fixing the structural challenges that keep the current account de� cit wide - such as weak manufacturing exports - could take years to reverse.

Dealing with rbi and el ninoA new government may face a factor beyond its control: the El Nino weather pattern typically associated with weak rains.

Analysts caution El Nino could bat-ter Indian agricultural output. Citi-group estimates that below average rainfall in the June-September mon-soon could shave 0.50-0.90 percentage points o� its economic growth forecast and lead to a spike in consumer in� a-tion.

A good monsoon last year was one spot of relief in an otherwise bleak eco-nomic picture with growth estimated at less that 5% in the � scal year that ended on March 31, close to the slow-est in a decade.

Surging in� ation could also spark tension with a central bank that under Governor Raghuram Rajan has made containing in� ation a priority.

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI)

wants to bring down annual consumer price in� ation to around 6% from the current 8.1% by January 2016, which would likely mean more interest rate increases. The RBI has raised rates three times since September.

Reviving the private investment cycleMarket hopes on Modi lie largely on perceptions of his track record as chief minister in Gujarat, where he is widely credited with attracting investment.

However, analysts say replicating that nationwide would be di� cult giv-en that states wield much of the power in approving projects. Credit Suisse estimates only one-fourth of pending projects depend on central govern-ment approval.

In its manifesto, the BJP promised to cut red tape and encourage foreign investment in sectors needed for job and asset creation. But it said it was opposed to foreign investment in multi-brand retail.

Capital investment contributes nearly 35% to India’s economy, but it barely grew in the � scal year that end-ed in March as delays in clearances and funding issues grounded many infra-structure projects.

That is particularly the case with state electricity boards, which remain hobbled by losses caused in part by costly fuel and little pricing power.

Short of recapitalising state utilities, the central government has few choic-es in pushing for a restructuring. Coal supply is also a key constraint, in large part due to the � nancial di� culties at state power generators.

Recapitalising state-run banksIndia needs to � x the piles of bad loans at the country’s state-run lenders, with stressed loans totalling $100bn, or about 10% of all loans.

The bulk of these bad loans are re-lated to infrastructure projects, which have made banks circumspect in lend-ing.

The interim budget set aside 112 billion rupees to help the sector meet minimal capital ratios mandated by Ba-sel III norms, but more will be needed, according to analysts, creating tough � scal choices for a new government

The BJP has tended to lean towards privatisation, raising the prospect of stake sales, although the party has not addressed the issue in the run-up to the polls. l

B4 Back PageDHAKA TRIBUNE Wednesday, April 9, 2014

A robotic pianist called 'Teotronica' performs at the Hannover Messe industrial trade fair in Hanover, central Germany on April 7. The Netherlands is the partner country of this year's trade fair running from April 7 to 11 and presenting a cross section of key industrial technologies AFP

UN: Global renewable energy investments slumped 14% in 2013n AFP, Paris

Global investments in renewable en-ergy slumped 14% last year, with China pouring more money into the sector than Europe for the � rst time on re-cord, the UN said Monday.

Investments in renewables apart from hydroelectricity dipped to $214.4bn in 2013, down $35.1bn from the previous year and 23% below the record set in 2011, according to a report from the UN Environment Programme (UNEP).

The fall was down to “political un-certainty in several markets,” mean-ing the lack of clarity over government support for the sector, and the falling cost of solar systems, said the report.

“While some may point to the fact that overall investment in renewables fell in 2013, the drop masks the many positive signals of a dynamic market that is fast evolving and maturing,” Achim Steiner, Executive Director of UNEP, said in a statement.

The � gures come as a panel of UN climate change experts issued its stark-est-ever warning about the perils of a ravaged climate system for future gen-erations.

“The impacts of climate change will

leave no part of the world untouched and una� ected,” chairman of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Rajendra Pachauri said Monday.

In Europe, which has been a global leader in supporting the develop-ment of renewable energy, investment plunged 44% to $48bn (35bn euros) last year, UNEP said.

That compares to a 6% fall in China, to $56bn, and a reduction of a tenth in the United States, to $36bn.

After nine years of growth, last year was the � rst time investments in re-newables fell in emerging economies, the report found.

Still, the news wasn’t all bad for the renewable energy sector.

Overall, its share of world electricity generation rose to 8.5%, up from 7.8% in 2012. Excluding hydroelectricity, re-newables accounted for 43.6% of new-ly installed generating capacity in 2013.

Solar energy still has the strongest backing from investors, even though the average price of installing a solar panel has dropped by 60%.

Renewable energy companies also got more backing from private investors, with equity-raisings doubling to a record $11bn over the year, the UN said. l

By region, in billions of US dollars

53.439.7 35.8

8.7 9.7 6.8 3.1 3.210.4 9.0

114.8

86.4

48.4

12.625.3 29.5

43.3

7.2 6.1

51.959.6 56.3

9.9 12.4

BrazilMid East,

Africa

**except China,India

Americas*

*except US, Brazil

Investment in renewable energy

Source: UNEP

USAEurope Asia** China India

2011 12 13

Brazil study forecasts Cup gainsn AFP, Sao Paulo

World Cup-related spending will give Brazil a major shot in the arm, tripling a $4.2bn contribution to the economy made at last year’s Confederations Cup, a study by the Institute for Eco-nomic Research Foundation (FIPE) revealed Monday.

The study for state tourist board Embratur estimated the June 12-July 13 tournament should more than tri-ple last year’s $4.2bn gain which ema-nated from a total $9bn spending at the Confederations Cup, a World Cup dress rehearsal.

“The expectation is that the World Cup will generate three times this

value,” a Tourism Ministry statement said.

Brazil has invested more than $11bn in this year’s extravaganza on new stadiums and infrastructure as the giant Latin American nation of 200 million stages its � rst World Cup since 1950.

But many citizens are appalled at the price tag in a country whose pub-lic services and infrastructure are in urgent need of a major overhaul.

Last year, more than a million peo-ple took to the streets during the Con-federations Cup to protest at spending on the tournament and World Cup.

Monday’s study showed that just 58% of the cash generated by the Con-

federations Cup remained in the six host venues - the World Cup will have 12 - with the remainder being distrib-uted countrywide.

“This result shows that the impact of the tournament is not restricted to match venues. The impact is for the whole of Brazil,” Tourism Minister Vinicius Lages said in the report.

Brazil’s economy, after a period of strong growth over the past decade, has faltered more recently and last month Standard & Poor’s lowered the country’s credit rating to BBB-, the lowest level for investment grade debt.

Moody’s rating agency signalled last week that the World Cup would have only a minor e� ect on the econ-

omy as a whole, although it forecast some sectors such as retail, food and beverages, accommodation and ad-vertising sectors would bene� t.

Brazil expects to welcome some 600,000 foreign visitors to the World Cup and some three million domestic tourists are expected to criss-cross the country.

The two-week Confederations event saw 303,000 jobs created and the World Cup will see some 48,000 jobs created in tourism alone, accord-ing to the National Confederation of Commerce.

The World Cup is expected to boost GDP by around 0.5%, analysts fore-cast. l

US warns China over currency depreciationn Reuters, Washington

The United States warned Beijing on Monday that the recent depreciation of the Chinese currency could raise “se-rious concerns” if it signaled a policy shift away from allowing market-de-termined exchange rates.

Washington has been pressing Chi-na for years to allow its currency to trade at stronger values. Last month, US Treasury Secretary Jack Lew wel-comed a decision by China to allow its currency to vary more against the dol-lar in daily trading.

Monday’s comments by a senior of-� cial from the Treasury Department suggested the United States was not completely sold on China’s intention to reduce authorities’ interventions in exchange markets.

“If the recent currency weakness signals a change in China’s policy away from allowing adjustment and moving toward a market-determined exchange rate, that would raise serious con-cerns,” the o� cial, who asked not to be named, told journalists in a phone call.

A weak yuan makes Chinese exports cheaper for US consumers at the ex-pense of US producers. A weaker yuan also makes Chinese consumers less able to buy foreign goods.

In comments that outlined US posi-tions before meetings later this week of the International Monetary Fund and between Group of 20 nations, the o� cial noted the widening of China’s currency trading band came just after a

drop in the yuan’s value that coincided with reports of “considerable interven-tion” in exchange markets by Chinese authorities. That is exactly the sort of behaviour Washington wants Beijing to ditch.

China’s foreign ministry, which has no say in currency policy but is the only government department to regu-larly answer foreign reporters’ ques-tions, said Beijing was committed to reform.

“We will continue to resolutely push forward reform of the renminbi exchange rate mechanism,” ministry spokesman Hong Lei told a daily news brie� ng in Beijing on Tuesday, using the currency’s formal name.

The United States also appears likely to pressure Europe at the meetings to act more decisively to � x its troubled banking sector.

The Treasury o� cial said recent economic data from Europe showed the region was experiencing “chron-ic low in� ation and weak demand.” That appeared to be a nod to growing concerns that Europe’s economy is so weak it risks falling into de� ation - a dangerous spiral of falling prices and wages.

“More needs to be done to support growth,” the Treasury o� cial said.

The o� cial had blunt words for other economic powers as well, saying that Japan should avoid engaging in too much � scal austerity.

He said US sanctions on Russian of-� cials were already having an impact on Russia’s economy. The o� cial also chided emerging markets for going too slowly in adopting free-� oating cur-rencies.

“Resistance in many emerging mar-kets to moving more quickly to mar-ket-determined exchange rate regimes is hindering the rebalancing needed to ensure a lasting, strong global recov-ery,” the o� cial said. l

DILBERT

We will continue to resolutely push forward reform of the renminbi exchange rate mechanism