Ramna Batamul killing caseverdict todayn Md Sanaul Islam Tipu

The much-awaited verdict in sensa-tional Ramna Batamul killing case is set to be pronounced today, 13 years after the bomb blasts which killed at least 10 people during the Pahela Baishakh cel-ebrations.

Judge Ruhul Amin of the Dhaka’s Second Additional Metropolitan Ses-sions Judge’s Court will hand down the verdict around noon.

However, verdict in other case, in-volving explosives, is uncertain as a petition seeking the Supreme Court registrar’s opinion is still pending.

Mufti Abdul Hannan, chief of the banned militant out� t Harkat-ul-Jihad-al Islami (Huji), and it’s 13 other leaders and activists are accused in the case. Hannan in a confessional statement before the magistrate said they had car-ried out the bomb attack as celebrating the Bangla New Year was “anti-Islamic.”

As per an order of the court oo May 28, the verdict was � rst set to be deliv-ered on June 16. But the date was later revised since the judgement had not been ready.

Md Abdullah Abu, public prosecutor of the Metropolitan Sessions Judge’s Court, yesterday told the Dhaka Trib-une that the prosecution had been able to prove the charges against the accused. He hoped that all the accused would get the capital punishment.

OC (prosecution) of the court Abu Musa Sheikh told the Dhaka Tribune

PAGE 2 COLUMN 2

3 | NewsIsolux Ingenieria SA of Spain and Samsung C&T Corporation of South Korea are set to get the job of building the Bibiyana South, a 400MW gas-based combined cycle power plant project, in Habiganj as an engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contractor.

4 | NewsThe o� cers of four batches of Bangladesh Civil Service (admin cadre) have expressed dissatisfaction as they have yet to get promotions, even after a decision was taken in this regard.

5 | NewsPresence of harmful chemicals in the air in Dhaka and other cities, which

cause respiratory problems and a� ect the brain and heart, is much lower than the permissible level, Environment Minister Anwar Hossain tells parliament yesterday.

6 | NationThe lives of people in several districts of the country have been hampered because of the continuous rainfall for the last three days.

8 | WorldSunni militants have seized another town in Iraq’s western Anbar province, the fourth to fall in two days, o� cials said yesterday, in what is shaping up to be a major o� ensive in one of Iraq’s most restive regions.

INSIDE

7 | THE STATE OF DEMOCRACY IN BANGLADESH

20 pages | Price: Tk12MONDAY, JUNE 23, 2014 | www.dhakatribune.com | SECOND EDITION

Ashar 9, 1421Shaaban 24, 1435Regd. No. DA 6238Vol 2, No 83

B1 | TUS BLAMED FOR ANTI-RMG PROPAGANDA 11 | THE END OF AN ERA

15

WC MATCHES

Jun 25, 20142am Japan vs Colombia2am Greece vs Côte d’Ivoire10pm Nigeria vs Argentina10pm Bosnia-Herzegovina vs IranJun 26, 20142am Honduras vs Switzerland2am Ecuador vs France10pm USA vs Germany10pm Portugal vs Ghana

Jun 23, 201410pm Australia vs Spain10pm Netherlands vs ChileJun 24, 20142am Cameroon vs Brazil2am Croatia vs Mexico10pm Italy vs Uruguay10pm Costa Rica vs England

Belgium’s Divock Origi (L) scores the only goal against Russia at the Maracana stadium in Rio de Janeiro yesterday. Belgium won the match 1-0 REUTERS

Brazil in search of goals

There is no easy way to put this but Brazilian fans want goals against Cameroon in their last

group match today after what has been an underwhelming tournament for the hosts so far.

Standing outside the beautiful na-tional stadium named after mercurial forward Garrincha, a number of Bra-zilian fans said they were disappointed with the goalless draw against Mexico. “They missed a lot of chances, Brazil-ian attackers are not performing as well as the nation wants, we hope there will

score some goals against Cameroon to-day,” said Atalia Piheiro, in her broken English, her friends another � ve girls echoed the same tune,  “We want goals and a big win” they said.

Brazil’s forward line with the excep-tion of Neymar have played well blow par with Fred who started the last two matches looking completely out of sorts in front of goal. And his statistics don’t lie, Fred has produced a solitary attempt on goal in 158 minutes he has played – a header from a corner. He completed 10 accurate passes against Croatia – a game when he failed to make a single run into the attacking third. Only half of the 16 passes he made dur-ing his 68 minutes on the pitch against PAGE 2 COLUMN 4

Illegal trades of Bihari Chairman Jalaluddin He earns Tk3-4 lakh every month by providing illegal power linesn Tazlina Zamila Khan

Jalaluddin Bhantu, chairperson of Kur-mitola Relief Committee, has earned a fortune allegedly by extorting money from his own Bihari community mem-bers for the past four years.

Most members of the community al-leged that Jalal’s accomplices “Napak” Raju, Md Asgar, Murad, Jabed, Selim, Bholu, Kamal and “Dariwala” Raju col-lect Tk50 to Tk1,000 from each house of East Kurmitola New Camp every month.

Riaz Uddin Ahmed, senior vice-pres-ident of Bangladeshi Bihari Rehabilita-tion Sangsad, told the Dhaka Tribune: “During last Ramadan, Tk500 was col-lected from each of the houses. Now they are demanding money ahead of this year’s Ramadan.

“Jalaluddin is our chairman and his duty is to look after us. But he is a bad man. He verbally abuses us.”

Neaz Ahmed Khan, chief patron of the Kurmitola Relief Committee, said: “Many unlawful acts take place inthe camps.”

Jalaluddin has been allegedly pro-

viding illegal electricity connections to houses in the camps in exchange for money. Many told the Dhaka Tribune that they had got their connections from him and pay a monthly bill of Tk50-60 to his men.

Riaz Uddin Ahmed said a complaint on behalf of the camp members had been submitted to the deputy commis-sioner on June 19.

The complaint reads: “Jalaluddin deliberately excluded East Kurmitola Camp, Irani Camp, Medical Camp, Mu-rapara Camp and School Camp from the government’s list of recipients of free electricity by bribing o� cials. He now takes money to provide illegal connections and earns around Tk3-4 lakh every month.

“Mirpur 11 Relief Committee mem-ber Sarfaraz, Sanaullah, Mostaq, Fak-ku, Bablu and Golam Gaus Guddu are providing electricity from the Bihari camp to around 1,500 shops of New Society Market in Mirpur and are earn-ing Tk4-5 lakh. As a result, the people from the camp are experiencing power outage.”

PAGE 2 COLUMN 5

Residents of Maulvirtek area in the capital’s Khilgaon have been forced to wade through dirty water every day for the past two months as over� owing waste from the sewerage lines inundate the alleys. The photo taken yesterday shows how even a brief spell of rain causes the water to reach knee-deep level MEHEDI HASAN

Khaleda revives her caretaker government demandn Mohammad Al-Masum Molla

from Joypurhat

BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia warned yesterday that hartals, blockades and a non-cooperation movement would be waged if the government did not hold a dialogue about holding fresh elections under a non-partisan government.

However, the former prime minister also said the election had to be held un-der a nonpartisan arrangement even if the talks never took place.

“For the time being, there will be no hartal. But we will announce all sorts of programmes after Eid and if the government creates any obstacle, we will be compelled to announce tough-

er programmes,” she said in front of thousands of cheering BNP leaders and activists at the RB High School play-ground in Joypurhart.

Despite heavy downpours, thou-sands of people attended Khaleda’s rally. Joypurhat district BNP organised the rally to drum up public support in favour of the demand for an election

under a non-partisan interim govern-ment and protesting the recent spike in killings, abductions and forced disap-pearances.

She said they would accept whoever came to power if the election was over-seen by a neutral body.

She claimed that her party and allies PAGE 2 COLUMN 1

from Brasilia, Brazil

News2 DHAKA TRIBUNE Monday, June 23, 2014

Life-term proposed in Formalin Control Law n Tribune Report

Commerce Minister Tofail Ahmed yes-terday said the government was � nal-ising the draft Formalin Control Law, keeping a provision of life-term impris-onment as the maximum punishment.

On November 4 last year, the cabi-net approved the draft law, in principle, which suggested 10 years of jail as the highest punishment.

Speaking to reporters at his Secre-tariat o� ce, the minister said the draft law would soon be placed before the cabinet for � nal approval.

Commerce Ministry Additional Sec-retary ATM Murtaza Reza Chowdhury told journalists that the government had rede� ned formalin in consultation with experts from Buet, Dhaka Univer-sity and the BCSIR.

Formalin is usually used in laborato-ries, hospitals, tanneries and hatcher-ies. These days, some dishonest traders have been using it to preserve fruits, vegetables and � sh. l

14 burnt in gas pipeline blastn Ashif Islam Shaon

At least 14 people including a CNG-run auto-rickshaw driver sustained burn inju-ries in Feni in an explosion caused by a gas pipeline at a CNG � lling station yesterday.

Of the victims, ten critically injured were rushed to the Dhaka Medical Col-lege Hospital's (DMCH) Burn Unit with severe burn injuries.

The condition of the six injured were said to be critical.

The injured are 30-year-old Md Ha-run with 30% burn, Yar Ahmed, 45, with 26% burn, a technician of the � ll-ing station 40-year-old Ra� qul Islam with 60% burn, Bappi, 25, with 20% burn, Abdullah Al-Mamun, 35, with 65% burn, Abdur Rahim, 25, with 11% burn, Nurul Amin, 45, with 65% burn, Wasim, 40, with 50% burn and Abu

Sayeed, 17, with 20% burn.Wasim, a sub-engineer of the Ma-

jumder Gas Filling Station in Chagal-naiya municipality area said they had had some technical problems in the gas supply in the last three days.

“The gas from the reserved tank was not passing properly to the supply line. We have been repairing it for the last three days,” he said.

Yesterday around 1pm as the repair was done to the gas line, it was opened for a test run but within a second the line exploded and caught on � re, he said.

At the time of the � re, CNG-run auto rickshaws and some cars were in queue for refueling. Some drivers along with the � lling station sta� also sustained injuries.

According to Wasim, injured Ra� qul Islam, Abdullah Al-Mamum are techni-cians, Nurul Amin and Abu Sayeed are

sta� . Police identi� ed Bappi and Ra-him as auto-rickshaw drivers. The oth-er injured was a passenger of a vehicle waiting in queue. The injured said they were � rst admitted to the Feni Sadar Hospital and then were shifted to the capital by ambulance.

Contacted, Moazzem Hossain, of-� cer-in-charge of Chagalnaiya police station, told Dhaka Tribune over phone last night that they had picked up the station owner Nur Ahammad Majum-der for interrogation.

Burn Unit's Resident Surgeon Partha Shankar Pal said six of the injured had severe burn injuries and their condi-tion was critical.

“None of them are out of danger as their respiratory system was damaged in the � re,” he said adding that they were under close observation. l

Jamaat ameer, activists detainedn Abid Azad

Police arrested the acting ameer of the Jamaat-e-Islami’s Kadamtoli unit Abul Kashem and eight other activists from the capital’s Dhania area yesterday.

Con� rming the arrests, the OC of Kadamtali police told the Dhaka Trib-une: “Kashem is the party's acting ameer for Kadamtoli unit. After primary interrogation, we have found that three of them are connected with the party.”

Police arrested them while they were holding a meeting, and recovered anti-government lea� ets, papers and banners from their possession. l

BIHARI CAMP ARSON ATTACK

Elias Mollah denies rolen Kamran Reza Chowdhury

Awami League lawmaker Elias Uddin Mollah, whom the Biharis blamed for the murder of 10 people in Pallabi, said yesterday that he was a “good friend of the non-Bengalis.”He shrugged o� his involvement in the attack on the camp of the stranded Pa-kistanis in his constituency, Mirpur.

The stranded Pakistanis, commonly known as Biharis, came to Bangladesh during the partition of India and Paki-stan in 1947.

Some left political parties demand-ed Elias’ arrest for his alleged involve-ment in the incident on June 13.

“I am a good friend of the non-Ben-galis who live in my constituency. I always extend my support whenever they face any problems. I have no in-volvement in the Bihari camp killing and arson attack,” Elias Mollah told a section of reporters at the chamber of Awami League Whip Iqbalur Rahim in-side the Jatiya Sangsad Bhaban.

Elias also said he would quit politics if he was found guilty after investiga-tion, urging all to cooperate with the committee tasked to probe the Bihari camp tragedy.

He alleged that a vested politi-cal group was hatching a conspiracy against him, centering the tragedy.

When he was asked about the alle-gation of land-grabbing that was made against him, he termed it baseless and boasted that his forefather being a land-lord in the Mirpur area.

Former Pakistan president Ayub Khan also branded our forefather as a land-lord, he said.

“Still I have su� cient properties,” he said.

“Many [reporters] are running reports [implicating me] like an essay on cow. Nobody has any authentic documents substantiating that I have grabbed even a decimal of land. If anyone can prove it, I will distribute all my land property among the people,” Mollah stated. l

Bangladeshis in Iraq can take shelter in Irann Rabiul Islam

Expatriates' Welfare Minister Engineer Khandker Mosharraf Hossain yesterday said in case of emergency the Bangla-deshi migrants in Iraq would be able to take shelter in Iran.

“We have asked Bangladesh Embas-sy in Iran to make arrangements and plan to set up camps on Iran borders,” the minister told reporters after a meet-ing of the Migration Crisis Observation Committee at the ministry in Probashi Kallyan Bhaban yesterday.

Expat Secretary Khandakar Showkat Hossain, Foreign Secretary Shahidul Haque and the International Organisa-tion for Migration (IOM) Chief of Mis-sion, Dhaka Sarat Das, among others, attended the meeting.

Mosharraf, however, stated that there was no necessity at the moment to evacuate the Bangladeshis from Iraq.

“We are fully prepared to bring back our migrants if necessary,” the minister said.

Khandker Mosharraf further said: “The IOM helped us in evacuating Bangladeshis from Libya and it will help us the same way if we need to evacuate Bangladeshis from Iraq.”

He urged the Bangladeshi expatri-ates to stay calm and safe in Iraq.

The government had brought back around 36,000 Bangladeshis from Lib-ya in 2011 with the assistance of the IOM.

Talking to the Dhaka Tribune, Sarat Das said: “We have discussed the evac-uation of Bangladeshis in Iraq if nec-essary. We would provide assistance if evacuation becomes necessary.”

According to the Expatriates' Wel-fare Ministry, there are around 25,000 Bangladeshi migrant workers in Iraq. But uno� cial sources said the number

was even higher.Earlier, the secretary concerned said

around 1,500 Bangladeshis in Mosul were at risk, but those in Nazaf, Karbala and southern Iraq were safe.

The Bangladesh Embassy in Iraq shifted 51 migrants to Kurdistan from Mosul. Some of them � ed away.

Mosharraf said: “We took prepara-tion to bring them back but they are unwilling to return.”

The Bangladeshi migrants are pass-ing days in fear and anxiety as sectari-an clash between Sunni insurgents and Shia people favoured by Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki swept over a large part of the country's north area in the past two weeks.

The Bangladesh Embassy on Fri-day set up two hot-lines to assist the expatriates in Baghdad. The numbers are 00964-7816601805 and 00964-7814238351. l

City BNP 'backing' Akram in Narayanganj by-polln Our Correspondent, Narayanganj

City BNP leaders have hinted at sup-porting independent candidate SM Akram for Narayanganj 5 in the by-elec-tion slated for June 26, though the party has neither landed any candidate or yet backed any candidate in the election.

Former BNP MP Abul Kalam said: “The people in Narayanganj will cast their vote in the election to stem any terrorism and further occurrence of killings, like Twaki killing and sensa-tional seven murders.”

City BNP General Secretary ATM Kamal said: “We have the moral support for the pineapple (election emblem of Akram).

Bandar Upazila Chairman and BNP leader Ataur Rahman said: “Though we have no candidate on behalf of the party, we will take stance against the terrorism as always.”

A BNP supporter who took part in the election campaign for Akram at the Bandar's Kolagasia said, “We have been instructed to vote for the pineapple and as such we are working now.”

“Besides, Nasim Osman had made an ugly remark against our leader a few days before he died and so it would not do even if his brother comes to seek vote from us.”

Jatiya Party-backed AKM Salim Os-

man said: “I am in fact a business lead-er though I have joined the Jatiya Party ahead of the election. The party lead-ers, activists and supporters already know what to do on the voting day.”

“Being a business leader, I am on good terms with all, including those from Awami League and BNP and so I believe everybody will vote for me.”

Independent candidate Akram said: “I have never harmed or harassed any BNP Leader but some people have van-dalised the BNP's o� ce. So I hope the BNP people will vote for me.”

He added that he had been on the good terms with the Awami League leaders and activists and so he expect-ed their votes too.

The former Awami League leader in January quit his post centring on disagree-ments with the party high-ups during the Narayanganj City Corporation elections.

In a calculated move, the BNP had also stayed away from � elding its may-or candidate, paving the way for a key ballot battle between indpendent can-didate Selina Hasan Ivy and Awami League-backed AKM Shamim Osman.

Ivy was elected mayor while Sham-im, now the MP for Narayanganj 4, was defeated. Shamim Osman is said to have been involved in Twaki killing and sensational seven-murder in the city. l

Khaleda revives her caretaker government demand PAGE 1 COLUMN 6represented 95% of the country’s peo-ple, who heeded their boycott call and refrained from casting their votes in the January 5 election.

Referring to a recent High Court ver-dict that declared the 154 MPs elected unopposed to be legal, Khaleda said: “No matter what the court says, the 154 MPs are not legal people’s representatives.”

If the 154 unelected MP’s are legal, then why should 11 unelected advisers of a caretaker government not be le-gal?” Khaleda inquired.

Terming the government corrupt, she said the ruling party men had been plundering money from the Padma bridge fund, the share market and oth-er organisations and siphoning it o� to foreign banks such as the Swiss Bank.

She demanded an impartial probe body to investigate into the matter and criticised the Anti-Corruption Com-mission, terming it “one-eyed” and “blind.”

Khaleda also slammed Prime Min-ister Sheikh Hasina, who recently said the BNP founder, late Ziaur Rahman, had blocked her from entering the country three decades ago.

“It is totally false. It was Ziaur Rahman who brought you [Hasina] back to the country… You signed a paper after you received all the valuables and properties of your family, except arms,” the former premier reminded the current premier.

She also said there was a connection between Hasina’s homecoming and Ziaur Rahman’s murder.

“You returned to the country on

May 17 [1981] and Ziaur Rahman was murdered 13 days later… on May 30. When the country’s people were in a sombre mood and busy taking part in his funeral, you tried to cross the border wearing a veil. Why? You did it because you were afraid, because you might have been involved with the kill-ing,” she said.

She once again echoed her son Tari-que Rahman who said Ziaur Rahman, and not Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, had proclaimed independence as the � rst president of Bangladesh.

The former premier also claimed that the government had been un-nerved by the recent change in power in India. “The Awami League leaders are making unguarded remarks be-cause they are very nervous and disap-

pointed with the change of government of India,” she stated.

Khaleda said the government had been sponsoring godfathers such as Shamim Osman, Joynal Hazari and Nizam Hazari and humiliating Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus.

While brie� y laying out her plans if she returned to power, the BNP chief said the highest importance would be given to agriculture and ICT.

“Once we return to power, we will create an investment friendly environ-ment by ensuring all the utility servic-es, other facilities and security for for-eign and local investors,” she said.

Reiterating her demand for the dis-bandment of RAB, Khaleda said the government had turned the elite force into a killer force. l

Ramna Batamul killing caseverdict today PAGE 1 COLUMN 1that the law enforcement agencies had taken all necessary preparations to ensure security on the court premises since it was a sensational case.

During the traditional celebrations of the Bangla New Year, 1408 (April 14, 2001) at the Ramna Batamul, sev-eral blasts killed 10 people and injured around 50 others. Leading cultural platform Chhayanaut organises the event every year.

Two cases – one for killings and the other under the Explosive Substances Act – were � led with Ramna police. It took the investigators over seven years to trace Huji’s links with the attack.

Since the accused and the witness-es were same in both the cases, the Speedy Trial Tribunal 1 of Dhaka in 2009 sought the Supreme Court regis-trar’s opinion on whether both the cas-es could be tried together. The registrar is yet to respond on the matter.

The prosecution concluded its ar-guments on May 18. Earlier the court recorded statements of 61 out of 84 prosecution witnesses, including the complainant of the case.

The Criminal Investigation Depart-ment on December 30, 2008 pressed charges against the 14 accused includ-ing Hanna in both the cases. The other accused are: Mufti Sha� qur Rahman, Maulana Yahiya, Mufti Abdul Hye, Maulana Shawkat Osman alias Sheikh Farid, Maulana Abu Bakar alias Selim Hawlader, Maulana Mohammad Ta-juddin, Maulana Abdul Hannan Sab-bir, Arif Hasan Suman, Maulana Akbar Hossain alias Helaluddin, Maulana Abu Taher, Maulana Abdur Rouf, Hafez Ja-hangir Alam Badar, and Shahadat Ullah alias Jewel.

Of them, Hannan, Suman, Jewel, Abu Taher, Sheikh Farid, Sabbir, Rouf, Yahiya and Akbar are behind bars, while the others are still at large. l

Illegal trades of Bihari Chairman PAGE 1 COLUMN 2Division in the communityThe army has been tasked with con-structing the � rst part of the camp which is divided into three parts. The second part is being built under the supervision of the deputy commission-er and the relief committee, while the last part, known as Rajur Basti (Raju’s slum), is being constructed by mem-bers of Non-Bangalee Camp Manage-ment Committee.

Jalaluddin took Tk2,000-3,000 from each household for building houses in Rajur Basti four years ago. There are at least 500 houses where around 80% of the people are Biharis. Although the Biharis there claimed themselves to be members of the new camp, new camp inhabitants refused to include them in the community.

Md Rahmat, a resident of the new camp, said: “They are slum people and most of them are Bangalis. We do not want them in our community. They have been using our electricity and wa-ter connections illegally. Now we are not going to give them any facilities.”

Case against Jalaluddin On June 12, Riaz � led a case against Jalaluddin, 19 named and 15-20 un-named people with Pallabi police sta-tion.

The case statement said: “Four years ago, the chairman took Tk2,000 from each family and provided electricity connections. A month ago, he want-ed Tk1,000 from each of us again and threatened to cut the power supply if the money was not paid. As we refused to pay the money, they disconnected the power lines on June 1. Later, they began threatening us that we would be ousted. Electricity o� cials came on June 11 and wanted to reconnect the lines but the chairman’s men, includ-ing Md Firoz, Napak Razu, Asgar, and several others, resisted them. When we wanted to intervene, they hit Riaz and left him injured. Some women were also assaulted and ear rings weigh-ing two tolas of gold worth Tk15,000 from a Bihari woman were snatched. Jalaluddin then threatened by saying he would kill us by bombing and burn-ing us.”

Secretary of Kurmitola Relief Com-mittee Mostaq Ahmed, however, de-nied the allegations, saying: “Our chairman is clean. People of Rajur Basti are trying to trap us.”

Interestingly, Md Nasim, known as “Current” Nasim who used to col-lect bills from the houses on behalf of Jalaluddin, said the opposite.

“The chairman is a wicked man. He provided three illegal power connec-tions to Tota Miyar Basti and Fazar Ali Basti, each having 500 houses. I my-self also paid Tk1,500 for a connection. Jalaluddin is running an illegal electric-ity business,” he said.

Electricity mechanic of the camp Shakir said: “Some components in the lines were burnt on June 1. Electricity o� cials came the following day and suggested reducing the load in order to carry out repair work. I disconnected the illegal lines as Jalaluddin promised to reconnect those later. When I � n-ished repairing and was reconnecting the lines, Jalaluddin’s men stopped me and asked for money.”

They blame each otherCommenting on Neaz, Jalaluddin said: “He is a cheap man. He used to collect extortion money from the houses.

When I tried to stop him, I was sued but I am not going to stop.”

“Soon we are going to � le case against Neaz Ahmed Khan.”

On the other hand, Riaz said: “They are blaming each other to save them-selves when we � led cases against them.”

Neaz said: “Lawmaker Elias Mollah is fully aware of the extortion business but is not taking any action. If he did, we would not have faced such prob-lems.”

The outsiders do not know what is happening inside the camps, he added.

Electricity office denies allegationElectricity o� cials have denied the al-legations brought against them by the new camp members, who said these of-� cials were also involved in providing illegal electricity connections.

Electricity for the camps in Mirpur 12 is being supplied from Pallabi Elec-tricity Supply and Distribution o� ce of Desco located in Mirpur 13.

Engineer Niaz Banda, sub-division-al engineer of S & D Division of Palla-bi branch of Dhaka Desco, said: “Our o� cials are not involved in any illegal act. Besides, as far as I am concerned, none of our o� cials went to the camp on June 11.”

He said a complaint was recently � led by the camp residents about ille-gal electricity.

Niaz said: “Earlier this month, we received a complaint that some groups are using electricity illegally. I can not disclose any further to the press.”

MP is unaware Contacted, lawmaker Elias Mollah told the Dhaka Tribune: “On June 10 around 10:45pm, the Biharis called me and I went to the camp. I called Jalaluddin to resolve the matter and he said he would arrive within 10 minutes. After a long wait, I called him again but his mobile phone was switched o� . I then tried to convince them to give electric-ity to other Biharis as they are from the same community.”

He added: “I am not aware of any ex-tortion business of the chairman. The Biharis are misunderstanding me. I be-lieve they will meet me after knowing the truth. Some of them have already apologised.”

When community members turn enemy Riaz said: “There is dispute among the community members and they have turned into enemies of each other. We are receiving threats. On June 13, Na-pak Razu threatened me and asked to withdraw the cases.”

Mostaq also said he was threatened. “Some unidenti� ed people are

threatening us, saying why we spoke against the lawmaker. We are su� ering from insecurity,” he said.

They support ex-chairman Most of the Biharis have expressed their support for former chairman Gafur, saying he did not extort.

Riaz said: “Jalaluddin ousted Gafur from the area and became chairman four years ago but we want our former chairman back.”

Current Nasim, who is working for Jalaluddin, echoed the same view.

“Four years ago, Gafur went to Pa-kistan for two months and delegated the responsibility to Jalaluddin. Taking advantage of the situation, Jalaluddin unlawfully assumed power,” he said. l

Nur to be placed in court todayn Tribune Report

Prime accused in Narayanganj seven murders Nur Hossain will be produced before the Barasat Judicial Magistrate’s Court in North 24 Parganas district of West Bengal today on completion of his eight-day remand.

He may � le a bail petition on the day. His two other accomplices – Khan

Sumon and Ohidur Zaman Shamim – were also placed on an eight-day re-mand on June 15.

Baguiati police arrested them in a joint drive with Anti-Terrorist Squad on June 14 from a fourth � oor � at of multi-storey Indraprastha apartment complex.

Nur took the � at identifying him as Bappi Saha, and said he had gone to Kolkata for treatment. l

Brazil in search of goals PAGE 1 COLUMN 3Mexico found a Brazil shirt. He has not created a chance, never mind regis-tered an assist, and he has lost the ball 17 times in total.

Brazil’s other attacker Hulk was injured and missed the game against Mexico throwing the team into moder-ate disarray. Bernard and Willain failed to � ll the vacuum though they were in-serted in the second half.

Brazil will seek inspiration from the name of Garrincha who was a � u-ent scorer and the hero of Brazil’s � rst World Cup triumph in 1958. Inter-estingly history is on their side as in 1958 under Vincent Fiola Brazil scored three goals over Austria in the � rst match and   drew their second game 0-0 against England. Brazilians will try to draw inspiration from it and rise on the occasion against Cameroon who showed they are not a united team af-ter two defeats of 1-0 against Mexico and 4-0 against Cameroon. l

Ban imposed on export of rice until next July n Mohosinul Karim

The government has imposed a ban on exporting rice, excepting some aromat-ic varieties, for the next � nancial year.

A gazette noti� cation issued by the Commerce Ministry on Thursday said the government had made the deci-sion to ensure supply and control price hikes in the local market.

The ban is e� ective from July 1 to June 30, 2015, said the noti� cation signed by Deputy Secretary Saidur Rahman Selim.

However, export of aromatic varieties, including Kalojira, Chinigura, Chiniatop, Kataribhog, Madanbhog, Radhunipagal, Banshphul, Khorma, BR 5 (Dulabhog) and BR 34, 37, 38 and 50, will be allowed with prior permission from the ministry.

In 2008, the caretaker government � rst banned exporting rice in the wake of price increases at home and abroad. The ban was lifted in June 2012. l

3NewsDHAKA TRIBUNE Monday, June 23, 2014

Awami League’s 65th founding anniversary todayn Tribune Report

The ruling Awami League will celebrate its 65th founding anniversary today. To mark the day, the party and its associ-ate bodies have taken up programmes.

The national and party � ags will be hoisted atop the Awami League o� ces across the country from sunrise today. The party leaders and activists would also pay tribute to the portrait of Bang-abandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman in Dhanmondi road 32.

The party will also bring out a mass procession on foot of Shikha Chiran-tan (Eternal Flame) at the Suhrawardy Udyan at 3:30pm to Dhanmondi 32.

A discussion will be held on June 28 at Bangabandhu International Confer-ence Centre in the capital with party President and Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in the chair.

Now Bangladesh Awami League, the party emerged as the Awami Muslim League on June 23, 1949 in the then East Pakistan.

Maulana Abdul Hamid Khan Bhasani and Shamsul Huq were unan-imously elected as president and gen-eral secretary of the party while Sheikh Mujib a joint secretary. The word “Mus-lim” was later rescinded from the party nomenclature. l

Experts: Political consensus must for sustainable economic developmentn Tribune Report

The country’s economic growth would not be sustainable without ensuring good governance, economists say.

They suggested that reforms and depoliticisation were urgently needed in autonomous bodies to function in-dependently and professionally. They also recommended reaching political consensus among the political parties for the economic development.

The observations came at the con-cluding session on Public Policy Making and Institutions of a two-day confer-ence of Bangladesh Economists’ Forum (BEF) at a city hotel yesterday.

“Good governance is needed not only for growth, good governance is more needed for ensuring basic human rights,” said economist Akbar Ali Khan.

He said: “In the last four decades, there has been deteriorating gover-nance. We have two elite groups – one is succeeding each other with no clear vi-sion where to go. Unfortunately, things are deteriorating. If things deteriorate, neither growth nor structure will last. That is why it is high time there should be political consensus for governance.”

Political parties should sit together to draw a programme of good gover-nance where politicisation would be minimised, he said. Big reforms were needed in the administration, but there was no concern about that, while no political party had really given any blue print on how things would be reformed.

In the keynote paper, economist Wa-hiduddin Mahmud said Bangladesh has had a unique record of experiencing ac-celerated average annual growth of GDP per capita in every � ve-year period since the last half of the 1990s, but the ongoing growth stagnation may jeopardise the continuation of that record beyond 2010.

“The challenge is to gradually ex-pand governance e� ectiveness and good practices beyond some existing enclaves. Unfortunately, the reverse seems to have been happening in Ban-

gladesh,” he said.The credibility of our � nancial sector

or the quality of our economic diplomacy would increasingly become major detri-ments of how far we can bene� t by lever-aging the emerging global order, he noted.

He recommended that a more coop-erative and accommodative approach among the political parties would also be needed to sustain any workable form of democracy.

In his keynote paper, economist M Khalid Shams said there was a clear need for initiating regulatory reforms, more e� ective enforcement of law and order based on a “rule of law, further decentralisation within political parties, decentralisation of government, profes-sionalisation of bureaucracy, depolitici-sation of professional bodies etc.”

He said at this critical stage of coun-try’s development, “we need strong political will regarding reforms in gover-nance that would accelerate our econom-ic growth.” Judicial reforms are essential for ensuring human rights, he said.

Former adviser to a caretaker gov-ernment Mirza Azizul Islam said growth was not only objective for the develop-ment. “But growth is a pre-condition for other objective for the development.

“There is really no di� erence among the political parties with regard to basic development strategy. And that strategy focuses on private sector led growth,” he said. Given that, “we needed private sector investment as a precondition to accelerate the growth,” Azizul said.

He suggested the government to de-velop infrastructure as a fast track basis for boosting the private sector invest-ment. He also put importance on health and education sector that contribute to the growth and poverty alleviation.

Prime Minister’s Political Adviser Hos-sain Tau� que Imam, BNP chairperson’s Adviser Amir Khasru Mahmud Chow-dhury, Prime Minister’s Foreign A� airs Adviser Gowher Rizvi, economists Qazi Kholiquzzaman Ahmed and Professor Emeritus AR Khan also spoke. l

National web portal to be launched todayn Muhammad Zahidul Islam

The government is going to launch a national portal today for around 25,000 of its websites, in a bid to reduce con-fusion and protect the sites from being hacked.

The portal would give a common design and layout to all the websites which are each currently being hosted and maintained individually.

Prime minister’s Information and Communication Technology A� airs Adviser Sajeeb Wazed Joy would for-mally inaugurate the portal at a cere-mony at Prime Minister’s O� ce (PMO), sources of the PMO said.

Access to Information (A2I) project under the PMO has claimed the portal would be the world’s largest national web portal.

The A2I developed the portal, also called National Portal or the NP, with the Information and Communication Division under Post, Telecommunica-tion and Information Communication Ministry.

Sources said around 24,000 web-sites which host the government’s up-azila and union departments; would be brought under one platform to mi-nimise hacking attempts and enable authorities to maintain the sites easily.

The other websites from di� erent ministries and their departments and wings will also be under this common platform.

“We want each and every govern-ment website to come under a common design which will be user-friendly and also reduce the unnecessary hazards,” Md Nazrul Islam Khan, secretary of the ICT Division, told the Dhaka Tribune.

Currently, the ministries, divisions and other wings of the government has individual layouts for their respec-tive websites which sometimes creates confusion among users and disrupts smooth browsing of the sites.

Sources at the ministry said the new design would also be implemented on union to secretariat-level websites, bringing all the websites under a com-mon platform.

In September 2013, the ICT Ministry set up more than 24,000 websites, with the claim that it was the world’s biggest national web network. However, they were unable to launch the sites for-mally as Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina could not give a schedule for the inau-guration programme, sources said.

The Cabinet Division has reportedly trained IT o� cials in every ministry for detailing the sites. l

Witness: Qaisar’s forces killed my nephewn Tribune Report

A freedom � ghter yesterday said the alleged war criminal Syed Mohammad Qaisar’s forces had killed his nephew and injured his mother in Nurpur vil-lage under Nasirnagar, Brahmanbaria during the 1971 Liberation War.

Azharul Haque, 61, son of Sobdar Ali, told the International Crimes Tri-bunal 2 that Qaisar and members of no-torious “Qaisar Bahini” had also burnt the house of Fisheries and Livestock Minister Mohammad Saidul Haque. During the war, Saidul was the presi-dent of Nasirnagar unit Awami League.

The witness said he had been an HSC student at Brahmanbaria Govern-

ment College in 1971. He said the accused had formed

Peace Committee in April, 1971 in Brah-manbaria and later formed “Qaisar Ba-hini.”

Azhar said on November 15 in 1971, some 150 people including Qaisar, members of Qaisar Bahini, razakar forces and the Pakistani Army had at-tacked his village and burnt his house. They also set � re to some other houses in the village.

“When I returned home around 9pm, I found my mother injured. She told me that Qaisar’s forces beat her severely and killed my nephew Azizul Haque. Locals buried my nephew,” he said.

The witness said on that day, the collaborators had killed around 10 peo-ple in the village including Torab Ali, Shukkur Ali, Azizul Haque, Siru Mia and Jummat Ali.

He also learnt that Kalpana, daugh-ter of one Chuni Lal, had been raped and killed.

The witness claimed that the collab-orators had killed a total of 108 people in 22 villages and burnt down some 400 houses. Most of the victims were Hindus.

The witness said he knew Qaisar for a long time as the accused had taken part in the providential council elec-tion. He also saw Qaisar at Madhabpur Bazar in 1970. l

Isolux and Samsung picked for Bibiyana South plantn Aminur Rahman Rasel

Isolux Ingenieria SA of Spain and Samsung C&T Corporation of South Korea are set to get the job of building the Bibiyana South, a 400MW gas-based combined cycle power plant project, in Habiganj as an engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contractor.

“After receiving tender and evalu-ation, we have selected Isolux Inge-nieria SA of Spain and Samsung C&T Corporation of South Korea from six companies and sent the proposal to the Power Division for approval,” Power Development Board Chairman Md Ab-duhu Ruhulla told the Dhaka Tribune yesterday.

“We hope that we will sign the com-pany as an EPC contractor soon…After signing of the EPC contract, the PDB

requires owner’s engineer for the im-plementation of this project. Construc-tion period for this project is 900 days including a simple cycle completion time of 720 days,” he added.

The PDB has already invited the ex-pression of interest (EOI) from reputed international engineering consulting � rms to indicate their interest in pro-viding consultancy services as owner’s engineer for the construction of the plant. The last date for EOI submission

is July 16.Around Tk1,800 crore will be used

from the consumers’ bill fund set up by the Bangladesh Energy Regulatory Commission – named Energy Develop-ment and Maintenance Fund – for the construction of the plant.

A power plant of this capacity re-quires at least Tk4,000 crore to be constructed, while every year nearly Tk700 crore is deposited to the fund.

Alongside the Bibiyana South, an-other plant named Bibiyana 3 with a 399MW gas-based power plant will be built under the PDB.

The PDB signed a deal with Marubeni Corporation of Japan last June and Hyundai Engineering and Construction Co of South Korea to build the Bibiyana 3 plant, and its full operation is expected to commence in September next year. l

Khandker Mahbub cleared from contempt charge n Tribune Report

The International Crimes Tribunal 1 yesterday acquitted senior Supreme Court lawyer Khandker Mahbub Hos-sain from a contempt charge.

The three-member tribunal, how-ever, said Mahbub, an adviser to the BNP chairperson, should be more cau-tious in future when making comments about the tribunals, courts and judges.

On October 6 last year, the tribunal issued a contempt notice against Mah-bub, also vice-president of the Bangla-desh Bar Council, after the prosecution had brought charges against him.

Shortly after the conviction of BNP lawmaker Salauddin Quader Chowd-hury on October 1, Mahbub told the media that “each and every person” involved in the trial process would be tried if the BNP assumed power. He said the BNP would hold trials of the “real war criminals.”

The tribunal yesterday said such comments were unexpected from a se-nior member of the bar.

On November 19 last year, Mahbub submitted his reply to the tribunal 1 issued notice which asked why his re-marks should not be taken as contempt of court.

He claimed that he had not said anything regarding the tribunal or its judges. He also said he had not tried to malign the tribunal. l

Tribunal sends Akram to jailn Tribune Report

The International Crimes Tribunal 1 yesterday sent war crimes accused Khan Akram Hossain to jail after he had been produced before it.

The three-member tribunal headed by Justice M Enayetur Rahim enquired whether the accused had a lawyer. Akram replied in the negative.

The tribunal told the prosecution that the trial process would begin after the appointment of a lawyer for the accused.

Akram, 60, was arrested on Thurs-day night in Rajshahi. On Saturday, he was produced before a metropolitan magistrate court as the tribunal was closed that day. That court too ordered him jail sentence.

The tribunal on June 10 issued ar-rest warrants against Akram and two other war crimes suspects in a case. One of them Abdul Latif was arrested on June 11.

Akram is from Morelganj upazila in Bagerhat district. l

Vehicles and rickshaws risk their lives to cross a rail crossing at the capital’s Moghbazar yesterday after the lineman tried to close the crossing to make way for an approaching train MEHEDI HASAN

EXTORTION CHARGE

Court orders probe against New Market, Ramna police o� cials n Md Sanaul Islam Tipu

A Dhaka court yesterday ordered a judi-cial inquiry into the allegation against Ramna police station o� cer-in-charge and New market police station sub-in-spector in an extortion case.

Dhaka Metropolitan Magistrate Mi-zanur Rahman passed the order after hearing a plea � led by Md Jakir Hos-sain, a complainant, who was on police remand in two separate cases in Ram-na police station on June 3 and later freed on bail on June 10.

The plainti� ’s counsel Md Ra� qul Islam Mollah mentioned in his com-plaint that Jakir was on a three-day po-lice remand in two separate cases, one in Nari-O-Shishu Nirjatan Daman Ain and another in a theft case.

Around 1am to 2am on June 3 night, O� cer-in-Charge of Ramna police sta-tion Mohammad Moshiur Rahman and

one of his associates Sub-Inspector Ja-mal Hossain of New Market police sta-tion tortured him and demanded Tk2 lakh, the complaint read.

The two o� cials also threatened to kill him in a cross� re if Jakir failed to come up with the demanded sum.

The plainti� also mentioned that the Ramna police station o� cer-in-charge called him into his room and tortured him for money.

During the torture session New Mar-ket police station Sub-Inspector Jamal Hossain was also present and he also joined in with his associate.

In fear of the death threat, the plain-ti� ’s wife, however, managed Tk2 lakh and gave the sum to the OC.

After getting the money, the o� cial asked him not to be worried.

Later on June 10 Jakir was granted bail and � led the case against the po-lice o� cials. l

Witness blames Subhan for ’71 killings n Tribune Report

A freedom � ghter from Pabna accused top war crimes suspect Maulana Abdus Subhan yesterday of atrocities in his village and the nearby places during the 1971 Liberation War.

Mamtaz Uddin Montu, 66, of Do-gachhi under Pabna sadar, told the In-ternational Crimes Tribunal 2 that the Pakistani occupation forces – assisted by the collaborators led by Subhan – had killed dozens of people in the area in May, 1971.

After the atrocities in Dogachhi vil-lage, the witness said the villagers had found the dead bodies of a 12-year-old

boy, an elderly person and six others.“We saw the bodies of Haripada

Saha and Benu Saha on the road in Do-gachhi Bazar,” he stated.

Montu said following Subhan’s or-ders, the Pakistani Army had killed Shomujuddin Pramanik and injured his wife Rahatunnessa in the nearby Kulnia village. They also killed one Amin Uddin’s wife Hasina.

The witness said the occupation forces had killed several other people, including Wazuddin.

Jamaat-e-Islami leader Subhan was indicted on December 31 last year on nine charges of crimes against human-ity.

According to the charges, Subhan was the acting ameer of Pabna district Jamaat during the war, and a key leader of the collaborators’ forces – Peace Committee, razakar, al-Badr, al-Shams and Mujaheed Bahini – in the region.

He was nominated for the by-elections held in late 1971. In 1972, he was accused by a special tribunal for collaborating with the Pakistani occupation army. The tribunal asked him to be present on February 29. But he was not, as he had � ed to Pakistan with then Jamaat chief Ghulam Azam. After 40 years, detectives arrested him on September 20 last year. l

Apart from this, another 399MW power plant named Bibiyana 3 will be built under the PDB

4 NewsDHAKA TRIBUNE Monday, June 23, 2014

BCS admin o� cers get frustrated over delay in promotion n Mohosinul Karim

The o� cers of four batches of Bangla-desh Civil Service (admin cadre) have expressed dissatisfaction as they have yet to get promotions, even after a de-cision was taken in this regard.

Although a meeting of the Superior Selection Board led by Cabinet Secre-tary M Musharraf Hossain Bhuiyan had � nalised a list of quali� ed o� cers for promotion, the Public Administration Ministry has yet to implement the deci-sion taken by the SSB four months back.

According to the ministry, of the of-� cials and o� cers selected for promo-tion, the 18th, 19th and 20th batch BCS cadre o� cers had already been consid-ered for promotion in the SSB’s meet-ing. Around 200 senior assistant secre-taries of three batches were enlisted to get promoted to deputy secretary.

After � nalising the list, the Public Administration Ministry’s Senior Sec-retary Abdus Sobhan Sikder was made principal secretary to the prime min-ister. Education Secretary Kamal Ab-dul Naser Chowdhury was made new secretary to the Public Administration Ministry and was later promoted to se-nior secretary.

As a result, the initiative to promote the o� cials of the three batches was stuck. In the meantime, the 21st batch of o� cers has also become eligible for promotion.

Despite having previous prepara-tions, the ministry did not make any move to promote the o� cers to deputy secretary.

Seeking anonymity, senior assistant secretaries working at the Secretariat,

including the Public Administration Ministry, told the Dhaka Tribune that most of the junior bureaucrats are get-ting frustrated as the ministry is delay-ing in executing the decision to pro-mote them to deputy secretary.

An o� cer of the 21st batch working in the Public Administration secre-tary’s o� ce said they are losing interest in working harder and better due to the dilemma in promoting them to deputy secretary, despite their being quali� ed. It will hamper the normal process of promotions which may also interrupt the promotions of their juniors.

Public Administration Ministry’s Senior Secretary Kamal Abdul Naser Chowdhury, however, recently told the Dhaka Tribune: “We are consider-ing the issue of promoting the o� cers to deputy secretary. It will be given in time. I am trying to learn everything from the ministry in this regard.”

“I must see the list again before placing in before the prime minister. A new batch (21st batch) may also be in-cluded in the list as it is also eligible for promotion,” he added.

Kamal Chowdhury said most of the o� cials of the batches are now work-ing in � eld level administration such as district or upazila levels. It may create a huge vacancy if they are immediately withdrawn after promotion.

We are replacing the o� cials by transferring junior o� cers in the � eld level administrations, as this will not create any vacuum. It will be complet-ed soon. The promotions will be made after ensuring that it will not create any vacuum in the � eld administration,” he added. l

RAPE VICTIM AWAITS JUSTICE

Family members accuse police of ine� ciency n Afrose Jahan Chaity

Ruma (not real name), 24, was on cloud nine when she went to Suhrawardy Udyan on the evening of May 12. Little did she know that her dreams would be shattered by the very man who had promised to make them come true.

Her boyfriend, Naim, 27, had prom-ised her that they would get married that day. When she went to meet him with her sister, Tumpa (not real name), she was raped by Naim and his friends while Tumpa was restrained, forced to witness the barbaric event.

Now Ruma is living in uncertainty, wondering if she will get justice.

Her family accused police of not tak-ing action deliberately in exchange of a huge sum of money.

Ruma could not be reached over

phone, and her family said she no lon-ger lived with them.

Tumpa, however, was available and gave the Dhaka Tribune an account of what happened.

Ruma met Naim at Suhrawardy Udy-an in the capital 15 days before the in-cident. They exchanged mobile phone numbers, and their relationship started.

On the day of the incident, Naim asked Ruma to marry him and told her to meet him at Suhrawardy Udyan in the evening. When she went there with Tumpa, she met Naim’s friends Shahin, 27, Rubel, 24, Imran, 28, and Habib, 45. The group passed a few hours chatting; Naim kept telling Ruma that the wed-ding preparations were taking a while.

Around 11pm, the guys took the girls to the Kali Temple in the park and raped Ruma, while a man named Kabil

restrained Tumpa.Around midnight, the culprits hired

a rickshaw for the sisters to go home and threatened them not to go to police.

However, the victim’s rickshaw was stopped by the patrol police near Nilk-het area, where she told them about the rape. The police then took them to Shahbagh police station. Later, they were taken to the Detective Branch.

Habil Hossain, inspector (investi-gation) at the police station, told the Dhaka Tribune that Ruma did not have any details about Naim other than his name, phone number and a few photo-graphs.

He said she was sent to Dhaka Medi-cal College Hospital for forensic test on May 14.

Tumpa said their family were living in fear as the culprits had not been ar-

rested yet.“They are threatening us to with-

draw the case. My sister has been sent away. I am afraid of going to school now,” she told the Dhaka Tribune.

Tumpa said Ruma followed DB o� -cials’ advice and planned twice to con-vince the rapists to meet her, so that she could tip o� the police and they could arrest them.

However, her plan was thwarted both the times as police did not re-spond when Ruma sought their help.

When asked about the accusation, Inspector Habil Hossain denied them all, saying police had been trying to ap-prehend the rapists.

“We have also informed the police station in their locality to ensure their safety. But we suspect the victim has left town,” he said. l

Brac Bank-Samakal Shahitya Puroshkar 2013 heldn Tribune Report

Brac Bank-Samakal Shahitya Puroshkar 2013 was held at Pan Paci� c Sonarga-on Hotel in the capital on Friday. The award ceremony was attended by Syed Mahbubur Rahman, managing director and CEO of Brac Bank Ltd, and Mr Gol-am Sarwar, editor of Dainik Samakal.

Many literary personalities and so-cial elites of the country also attended the event.

Moinul Ahsan Saber won the award for his novel “Akhon Porimol” in the Poetry and Novel category, Mashrur Are� n for his translation work “Franz Ka� a Golpo Shomogro” in the Essay, Autobiography, Travel Story and Trans-lation category, and Badrun Nahar for her book “Brihospatibar” in the Huma-yun Ahmed Young Writer category.

Moinul and Mashrur each won Tk1 lakh for the award, while Badrun Na-har won Tk50,000. The winners also

received crests and citations.Launched in 2011, the literary award

is a joint venture of Brac Bank and Dainik Samakal to inspire writers and litterateurs to further enrich Bangla lit-erature with their creative work.

The Young Writer category was named after the late Humayun Ahmed last year to honour his memory and work.

Since its inception, the Brac Bank-Sa-makal Shahitya Puroshkar has generat-ed great enthusiasm in the country’s literary community. More than 600 books were submitted this year for the three categories. A panel of judges com-prising Professor Mustafa Nurul Islam, Professor Zillur Rahman Siddiqui, poet Asad Chowdhury and novelist Selina Hossain selected the winners.

The organisers hope this award will inspire creative minds and provide writers, especially the young ones, a platform to practise and � ourish in literature. l

Committee formed to update draft of Coast Guard Actn Mohosinul Karim

A � ve-member expert committee was formed to improve and update the draft of Bangladesh Coast Guard Act, 2014, which was approved in principle in the last meeting of the cabinet on June 16 at the secretariat.

Law Minister Anisul Haque will head the committee while Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister Abdus

Sobhan Sikder, Senior Secretary to the Home Ministry CQK Mushtaq Ahmed, Defense Secretary Kazi Habibul Awal and Legislative and Parliament A� airs Secretary Shahidul Haque will be its members.

A gazette noti� cation of the Cabi-net Division said the committee was formed according to the decision and instruction of the cabinet.

The committee will prepare a � nal

draft of the act accommodating all the observations of the cabinet meeting on June 16 last. They will also amend several provisions of the draft, if needed.

But, the committee was not given a frame to submit its � nal draft to the Cabinet Division.

Earlier, the cabinet approved the draft of Coast Guard Act, 2014, keeping provision of capital punishment (death

sentence) as the maximum punish-ment for any kind of insurgency or in-discipline in the force.

After the meeting, Cabinet Secretary M Musharraf Hossain Bhuiyan told the media: “Though the draft of the act got approval, a number of secretaries will examine the loopholes of the proposed law led by the law minister. The Law Ministry will vet the draft after their approval. l

Healthcare facilities to get more ICUs, CCUs, burn units n Moniruzzaman Uzzal

The Health Ministry has decided to set up more Intensive Care Units (ICU), Coronary Care Units (CCU) and burn units at medical colleges and district hospitals across the country soon.

The burn units will have 20 beds while the ICUs and CCUs will have 10 and 8 beds respectively. The units will be opened at around 40 healthcare in-stitutions.

The Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) has told all medical college and district hospital authorities that it would provide instruments and necessary support to implement the decision quickly.

Professor Dr ABM Abdul Hannan,

director (medical education and man-power development) of DGHS, told the Dhaka Tribune facilities at ICUs and CCUs at medical colleges and district hospitals are very limited at present.

“If we can improve the facilities, more lives could be saved and the cost of treatment would also go down,” he said.

The professor said the Health Minis-try had recently declared burn injury as a “noti� able disease” and had directed all public hospital authorities to regis-ter each burn injury patient and send their details to the DGHS from now on.

A noti� able disease is any disease that is required by law to be reported to the authorities.

On June 22, the DGHS issued a circu-lar to directors, civil surgeons and su-

perintendants concerned, asking them to take initiative to open ICUs, CCUs and burn units at their institutes on an urgent basis.

According to the DGHS Health Bul-letin 2013, the number of di� erent non-communicable diseases, including heart and kidney complications, can-cer, hypertension, diabetes and pneu-monia, is on the rise.

At present, there are limited facili-ties even at ICUs, CCUs and burn units at the healthcare institutions in the ur-ban areas while these units at district hospitals have virtually no facilities.

A number of private hospitals are o� ering good services to ICU, CCU and burn unit patients but those remain be-yond the range of a� ordability for most

of the patients as the cost of treatment is very expensive.

According to DGHS sources, 10-bed ICUs will be opened at state-owned healthcare facilities in Mymensingh, Bogra, Khulna, Faridpur, Dinajpur, Go-palganj, Manikganj, Gazipur, Sirajganj, Kishoreganj, Cox’s Bazar, Kushtia, Pab-na, Noakhali and Jamalpur.

Eight-bed CCUs will be opened at dis-trict hospitals in Mymensingh, Bogra, Comilla, Khulna Faridpur, Gopalganj, Manikganj, Gazipur, Sirajganj, Moul-vibazar, Kishoreganj, Jessore, Patuakh-ali, Kushtia, Cox’s Bazar and Noakhali.

Meanwhile, Chittagong, Rajsha-hi, Mymensingh, Sylhet, Khulna and Rangpur medical college hospitals will have 20-bed burn units. l

Muggers snatch Tk11 lakh from bank employee n Tribune Report

A gang of armed men robbed more than Tk11 lakh from an employee of a private company yesterday, after shooting him in the leg in front of a bank in the capi-tal’s Uttara area.

The incident occurred when Mah-mudul Alam Shaheen, a business manager at Robi Digital Service, and a friend went to a branch of Prime Bank in Uttara sector 11 to deposit Tk11.92 lakh in cash.

“We got there in a CNG autorick-shaw. As soon as we got o� the vehicle, � ve youths approached us, brandish-ing arms, and attempted to snatch the bag of money from me. They opened � re when we tried to resist them,” said

Mahmudul.The alleged muggers then � ed the

scene on two motorcycles which were parked nearby.

“Perhaps, they had been following us since we left for the bank from our o� ce in sector 7,” he added.

Mahmudul, 32, received a bullet wound in his right knee and was taken to Dhaka Medical College and Hospital for treatment. His friend, Nazrul, was unhurt.

Meanwhile, police said no case has been � led yet regarding the mugging.

“But we have heard about the incident and we are looking into it,” said Sub-Inspector Shaheed Suhrawardi of Uttara West policestation. l

A city service bus pauses in the middle of the Bangla Motor intersection, one of the busiest spots in the capital, to drop o� passengers on Friday. Such reckless driving had led to many accidents in the city as passengers mostly get caught in between rushing tra� c SYED ZAKIR HOSSAIN

CSP submits memo protesting Madrasa education systemn DU Correspondent

Leaders and activists of the Chhatra Sangram Parisad (CSP), a platform of pro-government students’ organisations, submitted a memorandum to the Minis-try of Education yesterday, demanding the cancellation of the current syllabus of the Madrasa Education Board, alleg-ing that the contexts of the textbooks go against the country’s liberation war.

The protesters also alleged that the fabricated information in the textbooks also go against the constitution and distort the country’s history.

A seven member delegation from the platform submitted the memoran-

dum at noon to the APS of Education Minister Nurul Islam Nahid.

Earlier in the morning, police blocked the leaders and activists of the platform in front of Bangla Academy, when they tried to march a rally to the ministry from Dhaka University’s Mad-hur Canteen area. The protesters later staged a short demonstration in the area.

At the demonstration, Bangladesh Chhatra League President HM Badiuz-zaman Sohag, who is also the coordi-nator of the platform, alleged that the Madrasa Education Board has been dis-torting information about the country’s history and providing that to around 50

lakh Madrasa students. He further alleged that publishers

at di� erent books houses have been patronising the anti-liberation force Jamaat-e-Islami by using Madrasa edu-cation to publicise their political views.

“According to the National Educa-tion Policy-2014, general students and Madrasa students should study the same English and Bangla textbooks. However, the Madrasa Board has been violating the education policy by chang-ing few of the articles there,” he added.

He urged the respective authorities to reprint of these Madrasa textbooks after getting rid of all distorted information. l

Brac Bank Managing Director Syed Mahbubur Rahman and Samakal Editor Golam Sarwar, among others, pose for a photograph at the Brac Bank-Samakal Shahitya Puroshkar 2013 in the capital yesterday DHAKA TRIBUNE

Woman commits suicide in capitaln Tribune Report

A woman apparently took her own life by jumping o� the roof of a 10-storey building in the capital’s Dhanmondi area early yesterday.

The victim, Salma Islam Benu, 42, had been living with her elder sister’s family in Dhanmondi since her divorce.

Her sister, Sajeda Runu, said Salma had been depressed when she lost custo-dy of her two children to her ex-husband.

“She threatened to kill herself many times if her children were not returned to her,” Sajeda said.

Sub-Inspector Rejaul Islam of Dhanmondi police said after being informed, they recovered a body and sent it to Dhaka Medical College Hospital for an autopsy. l

Life comes to a halt for constant rain in Chittagong city, port activities hampered n Tarek Mahmud, Chittagong

Life in Chittagong has been at stand-still due to the downpour since Friday which has waterlogged a huge area of the city. The � ood has caused immense su� erings for the city-dwellers and, in some cases, has been life threatening.

Around 150mm of rainfall was re-corded in 24 hours until 3pm yester-day, said Nur Mohammad, duty o� cer at the Meteorological O� ce in the city’s Patenga area.

A special weather bulletin issued by Bangladesh Meteorological Depart-ment yesterday said under the in� u-ence of the deep convection over the North Bay of Bengal, stormy weather may continue over the North Bay, the adjoining coastal areas of the country and the maritime ports.

Due to the rain, parts of a hill col-lapsed on a four-storey building at Bagghona area around 4pm yesterday. No casualty was reported, said � re bri-gade sources.

Md Jashim Uddin, deputy assistant director of Fire Service and Civil De-fence headquarters in Chittagong, told the Dhaka Tribune that they had res-cued all the residents from the building.

“We also evacuated a building close to the a� ected one to further avoid ca-sualty,” he said.

The landslide was caused by an un-der-construction building on the hill slope, he added.

Parts of another hill collapsed on four thatched houses in the city’s Kushumbagh area yesterday morning, but no casualty was reported, accord-ing to the � re brigade o� cials.

Anticipating the mudslide due to the heavy rainfall, the district administration started a campaign asking the hill-side dwellers to move to the nearby school buildings and cyclone centres, said Chit-tagong district administration sources.

The district administration and Chittagong Metropolitan Police jointly evicted 666 hillside dwellers from 11 risky hills in the city by yesterday, said Additional Deputy Commissioner (Rev-enue) Abdul Quader of Chittagong dis-

trict administration.Because of the heavy rainfall, water

submerged the tracks on No. 34 rail bridge in the Navy Gate area under Sitakunda upazila, which halted the rail communication between the

port city and the rest of the country around 12pm, said Bangladesh Railway sources.

However, the railway technicians restored the communication around 4:30pm, said Tofajjal Hossain, general

manager of Bangladesh Railway (East Zone).

Several train services between Chit-tagong and other parts of the country was halted, while a few others were delayed, said AA Shamul Alam, station

manager of Chittagong railway station.Public su� ering: What is the govern-

ment doing?Motorised vehicles were hardly seen

in the waterlogged areas and commut-ers, mostly o� ce-goers and students, had to wade through � lthy water from the over� owing roadside drains.

Sumon Sikhdar, a commuter, had to pay excessive rickshaw fares. He blamed the poor drainage system of the city for the waterlogging.

Chittagong City Corporation May-or M Manjur Alam, however, said the city’s drainage system was better than what it was 10-15 years ago.

Claiming waterlogging as the prime problem, the mayor said it would not be solved until the government imple-mented the Drainage Master Plan of 1995, as per the city corporation’s re-peated requests.

“The city’s drainage system can en-dure up to 80mm of rainfall. The low-ly-ing areas and roads get � ooded when the rainfall exceeds that limit,” he said.

The present mayor had promised to to remove the waterlogging problem during the city corporation election campaign four years ago.

Port activities at haltShip movement at the Chittagong Sea Port channel were almost halted during the day yesterday due to the excessive rainfall.

Mohibul Haq, director (admin) of Chittagong Port Authority, told the Dhaka Tribune that a few vessels were able to enter the jetties, and some oth-ers had left.

“Ship movement at the port channel was suspended temporarily from 7am until noon due to torrential rain,” he said.

The loading and uploading of the goods at the port jetties and outer an-chorage also remained suspended during the day shift, he added. l

WEATHER

5NewsDHAKA TRIBUNE Monday, June 23, 2014

PRAYER TIMES Fajar 3:44am Sunrise 5:11am Zohr 12:01am Asr 4:42pm Magrib 6:49pm Esha 8:17pm

Source: Accuweather/UNB

D H A K ATODAY TOMORROW

SUN SETS 6:49PM SUN RISES 5:12AM

YESTERDAY’S HIGH AND LOW31.7ºC 23.0ºC

Satkhira Khulna

MONDAY, JUNE 23

F O R E C A S T F O R T O D A YDhaka 34° 28°Chittagong 30° 26°Rajshahi 36° 28°Rangpur 32° 25°Khulna 35° 28°Barisal 34° 28°Sylhet 30° 25°Cox’s Bazar 29° 27°

SourceL IslamicFinder.org

Minister: Chemical substance in 7 cities below permissible limitn Kamran Reza Chowdhury

Presence of harmful chemicals in the air in Dhaka and other cities, which cause respiratory problems and a� ect the brain and heart, is much lower than the permissible level, Environment Minister Anwar Hossain tells parlia-ment yesterday.

According to the standard set by the Department of Environment in 1997, the average (24 hours) maximum per-missible level of sulphur dioxide is 140 parts per billion (ppb).

Exposure to sulphur dioxide and nitrogen oxide for � ve minutes’ can cause asthma and other respiratory problems. And carbon monoxide can have harmful e� ects by reducing oxy-gen delivery to the body’s organs such

as to the heart and the brain, says the US environment protection agency.

Exposure to carbon monoxide can reduce the oxygen-carrying capacity of the blood, it further says.

But the air in Dhaka, Chittagong, Narayanganj, Rajshahi, Gazipur, Khu-lna, Sylhet and Barisal contains 2-30 ppb of suphur dioxide, said the min-ister quoting the data collected by 11 continuous air monitoring stations in the cities.

Replying to a question from the Awami League MP Nizam Uddin Hazari (Sonagazi) Anwar Hossain said air in the cities contains 35 to 40 ppb of nitro-gen oxide against the maximum level of 53 ppb (annual average).

He said the presence of carbon monoxide is 2-4 ppb against the set

maximum standard of 9 ppb (per eight hours).

“According to the data available from the monitoring stations, the con-tent of sulphur dioxide, nitrogen oxide and carbon dioxide are not alarming,” said the minister.

Under the CASE project, the envi-ronment directorate set up three con-tinuous air monitoring stations – two in Chittagong and one each in Narayan-ganj, Rajshahi, Gazipur, Khulna, Sylhet and Barisal.

The minister said the government chalked out plans to stop air pollution by the brick kiln under CASE project.

Besides, he said, the government with the assistance of the Germany had initiated the plan to distribute pollu-tion-free burner styled Bondhu Chula. l

Removal of BRU registrar demandedn Our Correspondent, Rangpur

A small section of o� cials of Begum Rokeya University (BRU) demanded the removal of the newly-appointed registrar from his post yesterday.

They also threatened to continue their movement until their demand was met. On the other hand, a large section of the o� cials welcomed the new registrar with � owers. ATM Em-dadul Alam was appointed as acting registrar on deputation. Previously, Emdad was an assistant deputy regis-trar at the Islamic University, Kushtia.

Meanwhile, Vice Chancellor Dr AKM Nur-un-Nabi accused the agitating of-� cials of trying to create disorder and ruin the educational atmosphere with their movement.

However, Deputy Director ATM Gol-am Firoz said they had been forced to agitate in order to remove the new reg-istrar since the vice chancellor had not taken any steps to do so, despite their telling him to remove the illegally ap-pointed registrar.

Public Relations O� cer Mohammad Ali said authorities had not found any-body here who was � t for the post of the registrar and so Emdad had been brought here on deputation to act as the registrar.

A reliable person at the vice chancel-lor's o� ce said a deputy director had been lobbying to be appointed as the registrar.

He said the deputy director who had been lobbying for the post of the regis-trar was among the agitators.

He added that when that director had learned that the post had been � lled by somebody from elsewhere, he and his seven followers began to agi-tate for the removal of the new regis-trar from his post.

Vice Chancellor Nur-un-Nabi said nobody had been appointed for the post of the new registrar. A person had just been “brought” here on dep-utation to “act as the registrar”. Those speaking up against this were just try-ing to create disorder and ruin the edu-cational environment on the campus. l

SAVAR FACTORY FIRE

Tk5cr sweaters gutted, reason still unknown n Our Correspondent, Savar

A blaze at a sweater factory in Savar de-stroyed nearly 12,000 sweaters worth around Tk5 crore on Friday afternoon, hours before 4,000 pieces were to be shipped to the buyer.

Witnesses and � re service sources said the � re at the four-storey ZA Sweat-er factory, located in Kuturia of Savar, originated from the yarn warehouse on the ground � oor around 05:30pm and rapidly spread to other � oors.

Eight � re� ghting units rushed to the scene and managed to douse the � ame after trying for nearly three hours.

However, the sweaters, 4,000 pieces of which were supposed to be loaded onto vehicles around 7pm, had been reduced to ashes by then.

A three-member probe committee led by Deputy Director (Dhaka divi-sion) of Fire Service Jahirul Amin was formed on Saturday afternoon but the reason behind the � re remains un-known even after two days. The com-mittee was asked to submit a probe re-port within 15 days.

Managing Director of the factory Jahangir Alam said the sweaters were made for several European buyers and 4,000 pieces were to be sent to Chit-

tagong port on Friday night. “Several o� cials and 8-10 workers

were waiting inside the factory since the transport vehicles which would take the goods to the port, were due shortly. The sweaters destroyed were worth Tk5 crore, though a part of those was insured for Tk1.5 crore with Nitol Insurance,” he said.

Tanzil Manzur, HR manager at the factory, said the o� ce of the transport vehicles was called and was asked not to send any vehicles.

Jahirul Amin said the reason for the � re has yet to be ascertained.

“We will know soon,” he added. l

Donation dependent budget in CCCn Tarek Mahmud, Chittagong

Chittagong City Corporation (CCC) yes-terday announced a Tk1,195.91 crore donation-dependent budget propos-al for the � scal year 2014-15 where it hopes to collect only Tk567.41 crore from own income sources.

While the donation was � xed at Tk628.50 crore which includes devel-opment donation Tk590 crore, relief fund Tk40 lakhs and other sources Tk38.10 crore, showed in the proposed budget that also stated that the CCC is hopeful that it also collect revenues from taxes of Tk352.87 crore from the city dwellers.

CCC Mayor M Manjur Alam proposed the budget at a programme held in the Nagar Bhaban auditorium at noon.

The mayor also announced the small revised budget of Tk498.35 crore for the FY 2013-14 while its proposed size was Tk1,106.30 crore.

According to the speech on budget, the donation and the tax of the city dwellers were considered as the main sources of CCC income which it allocat-ed mostly for the development sector. “To turn the city into a economically prosperous, livable and peaceful place, many development projects have been adopted,” said the mayor.

About the scanty budget implemen-

tation, Manjur Alam said: “As we did not get the desired allotment from the government, there is a big di� erence between the proposed and revised budget of the previous � scal year.”

Terming the water logging a big problem, the mayor said the drainage system of the port city has improved in his tenure than last 10-15 years.

He also stated that the problem would not vanish fully until the Drainage Master Plan of 1995 will be implemented.

Mayor Manjur said the CCC repeat-edly urges the government to imple-ment Drainage Master Plan to get rid of the water logging crisis, which is under process. l

Med schools likely to bid adieu to admission testsn Moniruzzaman Uzzal

The Health Ministry is planning to eliminate admission tests for public and private medical colleges from the upcoming academic session, and in-stead opt for enrolling students based only on their SSC and HSC results, said health sector sources.

However, a � nal decision in this regard will be made at a stakeholders meeting headed by Health Minister Mohammed Nasim on June 30, several senior o� cials of the ministry and health directorate told the Dhaka Tribune.

The meeting is scheduled to be attend-ed by top o� cials of the Health Ministry, Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS), Bangladesh Medical Association (BMA), Bangladesh Medical and Dental Council (BMDC), Bangladesh College of Physicians and Surgeons (BCPS) and oth-er o� cials concerned.

Sources said the initiative to change the admission system comes on the heels of the recent controversies sur-rounding question leaks as well as part of an attempt to reduce the hassles of taking tests of around 70,000 students.

Refusing to comment on whether there was any plan to cancel the tradi-tional admission test system, Dr ABM Abdul Hannan, DGHS director of med-ical education, told the Dhaka Tribune that they wanted to � nd a system that was acceptable to all.

A � nal decision regarding the issue

will be made at the upcoming meeting, he added.

Dr Moazzem Hossain, president of Bangladesh Private Medical College As-sociation (BPMCA), however, told the Dhaka Tribune that they preferred re-forms to the admission policy instead of the introduction of a brand new ad-mission system.

He said the BPMCA will recommend that the government take separate admis-sion tests for private medical and dental colleges. A separate proposal will also be placed for collecting Tk2,000 as admis-sion test fee for private med schools, and Tk600 for public ones to ensure that only the students who are truly interested and � nancially capable of getting admitted into private colleges apply.

Currently, there are 2,862 seats available at 23 government medical col-leges, while 55 private establishments o� er 4,850 places. There are also one public and 18 private dental colleges with 532 and 1,050 seats respectively.

Last year, 64,000 students sat for the admission test.

According to the existing admis-sion policy, a student can sit for the test twice, while a survey found that around 60% of the students who passed the test were ones who were appearing for the second time. To pass the test, a student has to score at least 120 out of 200 marks (100 marks from SSC and HSC and 100 marks from the admission test). l

The photo taken from Muradpur intersection in the port city shows that students return home from schools on rickshaws which run in waist-deep water DHAKA TRIBUNE

HEAVY RAIN

BM College students protest hike in exam fees n Our Correspondent, Barisal

Fourth year students of 18 departments under Barisal Brojo Mohun College held an agitation rally yesterday, pro-testing the increase in examination form � ll-up charges.

Demanding an immediate decrease of the charges, the students alleged that the authority increased the � ll-up charges from Tk3,300 to Tk4,500, without showing any cause or giving any prior notice.

The agitated students threatened to put forward harsher movements if their demands were not met immedi-ately.

Professor Fazlul Huq, principal of the college, said as per the direction and approval of National University, the form � ll-up charge had been in-creased. He said they had informed the NU authority about the students’ ag-itation. Form � ll-up will be held from June 23 to 26, he added. l

Cyclone centre inaugurated n Our Correspondent, Barisal

A cyclone centre was inaugurated yesterday at Mombi Para village in La-tachapli union of Kalapara upazila in Patuakhali dis-trict.

Francis Be-pari, regional di-rector of Caritas Barisal region, inaugurated the centre at the local primary school as the chief guest.

Syed Fakir, acting chairman of Latachapli union parishad,

presided over the function.Abu Hanif, Parimal Gayin, Stayen-

dra Nath Haoladar, Anwar Hossain Anu and Mohiuddin Musulli addressed the programme, among others. l

6 NationDHAKA TRIBUNE Monday, June 23, 2014

Rain disrupts life across country n Tribune Report

The lives of people in several districts of the country have been hampered be-cause of the continuous rainfall for the last three days.

People in those districts have been su� ering a great extent as low-lying areas were submerged because the of poor drainage system.

Moreover, crops on vast tracts of land were submerged which could be a disaster of farmers.

Our Khagrachhari correspondent reports, low-lying areas in the hill district went under water because of the heavy downpour which the district has been experiencing for the last three days.

According to Department of Agricultural Extension Department, crops on 3,000 acres of land at nine uapzilas of the district were inundated.

The villages are Kaladeva, Battali, Golabari, Ganjapara, Muslimpara and Mehedibug area under Sadar upazila while Chhoto Merung, Bachha Merung, Boro Merung, Sobahanpur, Shantipur, Kobakhali of Dighinala upazila, Fatemanagor, Pujgangmukh, Latiban of Panchhari upazila, Tabalchhari, Gumti, Natunpara of Matirnga, Gachhabil, College Para, Tintahori of Manikchhari upazila.

Farmers fear that if the rain con-tinues for more a few days then they would have to incur huge losses.

Sub-assistant of Agriculture O� cer Ranjit Chakraborty said farmers are becoming the biggest victims of � ash � oods as most of the vegetable gardens in the district were situated on the bank of Chengi-Mainee and Feni rivers.

When contacted, Deputy Com-missioner Md Masud Karim said they would stand beside the farmers if they get required monetary aid from the government.

In Feni, around 8,000 people were marooned as a portion of an embank-ment at Sripur under Fulgazi upazila collapsed because of � ash � ood which was caused by torrential rain and the onrush of water from the hills.

The � ood a� ected villages are Sripur, Gosaipur, Shaldor, Nilokshi and Bijoypur.

Ramjan Ali, executive engineer of Water Devolopment Board, Feni told the Dhaka Tribune that the Mohuri River � owed 13.4 cm above the danger level.

Our Kushtia correspondent adds: The life in Kushtia has come to a halt as most of the low-lying areas in district have been submerged in waist-deep water, causing immense su� erings to city dwellers.

The waterlogged areas of the dis-trict are Courtpara, Kalisangkarpur, Peyaratola, Hospital road area, Purba Mojompure, Pashchim Mojompur and Kataikhana intersection.

Motor vehicles were hardly seen in those areas while some rickshaws were seen on city roads. Commuters faced immense su� erings while travelling through waist-deep water.

School authorities of many schools postponed examinations as rainwater intruded into those schools.

DAE sources said crops on a vast tract of land have been damaged by the rain. Farmers are afraid that if the rain does not stop within a short period of time then they will also have to incur huge losses.

The rainfall in the district was re-corded 111.4 millimeter which is high-est this year, said Obaidur Rahman, executive engineer of Water Devolop-ment Board, Kushtia.

Local people blamed poor sewage and drainage systems for the waterlog-ging.

In Dinajpur, road communication

in between Dinajpur and Gobindaganj remained suspended as a wheel of a goods-laden truck fell into a hole.

Inspector of Ghoraghat police sta-

tion said the driver of the truck could not see the hole because of the heavy rainfall.

Later, the road communication be-

came normal by 12 noon. According to the Met o� ce, heavy

to very heavy rainfall is likely to occur in places in Rajshahi, Rangpur, Dhaka,

Khulna, Barisal, Chittagong and Sylhet divisions till today due to the deep con-vection over the North Bay and adjoin-ing coastal areas of Bangladesh. l

Rebel candidates weigh in Nakla UP polln Our correspondent, Sherpur

The Awami League and BNP rebel can-didates are weighing heavily against their party-nominated candidates vy-ing for the Nakla upazila parishad elec-tion slated to be held on June 26.

A total of 15 candidates are compet-ing for the posts of chairmen, vice-chairmen and women vice-chairmen.

The forthcoming poll turns out to be a talking point and holds an extra interest to voters as the constituency belongs to Awami League presidium member and incumbent Agriculture Minister Matia Chowdhury.

There are a total of three rebel can-didates from the Awami League and two from the BNP contesting the post

of chairman in the election. The ruling party has nominated

Shah Mohammad Borhan Uddin, in-cumbent UP chairman, to again run for the post while the BNP has given the nod to Mahbub Ali Chowdhury, alias Munir Chowdhury, former chairman of the upazila.

The Awami League rebel candi-dates � ghting for the post of chair-man are acting president of the upazila AL Md Golam Rabbani, Jubo League leader Md Munir Hossain and Awami League activist Shawkat Hossain Khan Mukul.

The BNP rebel candidates are Za-hid Hossain Badsha and Zahurul Islam Manzu contesting the chairman post.

A total of three candidates from the

AL are running for the posts of vice-chairmen while only one BNP candi-date vies for it.

Besides, the Awami-backed former vice-chairman Umme Kulsum Renu, Lucky Akter and Hazera Begum are running for the women vice-chairman posts while Dewan Kohinur and Latifa Begum Usha are running from the BNP.

The Awami League and BNP leaders, plus voters are seized with apprehension about the victory of their party-nominated candidates facing a surge of rebels.

The upazila has a total of 1,32,604 voters. Of them 66,005 are female vot-ers and 65, 342 male.

The election will be held in 63 polls centres across Nakla. l

Five Indian nationals held with 4.4kg gold in Benapole n Our Correspondent, Jessore

Members of Border Guard Bangladesh detained � ve Indian nationals from a Dhaka-bound BRTC bus on the Jessore-Benapole road yesterday afternoon with possession of 36 pieces of gold bars weighing 4.4kg.

Lieutenant Colonel Matiur Rahman, director, 26 Border Guard Battalion told the Dhaka Tribune that the BGB men arrested Bijoy, Ashok, Ramkumar and Rakesh of Maharashtya and Kamal of Nagpur, India after stopping a BRTC bus at Pulerhat under Jessore Kotwali police station.

Later, members of the Border Guard

found the gold bars after searching their bodies. The gold was estimated to be worth Tk2.2 crore.

“The arrested came to Bangladesh from Dubai on June 19 and reached Bena-pole yesterday morning, using Indian passports. But instead of going into India, they were coming towards Jessore,” said Lieutenant Colonel Matiur Rahman.

During interrogation, they confessed that they had smuggled gold into India earlier through this route as there is no gold scanner at the Benpole and Petra-pole check posts. BGB members pumped out the gold bars from the stomach of the smugglers as they had been pushed in through their rectums, he added. l

Train derails in Sirajganj n Our Correspondent, Sirajganj

Two compartments of a container train heading towards Sirajganj got derailed at Raypur railway station yesterday since the rain damaged the slippers of the rail-line.

Railway and local sources said two compartments of a container train went o� the track at the station around 9pm.

A rescue train was making an e� ort to remove the train from the track but it is yet to rescue the train as the work was disrupted due to the rain, said Ab-dul Mannan, an engineer at Sirajganj Bazar Railway Station.

The two trains were stranded at the Sirajganj station after the accident, snapping rail link between Dhaka and Sirajganj

Train communication on the Ish-wardi-Sirajganj-Dhaka route remained suspended since the night following the derailment. l

Two get death sentence for murder n Our Correspondent, Barguna

A court in the district awarded death sentences yesterday to two persons in a murder case.

According to the prosecution, on 23 December 2006, Tazenur, 30, the mother of two children and the wife of Khalilur from Tafalbaria village, was brutally killed by her husband and stepson Ismail over a family feud. Ta-zenur was Khalilur’s second wife.

Later, Abdur Rashid, the victim’s fa-ther, � led a case, accusing Khalilur and his son.

Police arrested Khalilur and Ismail and sent them to jail.

The court, led by Judge Nazrul Is-lam, handed down the verdict after examining the evidence and the wit-nesses.

Two drug peddlers held n Our Correspondent, Cox's Bazar

Border Guard Bangladesh arrested two drug peddlers yesterday in a drive at Natun Pallanpara area of Teknaf upa-zila of the district.

BGB commander Abuzar-al-Zahid said on a tip-o� , a team of law enforc-ers made a drive in the area and arrest-ed Farid Alam, 25, and Enaetullah, 20, with possession of 552 cans of alcohol.

A case was � led in this regard. l

Emphasis on mass awareness among families and guardians to stop child marriage n Our Correspondent, Gazipur

Participants at a workshop yesterday stressed on building mass awareness among families and guardians in order to stop early marriages in the country.

They suggested informing families and guardians of the merits and demer-its of early marriage.

The workshop was organised by the Upazila Department of Women A� airs on stopping early marriage, in associa-tion with Plan International, Bangla-desh, at the Sripur Upazila Auditorium in Gazipur. Upazila Nirbahi O� cer Mo-hammad Sadekur Rahman presided over the workshop.

Upazila Parishad Vice Chairman Mo-hammad Ra� kul Islam Mondol Bulbul

and Women Vice Chairman Sheikh Fari-da Jahan Shwapna attended as the chief guest and special guest, respectively.

Plant International, Bangladesh Gazipur Programme Unit Manager Abdul Kuddus was also present at the workshop.

He said 188 early marriage cases had taken place from April, 2013 to March, 2014 in the upazila.

He said that, of the marriage cases, 123 were held, 27 were stopped upon re-ceiving information, 11 were held at the court, nine through notary public, six without registration and 33 outside the upazila, Sripur Reporters Unity President Abu Bakar Siddique Akand and Barmi Union Parishad member Pandit spoke, among others, at the workshop. l

Three injured in attack by robbersThree people were injured in an attack by robbers at Begunbari area in the district yesterday. According to sources, a gang of robbers entered the house of Rashedul Islam, an engineer of Kaliakoir Telecommunication. The family members protested while being robbed. At one stage, they attacked the family members, leaving Rashedul, his mother Rousan Ara and grandmother Joytunnesa critically injured. The injured were admitted to Savar Enam Medical

College. SI Masud con� rmed the incident. A case was � led in this connection. – Our Correspondent

Lightning kills oneAn adolescent boy was killed in a lightning strike at Sagorkanda village in Sawarupkathi upazila yesterday. Local UP chairman Mahmud Kabir said Alok Debnath,18, son of Gobindra Chandra Debnath died in a lightning strike while he was he was going to local Bazar. – Our Correspondent

UP member murdered in Mymensingh A gang of assailants murdered a UP member at Muktagachia Union Parisad in Mymensingh district yesterday. According to police sources, the assailants hacked Dulal Mian, member of 10 no ward in the union council. He died while he was being taken to hospital. OC Kamal Hossain said Dulal might have been killed over land dispute. The OC said they were trying to arrest the people involved with the killing. – Our Correspondent

A youth was a raft in front of Fulgazi police station yesterday as low-lying areas of Feni were inundated by rainwater DHAKA TRIBUNE

NEWS IN BRIEF

Labourers unload goods from a train which derailed near Raipur railway station in Sirajganj yesterday DHAKA TRIBUNE

7Long Form Monday, June 23, 2014DHAKA TRIBUNE

n Rounaq Jahan

In the last two and half years, as the contestations between the two opposing political forces of the country, one led by the Awami League (AL), and the

other by the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), about the organisation of the tenth parliamentary election could not be resolved peacefully through dialogue, and escalated into violent confrontation, we began to again wor-ry about the future of our democracy. The high hopes of democratic renew-al, which was kindled after the 2008 parliamentary elections that ended a two year rule by a military-backed “caretaker” government, began to fade away.

We not only witnessed the failure of the two opposing sides to come to an agreement on the modalities of a poll-time government overseeing the elections, we also saw unprecedented violence unleashed on the ordinary citizens by one of the alliance partners of the BNP, the Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) whose main agen-da was to thwart the trials of the war crimes of 1971.

Despite the BNP-led alliance’s repeat-ed threats to boycott and prevent the holding of the tenth parliamentary elections, and months of mayhem and destruction, the AL-led alliance government did succeed to hold a one-sided parliamentary elections on January 5, 2014. Prior to the elections, many members of the government said the elections had to be organised to meet the constitutional requirement of organising the parliamentary elec-tions within the � ve year term limit.

The BNP led alliance did not participate in the elections leaving to the AL-led political forces to divide the 300 seats in the parliament among themselves.

Even before the elections were held on January 5, 2014 a record 153 mem-bers of parliament (MP) were declared winners as they were uncontested in their constituencies. After ensuring the majority in the tenth parliament without having a single vote cast, the government organised elections to the remaining 147 seats on January 5, 2014, which attracted little voter inter-est resulting in low voter turnout.

One alliance partner of the AL, the Jatya party (JP) could be persuaded to play the role of the opposition in

parliament, but the JP still insisted to remain as part of the government and was rewarded with three ministerial posts in the cabinet.

After the election, each of the two opposing political forces has attempt-ed to portray the elections as a “victo-ry” for its side. The AL led forces have argued that the mere organisation of the elections, no matter the � aws, was a victory as they were able to over-come all the obstacles created by the opposition.

The BNP led forces, on the other hand, have claimed victory pointing out the lack of credibility of the elec-tions organised by the government. They argued that they were right in their claim that the AL-led govern-ment cannot be trusted to organise a fair and credible election.

While both sides have continued with their claims and counter-claims of victory blaming each other for undemocratic behaviour, the nation has remained shell-shocked reel-ing from the death and destruction caused by hartals and oborodhs called by the BNP-led opposition over many months, and the incredulous elections engineered by the AL-led government.

While debates are raging as to which side has won, it is very clear as to who has lost.

The citizens of Bangladesh have lost. They had to bear a heavy price in terms of loss of life, property, and sense of security. They were deprived of an opportunity to cast their ballot and choose who will be their repre-sentatives in the parliament. The state of our fragile and halting democracy has been dealt a grievous blow, and it will take painstaking e� orts by all stakeholders to nurse it back to recovery.

Of course, as a nation we are known for our resilience – overcoming many obstacles and making many fresh starts. Since our independence in 1971, our democratic journey has not been smooth. We have often lost our direction and walked on wrong paths. Though we started as a parliamentary democracy in 1972, within four years we fell under military rule which continued for the next � fteen years (1975-1990).

However, thanks to the people’s unwavering commitment we have repeatedly succeeded in getting back to the path of democracy. In 1990, as a result of a people’s movement we

were able to end military rule and renew our democratic journey. Over the next � fteen years (1991-2006) we made gradual progress in ful� lling three criteria of being classi� ed as an electoral democracy.

First, we organised three regular free, fair and contested elections in 1991, 1996 and 2001 under a system of Non-party Caretaker Government (NCG).

Second, there was peaceful transfer of governmental power as a result of these elections.

And, third and most signi� cantly, we were able to establish civilian con-trol over policy and institutions.

But we stumbled in 2007 when we failed to organise the scheduled ninth parliamentary elections as the two opposing political forces could not agree on the ground rules for organis-ing elections. We had to again witness military intervention, and the country was ruled by a military backed “caretaker” government for two years (2007-2008).

This time, however, it was very clear that the people would not toler-ate a prolonged period of military rule. The military was also sensitive to the people’s mood. Within two years, the military backed government organ-ised a free and credible parliamentary elections on December 29, 2008, and handed over power to the democrati-cally elected government. This volun-tary transfer of power from a de facto military government to an elected civilian government was unprecedent-ed in South Asian history.

The ninth parliamentary elections organised by the military backed government was widely acclaimed by national and international observers as the freest in the country’s history. The election commission (EC) prepared a new voters list discarding the names of approximately 12.2 million bogus voters. New guidelines were intro-duced controlling election expenses and election related violence. This encouraged nomination and election of a record number of relatively clean candidates, and also a good number of women. Voter turnout was nearly 87%.

The AL-led grand alliance won 262 parliamentary seats thus securing more than three-fourth majority in parliament. The BNP-led political opposition won only 34 seats.

We had hoped that one of the � rst priorities of the AL-led grand alliance government would be to work out a formula for a poll-time government that would be acceptable to all major political parties so that we would not have to face uncertainties regarding elections again as we did earlier in 1995-1996 and 2006.

However, the government pushed through the � fteenth amendment of the constitution in June 2011 abol-ishing the NCG system in the face of strong opposition from the BNP-led forces.

As a consequence, from mid-2011 onwards, we were again faced with a situation when the two main political forces of the country took opposing stands regarding the poll-time govern-ment; the AL-led government arguing

in favour of the incumbent elected political government going into a care-taker mode, and the BNP-led forces ar-guing for the continuation of the NCG system instituted by the 13th amend-ment of the constitution in 1996.

The two sides could not come to any negotiated settlement despite repeated appeals by concerned Bangladeshi citizens and international organisations.

Finally, we witnessed a very � awed tenth parliamentary elections, and we face a risk of not being classi� ed even as an electoral democracy.

In 2014, we appear to be again at a crossroads, needing to make another fresh start to sustain our democratic process.

It will be pertinent to ask at this point, why are we having so many breakdowns? Why is our democratic journey not one of linear progress? There is no easy answer. We can identify many causes for our repeated set backs. However, the primary focus here, is on the argument that our fresh starts have � oundered because we have failed to break away from the undemocratic practices of the past.

Let me now elaborate what are some of our undemocratic practices that have continued to bedevil our democratic process.

The challenge of breaking away from past undemocratic practices

Over the last 42 years we have wit-nessed the development of certain patterns and practices of politics and governance, which have been inimical to democracy. Some of these practices are legacies of Bangladesh’s inher-itance from military rule; but some have also been spawned from the cauldron of our electoral democratic process.

Unfortunately, our elected polit-ical rulers did not repudiate many of the undemocratic practices of military rulers; instead they perpetu-ated and sometimes even exacerbat-ed these practices. Let us � rst focus on the undemocratic practices of our military rulers which have been carried over by our elected political rulers, then highlight a few of the undemocratic practices which have become the hallmarks of our elector-al democracy.

Legacy of military rule (1975-1990)

During the 15 years of rule by the two military dictators – Major General Ziaur Rahman (1975-1981) and Lieu-tenant General HM Ershad (1982-1990) – we witnessed monopoly control of state power by the chief executive who ruled unconstitutionally. We also saw their attempts to “civilianise” their regimes in order to attain a semblance of representative legiti-macy through the process of election engineering.

Both of them � oated political parties by using state patronage and intelligence agencies. In their bid to recruit support from constituencies who were opposed to the post-in-dependent AL rule (1972-1975), the

military rulers abandoned two funda-mental principles enshrined by the AL in the 1972 constitution: secularism and socialism. Islam was privileged as a state religion, and the practice of the political use of religion which was much favoured by Pakistan’s military dictators, was revived.

Many of the undemocratic features of military rule left a profound impact on the pattern of our politics and governance. Four major features, which have created a lasting political imprint, can be highlighted in this regard.

Unconstitutional rule

The military rule, � rst and foremost, left a legacy of unconstitutional rule when the control of state power was transferred not through the ballot, but through the bullet. The military � rst intervened on August 15, 1975, by assassinating the elected political leader, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the founding father of the nation, together with most members of his family.

After several coups and coun-ter-coups, which resulted in the kill-ing of many military o� cers and four major leaders of the AL who refused to collaborate with the military, Major General Ziaur Rahman emerged as the strongman of the regime in November, 1975.

The military assassins of Bangaband-hu were constitutionally pardoned by Ziaur Rahman, and most of them were awarded with diplomatic assignments abroad. This culture of impunity bred its own malign nemesis. Ziaur Rahman himself was assassinated in another military coup in 1981.

The second military dictator, Lt General HM Ershad ruled for another eight years, but was eventually top-pled from power through a peoples’ movement in 1990. During the next 15 years (1991-2006), elected political leaders ruled the country, but when they failed to agree on the ground rules for holding the scheduled par-liamentary elections, and violent con-frontations appeared imminent, the military again intervened in January, 2007, but this time they remained in the background. A civilian “caretak-er” government, backed by the mili-tary, ruled the country for two years (2007-2008) under emergency laws.

During the � rst two military regimes, the country remained under

martial law for prolonged periods when the constitution and fundamen-tal rights were suspended. The two military dictators changed constitu-tional provisions, and enacted laws through ordinances, which were later rati� ed by their hand-picked parlia-mentarians.

Many of their unconstitutional acts, including the killings, were subsequently indemni� ed. Thus, Ziaur Rahman pushed through the � fth amendment of the constitution in the second parliament elected in 1979, which validated all acts of the military government from 1975 to 1979. Simi-larly the third parliament passed the seventh amendment of the constitu-tion in 1986, which validated the acts of HM Ershad’s military government.

This practice of lawmaking, � rst through executive ordinances those were later validated by the parliament, was continued even after the restora-tion of democracy in 1991. For example, during the tenure of the � fth parlia-ment (1991-1996), 34% of laws passed by the parliament were � rst promulgat-ed as ordinances, and were later placed before the parliament for approval.

This trend was diminished during the seventh (1996-2001) and the eighth (2001-2006) parliament, when less than 5% of the laws originated as ordinances. However, the ninth par-liament (2009-2013) was again faced with the task of giving legal cover to

many of the ordinances passed during the two years of the military-backed civilian government (2007-2008).

In two landmark judgements, the Supreme Court declared military rule and all acts passed by military govern-ments as illegal. The � fth and seventh amendments of the constitution were annulled by the Supreme Court.

The parliament passed the � fteenth amendment of the constitution on June 30, 2011, which declared military takeover of government as an act of sedition.

It is to be seen whether the judge-ments of the Supreme Court and the � fteenth amendment of the constitu-tion will work as e� ective inhibitors to prevent future extra-constitutional take-over of state power by the military. l

This article is based on the second Moza� ar Ahmed Chowdhury Memorial Lecture by Rounaq Jahan, delivered on February 3, 2014. A former faculty of Dhaka University, Professor Jahan teaches and researches at Columbia University.

The state of democracy in Bangladesh

The � rst of a three-part series on the current state of democracy, the challenges it faces, and the future

Since our independence in 1971, our democratic journey has not been smooth. We have often lost our direction and walked on wrong paths

The citizens of Bangladesh have lost. They had to bear a heavy price in terms of loss of life, property, and sense of security

RAJIB DHAR

Monday, June 23, 2014DHAKA TRIBUNE World8

‘Game of Thrones’ puts N Ireland on the mapn AP, Belfast

Giants, dragons and vengeful queens have for generations populated North-ern Ireland’s folk tales. Now, such crea-tures are visiting the land in a di� erent version — on the sets for the hit TV show “Game of Thrones.” But rather than spells and destruction, they’re bringing an economic boost to this Brit-ish province still healing from its past of political violence.

Fans of the HBO fantasy drama would recognize here the landscapes from the � ctional land of Westeros — the castle of Winterfell, the seaside cli� s of the Iron Isles and the King’s Road leading to the north. About 75% of the show is � lmed in Northern Ire-land, both in natural settings and in the Titanic Studios in Belfast.

Since the pilot episode began � lming in 2009, the show’s presence has helped foster a � lm industry that is catching the eye of other Hollywood productions. And Northern Ireland is taking advan-tage of the attention by promoting the � lming locations as tourist destinations. The latest — and perhaps most illustri-ous — visitor is Queen Elizabeth II, who will tour the studio sets today. But thou-sands have already been visiting from across the globe. Cara and Tom Collins from Springdale, Arkansas, were in Ball-intoy Harbour recently to see the rocky coastal setting used in the show for the ‘Iron Isles,’ a kingdom of rugged sailors. “You can just close your eyes and pic-ture everybody there,” said Tom.

The province’s tourism industry hopes to use the show’s popularity to increase the number of tourists to over 2 million annually by 2016, from 1.8 million in 2013 — more than the re-gion’s population of just 1.8 million. l

As the Sunni terror spreads, its � ghters look for wivesn Patrick Cockburn

The Iraqi army and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS) are battling for control of Iraq’s largest re� nery outside Baiji north of Baghdad, with each side holding part of the complex. But in the town of Baiji itself, a few miles away, which is completely under the control of ISIS, residents say they are most fright-ened by ISIS militants going door to door asking about the numbers of married and unmarried women in the house.

“I told them that there were only two women in the house and both were mar-ried,” said Abu Lahid. “They said that many of their mujahedin (� ghters) were unmarried and wanted a wife. They in-

sisted on coming into my house to look at the women’s ID cards (which in Iraq show marital status).” ISIS says its men have been ordered not to bother local peo-ple if they are Sunni, but in many places they are imposing their puritanical social norms in the towns they captured.

In Mosul people were at � rst jubi-lant that ISIS had removed the check-points that for years had made move-ment in the city very slow. Merchants and farmers were ordered to reduce the prices of their goods. But tolerance and moderation on the part of ISIS is inter-mittent and may be temporary. In one case in Mosul a woman was reportedly whipped, along with her husband, be-cause she was only wearing a headscarf

rather than the niqqab cloak covering the whole body. In some captured towns fanatical ISIS militants start imposing rules about women’s clothing, watching TV in co� ee shops and cigarette smok-ing almost before the � ghting is ended.

The restraint, or lack of it, shown by ISIS has important political implications. When al-Qaida in Iraq, the forerunner of ISIS, insisted on local women marrying their � ghters during the Sunni-Shia civil war between 2004 and 2008, they alien-ated much of the Sunni community. They killed even minor government em-ployees. “I would rather have my door kicked in by American soldiers than by al-Qaida because, with the Americans, I would stand a better chance of staying

alive,” a young Sunni man in Baghdad said at the time. Such feelings enabled the Americans to create Sahwa, an an-ti-al-Qaida force among the Sunni.

ISIS could isolate itself again through its brutality and bigotry, though its leaders show signs of rec-ognizing where they went wrong last time. Its � ghters act as the shock troops of what has turned into a general Sunni uprising, but it is only one part, albeit the most important, of a loose alliance of seven or eight militant Sunni groups that could easily break apart.

For now, it is held together by a common sense of grievance and ha-tred against Nouri al-Maliki, the Prime Minister, and his government whom it

sees as persecuting and marginalizing the Sunni community. The departure of Maliki will remove part of the glue hold-ing together the ISIS-led Sunni alliance.

Some strains between the Sunni rebel factions are already evident: When the Naqshabandi Army, of which Saddam Hussein’s former deputy Izzat al-Douri is titular head, put up posters of Saddam in Mosul, ISIS gave them 24 hours to take them down or face the consequences. The Naqshabandi Army did not want a confrontation and complied.

Government television channels try to push the idea that the Sunni co-alition is already in disarray, but this is probably premature. In most Sunni towns captured by the insurgents, peo-

ple say they are more frightened by the return of vengeful government forces than they are by the presence of ISIS.

For the moment, the battle lines have steadied north of Baghdad after the blitzkrieg advance of ISIS and its allies. The � ghting for Baiji re� nery has been swaying backwards and forwards for the past � ve days. Further south, ISIS holds Tikrit, though a resident said “many peo-ple are � eeing to Erbil and Sulaimaniyah in Kurdistan because they think that if the Iraqi Army returns, it will shoot ev-erybody indiscriminately.” In Sunni ar-eas ISIS is still mopping up resistance: on Saturday, its � ghters captured al-Qaim close to the border with Syria after a � ght in which 30 soldiers were killed. l

Iraq insurgents capture fourth town in Anbar n AP, Baghdad

Sunni militants have seized another town in Iraq’s western Anbar province, the fourth to fall in two days, o� cials said yesterday, in what is shaping up to be a major o� ensive in one of Iraq’s most restive regions.

The o� cials said the militants cap-tured Rutba, about 90 miles (150 kilo-meters) east of the Jordanian border, late Saturday. Residents were on Sun-day negotiating with the militants to leave after an army unit on the town’s outskirts threatened to start shelling.

The latest advance has dealt anoth-er blow to Shiite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who is � ghting for his polit-ical life even as forces beyond his con-trol are pushing the country toward a sectarian showdown.

In a re� ection of the bitter divide, thousands of heavily armed Shiite mili-tiamen — eager to take on the Sunni in-

surgents — marched through Iraqi cit-ies in military-style parades Saturday on streets where many of them battled US forces a half decade ago.

The towns of Qaim, Rawah, Anah and Rutba are the � rst seized in pre-dominantly Sunni Anbar province since � ghters from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant overran the city of Fallujah and parts of the provincial capital of Ramadi earlier this year.

The capture of Rawah on the Eu-phrates River and the nearby town of Anah appeared to be part of march to-ward a key dam in the city of Haditha, the destruction of which would dam-age the country’s electrical grid and cause major � ooding.

Taking Rutba gives the insurgents control over the � nal stretch of a major highway to neighboring Jordan, a key artery for passengers and goods that has been infrequently used for months because of deteriorating security.

Rutba has a population of 40,000 but it has recently been home to 20,000 displaced from Fallujah and Ramadi.

Iraqi military o� cials said more than 2,000 troops were quickly dispatched to the site of the dam to protect it. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.

The Islamic State and allied mil-itants have carved out a large � ef-dom along the Iraqi-Syrian border. Control over crossings like that one in Qaim allows them to more easi-ly move weapons and heavy equip-ment. Rebels control the Syrian side of the crossing.

Al-Maliki’s Shiite-dominated gov-ernment has struggled to push back against the Sunni militants, who have seized large swaths of the country’s north since taking control of the sec-ond-largest city of Mosul on June 10 as troops melted away. l

Nasa to build world’s most-powerful telescope in hunt for alien life

n Agencies

NASA scientists have announced plans to build a telescope that may give us clues to whether alien life exists on planets millions of miles away, The Independent reported.

The Atlast, or Advanced Technology Large-Aperture Space Telescope, will be the most powerful telescope in the world and will be able to analyse atmospheres of planets and solar systems up to 30 light years away. It is hoped that the telescope will give astronomers crucial insights into whether extra-terrestrial life forms are able to exist in undiscovered areas of space.

To be able to analyse these planets, the

telescope will have to be the largest of its kind ever to be built and up to four times bigger than the 44ft Hubble Space Tele-scope. Inside will be a mirror with a diameter of 52ft, the largest man-made mirror ever.

Due to the size of the telescope, no rocket will be capable of transporting it up to space and instead, a team of astronaut construction workers will be ferried by Nasa’s Orion rocket to assemble the telescope situated 1million miles from the earth’s surface. The details of the project will be revealed at this week’s National Astronomy Meeting in Portsmouth by the president for the Royal Astronomical Society, Martin Barstow. l

Two die in clash with Israeli troopsn Agencies

Israeli troops killed two Palestinians yesterday, Palestinian medics and a militant group said, as Israel pressed on with its crackdown on Hamas, the Islamist group it accuses of abducting three Israeli teens.

The latest death brings to four the number of con� rmed fatalities since Is-rael started its operation to � nd the miss-ing teens. Soldiers entered several Pales-tinian cities and villages in the occupied West Bank, rounding up six suspected armed men. Israel has said its West Bank operation is twofold - to � nd Gil-Ad Shaer and US-Israeli national Naftali Fraenkel, both aged 16, and Eyal Yifrah, 19, who went missing near an Israeli settlement on June 13. l

Pope ‘excommunicates’ ma� an Agencies

Pope Francis has issued the strongest attack on organised crime groups by a ponti� in two decades, accusing them of practising “the adoration of evil” and saying that ma� osi were excommuni-cated. It was the � rst time a pope had used the word ‘excommunication’ – a to-tal cuto� from the church – in direct ref-erence to members of organised crime.

“Those who in their lives follow this path of evil, as ma� osi do, are not in communion with God. They are ex-communicated,” he said in impromptu comments at a mass before hundreds of thousands of people in one of Italy’s most crime-infested areas.

To sustained applause he told the crowd: “This evil must be fought against, it must be pushed aside. We

must say no to it.” He branded the local crime group, the ‘Ndrangheta, as an ex-ample of the “adoration of evil and con-tempt of the common good” and said the church would exert its full force in e� orts to combat organised crime.

“Our children are asking for it, our young people are asking for it. They are in need of hope and faith can help re-spond to this need,” he said.

Vatican spokesman Father Ciro Ben-edettini said the pope’s stern words did not constitute a formal over-arching de-cree of canon (church) law regarding ex-communication, which is a formal legal process. Rather, he said it was more of a direct message to members of organised crime that they had e� ectively excom-municated themselves, reminding them that they could not participate in church sacraments or other activities because

they had distanced themselves from God through their criminal actions.

Still, the use of the highly charged word by a pope was signi� cant because many members of organised crime in Italy see themselves as part of a reli-gious, cult-like group, take part in sac-raments, go to church and in some cas-es have also found complicity by some churchmen in the south.

The pope, Benedettini said, was try-ing to “isolate ma� osi within their own communities,” sending a message that they should not in any way be looked up to as “men of honour.”

In 1993 Pope John Paul sternly warned members of Sicily’s ma� a that they would “one day face the justice of God.” The ma� a responded several months later with bomb attacks against several churches in Rome. l

On social issues, America edges steadily leftn Agencies

Along the left-right spectrum on social and economic issues, Americans have traditionally tended to be a bit more conservative – certainly compared to the European countries to which they trace their ancestry. That, however, appears to be changing, according to recent surveys.

Just since 2010, Gallup � nds, the conservative advantage on economic issues has dropped from 36% down to 21%. On social issues, the decline over the same period looks more precip-itous: from 17% to just four percent. “Conservatism is still the dominant ideology in the US when Americans are asked to describe their political views overall and when asked about their

views on economic and social issues separately,” Gallup reported recently. “However, the conservative advantag-es are shrinking, in large part because of Democrats’ increasing likelihood of describing their views as liberal rather than conservative or moderate.”

In other words, party a� liation and the current state of political a� airs – par-tisan to the point of divisiveness – are part of the picture. But demographics (younger generations coming along) and the rise of libertarianism are too. Look-ing ahead, Gallup predicts: “With the conservative advantage on social issues down to four points, it is possible in the next few years there will be more Amer-icans describing themselves as socially liberal than as socially conservative.” l

A group organized by the Act Now to Stop War and End Racism (ANSWER) Coalition stages a small protest against any new US wars in Iraq, during a demonstration in front of the White House in Washington REUTERS

Clockwise from top: Game of Thrones tourists take part at clearsky adventure which has built an exact replica of Winterfell Archery range in the same spot where � lming took place at castleward, Strangford, Northern Ireland. Game of Thrones fans stop for a picture on their way to Audleys � eld and castle, which was used for � lming season 1. Tourists visit Audleys � eld and castle AP

9Monday, June 23, 2014DHAKA TRIBUNE World

Submarines to choppers: A sneak peek into Modi’s defence agendan Agencies

Major decisions and policy announce-ments aimed at bee� ng up India’s de-fence are going to be on the front burn-er of Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the next few weeks, Firstpost reported.

Multi-billion dollar deals for acqui-sition of submarines, attack helicop-ters, heavy-lift helicopters, missiles and � ghter aircraft are on Modi’s radar screen. In fact, the prime minister’s foreign policy in near term too will have heavy defence agenda. Here is a sneak peek into the Modi government’s defence agenda in near future.

SubmarinesThis is a crucial sector and a major area of concern as the former defence min-ister AK Antony did more harm than good to the cause of modernisation of Indian armed forces. Antony brought the defence armaments’ acquisition process to a virtual halt for a major part of his tenure. After INS Sindhurakshak was lost to the Indian Navy due to a massive � re and multiple explosions in Mumbai naval dock yard on 14 August, 2013, and operational issues with sev-eral other aging submarines, the navy has been left with just 13 conventional diesel-electric submarines, 11 of which are 20-27 years old.

Interestingly, it was the previous NDA government of the then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee which had approved in 1999 a long-term ambitious project, called Project 75i, aimed at adding 30 new submarines to the naval � eet by 2030. It is for the Modi government now to put this proj-ect back on the rails. A major decision of clearing pending submarines project is awaiting the nod of the new Indian government.

HelicoptersThis is another area where the Indian armed forces are feeling distressed for years but no decision could be taken by the UPA government.

The armed forces are in dire need of attack helicopters and heavy-lift trans-port helicopters. The US is the front-runner for grabbing the deal for o� -the-shelf purchase of these two types of helicopters — 16 Chinuk heavy-lift helicopters and 22 Apache attack heli-copters.

The helicopter deal, likely to cost up to $3bn, is going to dominate the India-US conversations in the coming weeks in the run up to Prime Minis-ter Modi’s bilateral visit to the US in September this year. Modi is likely to hold a summit meeting with President Barack Obama in Washington on 30 September.

But then, this won’t be an easy de-cision for the Modi government as sev-eral major foreign powers, including Russia, have been wooing India for this lucrative deal.

MMRCA ProjectThis mega project of Medium Multiro-le Combat Aircraft, though awarded in principle to France by the UPA govern-ment in January 2012, is still in a limbo as � nal commercial negotiations with the French company Dassault are lin-gering on. The Modi government has to come up with its decision of ‘clearing’ the deal.

The project is going to cost a whopping $20bn involving 126 � ght-er aircraft. The project is of utmost necessity for the Indian Air Force which is currently down to just 34 � ghter squadrons as against a min-imum requirement of 44 � ghter squadrons. l

Hong Kong votes in democracy ‘poll’ in de� ance of Beijingn Reuters, Hong Kong

Nearly 600,000 votes have been cast in three days of an uno� cial referendum on democratic reforms in Hong Kong, part of a civil campaign that has been branded illegal by the former British colony and by Communist Party au-thorities in Beijing.

Hong Kong returned to Chinese rule in 1997 with wide-ranging autonomy under the formula of “one country, two systems,” along with an undated prom-ise of universal su� rage.

But social tensions have risen steadi-ly, with many residents concerned that civil liberties are being eroded and with pro-democracy activists threat-ening to blockade part of the city’s � -nancial district if China doesn’t stick to its promise.

Polling in the uno� cical referendum was extended from June 22 until June 29 after the voting website received bil-lions of hits in an apparent cyberattack last week that prompted organisers to open 15 polling booths across the city on Sunday. Residents have so far voted online and via smartphones.

While Beijing says Hong Kong can go ahead with a vote in 2017 for the city’s top leader, Hong Kong’s mini-constitu-tion, the Basic Law, speci� es that only a nominating committee can pick leader-ship candidates. Pro-democracy activ-ists say this should be changed to allow public nominations.

“What is the point of one man, one vote if at the end of the day we have to vote from three puppets or four pup-pets anointed by Beijing?” Anson Chan, Hong Kong’s former top civil servant and a key supporter of the vote, said on Sunday.

The uno� cial referendum comes a week after Beijing released a white pa-per in which it reasserted its authority

over Hong Kong, a move that unnerved and enraged many in the city, raising fears of direct intervention.

At one polling station, about 20 people from pro-Beijing group Caring Hong Kong Power shouted at voters who braved the rain, urging them not to cast ballots.

“You are sending your children to the battle� eld,” one shouted at a voter.

The referendum, organized by the Occupy Central protest group, o� ers voters three options, which all include a popular vote. There

is also an option to abstain, but no breakdown of the results has been provided.

More than 590,000 votes had been cast by midday on Sunday, according to organisers, or nearly 10% of Hong Kong’s population of seven million.

Occupy Central had said it hoped the referendum would draw up to 300,000 people and it aims to mobilize thousands on to the streets of the city’s � nancial district as part of its campaign to demand full democracy.

It’s been a busy few weeks for pro- and anti-establishment groups. Pro-Beijing group Silent Majority re-leased a video last week warning of possible deaths and general mayhem if the Occupy Central protests proceed. In one scene, a dagger pierces a throb-bing heart that symbolizes the central business district.

At a sing-along rally in support of the referendum on Friday, more than 100 people gathered in Central to sing “Do You Hear the People Sing?” from the musical Les Miserables. l

MH370 pilot ‘chief suspect’ in case of foul playn Agencies

The captain of Flight MH370 has been identi� ed as the prime suspect by a Malaysian police investigation into the disappearance of the plane after checks cleared all other people on board, a me-dia report said yesterday. The criminal inquiry does not rule out the possibility the Boeing 777-200 plane was lost due to mechanical failure or terrorism, but the police view is that if it was the re-sult of human action, the captain was the most likely perpetrator.

Malaysia’s special branch focused

the inquiry on Captain Zaharie Shah, 53, after intelligence checks failed to sub-stantiate any suspicions about the other people on board the jet, the report said.

The Beijing-bound Flight MH370, carrying 239 people, mysteriously van-ished on March 8 en route to Beijing from Kuala Lumpur. The disappear-ance of the plane is one of the greatest mysteries in aviation history.

Detectives conducted more than 170 interviews. They found that Zaharie, an outgoing man with a penchant for gad-getry, appeared to have made no social or work commitments for the future. l

Malaysia’s tiny, strutting serama fowl gains fansn AFP, Kampung Pandan

Marching imperiously with a pu� ed-out chest and soldier’s ramrod posture, Moha-mad Hatta Yahaya’s tiny chicken strutted its rich yellow plumage for a stone-faced judge.

“Yes my hero, pu� out your chest!” Moha-mad Hatta cried out above the din of fellow fowl-owners as his $10,000 bird pranced to victory in a “beauty contest” for serama chickens outside the capital Kuala Lumpur.

The breed – among the world’s smallest chickens with adults weighing less than 500 grammes (17 oz) – has been a favoured pet in its native Malaysia for decades. But its popularity has spread to as far as Europe and America, with enthusiast clubs prolif-erating as owners celebrate the decorative breed’s distinctive characteristics.

These include attractive and richly coloured plumage and a unique bearing

marked by a protruding, heart-shaped chest and wings that hang straight to the ground, giving the pigeon-sized bird the air of a goose-stepping soldier on military parade.

While the Asian bird-� u outbreaks of re-cent times and subsequent poultry restric-tions have hamstrung breeding e� orts, the serama has been sustained by the e� orts of ardent enthusiasts who will pay up to several thousand dollars for a prize bird.

‘Part of my family’ “There are people who want to buy my bird. But I am not selling it. It is part of my family,” Mohamad Hatta said.

Believed to be a cross between the Malaysian wild fowl and Japanese bantam, the serama � rst emerged decades ago as a decorative pet for Malaysia’s state sultans before gaining a broader public following beginning in the 1980s.

Its name is thought to derive from “Rama” – a term referring to Thailand’s royalty. Some believe the breed originated as a long-ago gift from a Thai king to a Malaysian sultan. Many Malaysians eat serama, believing them an aphrodisiac that also � ghts asthma. But the bird’s attractiveness and good-natured, manageable disposition has pushed it up the pecking order of Malaysian pets.

“These beautiful tiny birds gives you great pleasure to own,” said Norzamini Tukiban, a 54-year-old banker who heads the district chapter of Malaysia’s serama association.

Ahmad Fauzi Mohamed, president of the Malaysia branch of the World Serama Fed-eration, estimates there are about 250,000 serama in Malaysia. There are nearly as many overseas, he said, and serama clubs have sprouted across Southeast Asia, the United States, Canada, Belgium, Holland, South Korea and elsewhere. l

Pakistan o� ensive displaces 350,000n Agencies

Some 350,000 people have been dis-placed since the start of an army o� en-sive against militants in Pakistan’s North Waziristan a week ago, o� cials say.

Long lines of buses and lorries are reported waiting in intense heat for security clearance to enter the nearest town of Bannu. There are fears the ref-ugees could spread polio, as many of the displaced children have not been vaccinated.

The o� ensive began after a deadly attack on Karachi airport. The attack was claimed by an Uzbek militant group and the Pakistani Taliban.

Tens of thousands of children are

among those who are currently on the move in the tribal region. “The civil-ians have no idea where they are go-ing,” reports Shazeb Jillani from Bannu

Many of them have never been vac-cinated for highly-infectious diseases - like polio - because of a Taliban-im-posed ban.

Local o� cials say they are doing ev-erything they can to deal with the un-folding humanitarian crisis. A camp for the displaced people has been set up near Bannu.

But most families have refused to go there, saying the place lacks basic necessities like water, food and sanita-tion, the BBC’s Shahzeb Jillani in Islam-abad reports. l

Protests over election fraud claims gather pace in Afghanistann Reuters, Kabul

Protests in support of Afghan presi-dential candidate Abdullah Abdullah’s decision to drop out of the electoral process gathered in several cities yes-terday, as tension over allegations of mass-fraud in the run-o� vote grew.

Abdullah has so far ignored calls by the United Nations and the Afghan government to return to the electoral process, after withdrawing earlier this week by declaring any outcome was il-legal and recalling his observers moni-toring the vote count.

The second day of protests came despite appeals for calm by Afghan authorities and the United Nations, intensifying longstanding concerns of a struggle for power along ethnic lines and casting doubt on Afghanistan’s at-tempt to transfer power democratically for the � rst time in its history.

The election comes as most foreign troops are planning to leave Afghanistan by the end of the year. The fragile state of the society they will leave behind was underscored on Saturday by a suicide bombing aimed at a government o� cial.

Abdullah, of mixed Tajik and Pash-tun heritage, is known for his leader-ship role in the anti-Taliban Northern Alliance. The June 14 run-o� vote pit-ted him against ex-World Bank econo-mist Ashraf Ghani, who belongs to the majority ethnic Pashtun group.

Abdullah is demanding an investiga-tion into vote fraud and the dismissal of the head of the Independent Elec-tion Commission (IEC) Secretariat Zia-ul-Haq Amarkhil. l

Cu� ed knifeman ‘apologises’ for holy war in Xinjiangn Reuters, Beijing

One of the assailants who carried out an attack in western China that injured four people has apologised and said other members of his group had con-vinced him to participate in a “holy war,” state media said late on Saturday.

The knife attack occurred last Sun-day in a crowded chess hall in the city of Hotan in troubled Xinjiang, the tradi-tional home of ethnic Muslim Uighurs. Two of the attackers died from serious injuries, while the remaining one, Muer Zhati, was arrested, China Central Tele-vision (CCTV) said on Saturday.

“I just listened to them and did something like this, hacked people,” Muer Zhati was shown as saying on CCTV. “I’m sorry, I apologise for my behaviour. I just want to say I’m sorry.”

Muer Zhati, who was shown on tele-vision wearing an orange prison vest and handcu� s, said members of his group had advocated a holy war, telling him that he could obtain a straight path to heaven.

“They told me about this matter of the holy war, that as long as I died while participating, I could go directly to heaven and not be subject to a trial after I die,” Muer Zhati said.

On June 15, Muer Zhati said he spent � ve seconds observing people in a room playing cards before he started hacking a woman.

CCTV said, however, that Muer Zha-ti’s confession “came too late and all that is waiting for him now is the strict punishment of the law.”

CCTV often airs confessions by thieves, prostitutes and other petty criminals, but in recent months, sever-al high-pro� le suspects have confessed to crimes on air, often wearing hand-cu� s and jumpsuits. Critics say public confessions deprive the accused of the right to a fair trial.

China has been on edge since a sui-cide bombing last month killed 39 peo-ple at a morning vegetable market in Xinjiang’s capital of Urumqi. Knife at-tacks in the past have often resulted in attackers being arrested or killed.

Chinese police shot dead 13 attack-ers in Xinjiang on Saturday after they rammed a car into a police station and detonated explosives, state news agen-cy Xinhua said.

Police in Xinjiang have arrested or tried dozens of suspects in recent weeks for spreading extremist propa-ganda, harbouring banned weapons and other crimes.

Rights activists and exile groups have charged that the government’s own repressive policies in Xinjiang have sowed the seeds of unrest. l

A man leaves after voting in a polling station for an uno� cial referendum on democratic reform as assistants sitting on left side use smart devices to register the voters’ ID card infomation in Hong Kong AP

A judge watches as a Serama chicken struts down a judging table during a beauty contest at Kampung Pandan in Kuala Lumpur AFP

Supporters of Afghan presidential candidate Abdullah Abdullah shout slogans during a protest in Kabul, Afghanistan, June 22 AP

Editorial10 DHAKA TRIBUNE Monday, June 23, 2014

CODE-CRACKER

ACROSS1 Facts given (4)5 Joint (5)9 Keen insight (6)10 Respectful fear (3)11 Nothing more (4)12 Ventured (5)14 Register (5)16 Region (4)19 Meshed fabrics (4)21 Loyal vassal (5)24 Stringed instrument (5)27 Poker stake (4)29 Anger (3)30 Pokes gently (6)31 Garment (5)32 Look for (4)

DOWN1 Moist (4)2 Top card (3)3 Soup dish (6)4 So be it! (4)5 Sanction (7)6 Barrier (3)7 Be indebted (3)8 Cleat (5)13 Beverage (3)15 Fixed allowances (7)17 Take vengeance (6)18 Shining (5)20 Old cloth measure (3)22 Cattle goads (4)23 Furniture item (4)25 Do wrong (3)26 Sheltered side (3)28 Golf mound (3)

CROSSWORD

How to solve: 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 number repeating.

SUDOKU

How to solve: Each number in our CODE-CRACKER grid represents a di� erent letter of the alphabet. For example, today 3 represents G so � ll G every time the � gure 3 appears.You have two letters in the control grid to start you o� . Enter them in the appro-priate squares in the main grid, then use your knowledge of words to work out which letters go in the missing squares.Some letters of the alphabet may not be used.As you get the letters, � ll in the other squares with the same number in the main grid, and the control grid. Check o� the list of alphabetical letters as you identify them.

CODE-CRACKER

CROSSWORD

SUDOKU

YESTERDAY’S SOLUTIONS

CALVIN AND HOBBES

PEANUTS

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The beautiful gameJune 18

saima imamDon’t Bangladeshis have anything better to do? It was only a few months ago when the whole frenzy about cricket ended. Now the World Cup. Why do they not work on their skills so that one day they can participate in the World Cup? Ain’t going to happen? With that attitude they are not going to even try. When do people work if they are watching games all day long? What about the students? When do they sit down and study?

Perhaps Bangladeshi television should broad-cast one major game each night. No wonder things

are slow-paced here, with people just watching TV.

Breadbitten saima imam: Wow! Lighten up!

Zero-AgendaIt always amazes me how festive things get here in Bangladesh every four years when the World Cup comes around. It’s the only time when people butt heads over opposing views, but do so with some much-needed level of endearment and lightheart-edness. I love it!

Drive against foreign language adverts begins in capitalJune 19

VKJust ask yourself why countries in the region, like India, Malaysia, Singapore and others, are so much advanced, and why countries like Bangladesh are going backwards. Maybe because they put the emphasis on the use of English instead of banning it!

SomeoneThis is incredibly regressive and extremely unfortunate. Now that this mindless campaign to obliterate English from our city streets has begun, I’d say the HC and the ruling party might as well reconsider the name “Awami League,” neither of which is a Bangla word. On another note, whether written in English or Bangla, I’ve always cursed and resented the very sight of advertisement billboards in Dhaka. I still � nd them an absolute abomination that have for long ruined the city’s landscape and aesthetics. Left to me, I’d tear all of them down.

Plainti� s do not know about case detailsJune 18

Vikram KhanSo, the horrible event that shamed the nation will be treated in typical Bangladeshi style; (politically) covered up. Very, very nice indeed!

A long road to developmentDhaka continues to face new tra� c and transportation crises every year,

a key reason being there has not been any long-term planning since its inception as the capital city. It is past time for our city planners to

conceive a more lasting solution to the problem. Nor is this a problem that is limited to Dhaka alone. Congestion and insu� cient infrastructure bedevils the entire country, and there is not a village, town, or city which is immune.

Any development that has taken place in road infrastructure was done with minimal consideration for the city’s rapidly growing population, with the result that we are always playing catch up and that, despite continual expansion, road infrastructure has never been su� cient for our needs at any given moment in time. Once again, this is a problem that has replicated itself countrywide.

No government in the past has been successful in expanding either the capital city – or any urban area – in a planned manner, leading to the relentless tra� c congestion.

Considerable amounts of money and time have been wasted in makeshift solutions to the problem. If city planners do not � nd more durable answers, sooner or later, Dhaka will no longer be able to serve its purpose as a capital city.

Major investments are required for such a project and cannot be implemented without proper management and coordination between city planners and transport authorities. Implementing such plans will be a prolonged process and will also require the commitment of all. Additionally, certain policies will need to be put in place to protect resources that are intended for the project.

We urge the government to formulate a long-term strategy for developing the nation’s infrastructure that can tackle the tra� c issue once and for all. The capital city would be a good place to start.

Shut the valve on water-logging

Roads in various parts of the country are badly congested because of water-logging caused by the sudden surge in rainfall, and the increased number of vehicles plying them for that very reason.

This phenomenon is nothing new to those who have lived in Bangladesh for long enough, but it is high time that the government took measurable steps in alleviating this frustrating issue.

The centre of this problem can be traced back to the ine� cient and poorly-managed sewage systems in our cities.

Negligence on the part of local government bodies in maintaining drainage systems is the primary reason contributing to the woes of city dwellers around the country, with citizens often citing � ippant, uncooperative attitudes from both the water authorities and the city corporations in tackling the issue with more fervour.

This rationale pervades more than the drainage system, however.

The government’s strategy in building metropolitan infrastructure thus far has been on an ad hoc basis in place of having a planned, comprehensive system designed, one that also takes future conditions into account. This is not the way urban centres are meant to be maintained.

Instead of dipping its toes into sectors which can take care of themselves, the government should instead concentrate on the more pertinent responsibilities it has been given.

Taking care of water-logging, disentangling tra� c, improving infrastructure, these are not duties that the private sector can, or should, be left to tackle. This is the government’s job, and we expect the government to make it a priority.

Taking care of water-logging, disentangling tra� c, and improving infrastructure are duties for the government to tackle

Major investments in city planning cannot be implemented without proper management and coordination

A bridge over troubled watersJune 19riazoWe need the Padma Bridge to rejuvenate the south and south-west of Bangladesh, in the same way we needed the Jamuna Bridge to rejuvenate northern Bangladesh. I am sure the government is well aware of any short-term pressures the bridge construction may put on the macro-economic situation of the country.

Evil people politicsThe Padma Bridge project may forever be stuck in a limbo if more concrete headway (pun unintended) is not made by the government.

Hasina is godfather’s mother, claims KhaledaJune 17

RonnieKhaleda Zia isn’t alone in correctly castigating the PM’s mind-boggling defence of Shamim Osman, and her doting tribute to the Osman family, in Parliament. Any fool who still harboured hopes of seeing the PM and her government properly pursue the course of true justice, regarding Mr Osman and others, has no excuse to delude himself any longer after the PM’s public conferral of immunity from prosecution to this man.

Apur Panchali: Obsession reincarnateJune 19

Mosabber RahmanThe � nal paragraph should read as follows:“We are thankful cannibals, devouring our heroes for our own glory and later paying them tributes. Is this the way? To be an heir to a legacy is to digest the ‘ideas’ of the � lmmaker that he so densely packs into his � lms from whose DNA strands an entire dinosaur can be made. Films are the ambers that carry ‘ideas.’ In that aspect, ‘our � lms’ might be closer to Satyajit Ray’s legacy than ‘their � lms.’”

A media monsterJune 18

VHSMedia tends to love monsters. Also, I guess the public loves to watch something they hate on TV.

Mewing Tigers su� er shocking defeat

June 18

ZaheerI refuse to let these cricketers represent

Bangladesh.

TamimFirst of all, tell me: Why are they even called

Tigers? They couldn’t even perform like Tigers!

MonirThe Indian cricket team is not even the main team.

India sent a very young team to Bangladesh. We really are not capable of winning against them.

Are we aware of our true abilities? I think we are expecting too much from our team.

Bangladesh deserves defeat for this failure because we are too proud for no reason. We only

hold 9th place with 1807 points. But if you see the ratings list, you will notice that India is holding 2nd

place in ODI with 6169 points. They are far ahead of us. In test cricket, we hold last place. We should

be aware of our abilities before we say anything. Still we have a long journey to go.

“Bangladesh pacer Taskin Ahmed’s heroic e� ort on his memorable ODI debut was made

even more memorable, credit to his colleagues with the bat who failed to chase a paltry 106 runs

and hence succumbed to an appalling 47 run defeat against an untested and young India team

at the Sher-e-Bangla National Stadium yesterday.”The article’s � rst line talks about Taskin

Ahmed’s bowling. But why didn’t we appreciate Binny’s bowling? He is the one who took more

wickets in this match.

Tamim Monir: I think even the Kolkata Knight Riders can

beat this team with ease.

Khaleda: Movement after EidJune 18

SDKhaleda is all about political bickering and

does not care about the needs of the people of Bangladesh. She should be imprisoned for life

for inciting violent demonstrations, which only damage the Bangladeshi economy and make the

people su� er.

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

n Towheed Feroze

It was an area just outside the main bustling city of Sylhet. The house which provided temporary sanctu-

ary for Fatiha (name changed) was a nondescript structure. Inside, Fatiha was coming to terms with the fact that her British citizenship has made her into a conduit for the wish ful� llment of others.

Still reeling from a forced marriage, Fatiha’s case was far more deviant than the basic “bring back home on false pretext and have the girl married” type. She was married to an unknown person over the phone and made to live in a hostile household of a relative of her husband in the UK, where the treatment she received was appalling.

When she came back to Bangladesh, the husband turned out to be a drug addict. And to make matters worse, her father, who had two wives, died suddenly, triggering a family feud over property. In the frenzy, Fatiha’s plight was forgotten. Thanks to the Forced Marriage Unit (FMU) of the consular services of the British High Commis-sion in Dhaka and the support o� ce in Sylhet, she was saved from becoming a victim of unremitting sorrow.   

The case I just mentioned dates

back to 2009, when I was in the service of the British government, working as the press o� cer. As part of the team to rescue her and provide her with regular assistance to overcome the or-deal, I found that while she had strong belief in her faith and culture, she also loved football, hanging with friends, cycling in the park, and listening to Spice Girls. A balanced mixture of two cultures, one can conclude.

Before coming face to face with Fatiha’s case, we had, as journalists, a very vague idea about the whole issue of forced marriage involving Brit Bang-ladeshis. In light conversations, people raised the issue stating that a lot of young women of Bangladeshi families who were born and brought up in the UK were often brought back home and married o� without their consent.

The major topic was how a bur-qa-clad girl was speaking � uent Eng-lish whereas her husband could hardly speak a single line.  

However, the human ordeal of such episodes never came out in the open for two reasons – � rstly, many women, living within strict conservative social rules, accepted their fate, and second-ly, those who somehow managed to escape these arbitrarily imposed wed-dings hardly came to the media with their stories because they were embar-

rassed that disclosure might humiliate their parents or relatives.

Scarring family honour is very much a vital matter among the South Asian communities abroad, which often leads to honour-based crimes. Just to recall a recent incident, a woman with two children was severely beaten and bruised by her Sikh father-in-law in Britain when the latter suspected her of having an a� air with a Muslim man.

Again, another social anomaly sur-faces – the schism between expatriate communities of di� erent faiths, taken to a fanatical level. Anyway, now that a UK law banning all such unions without consent comes into e� ect, can we expect victims to step forward to seek help?

The truth is, the whole matter is riddled with mind-boggling social and moral conundrums – on one side, a girl may not be willing to marry someone she has never met, or with whom she has very little in common and may desire support, but from the other an-gle, she may be unwilling to have the forced-marriage law enforced to have her parents or guardians punished.

It is of course laudable that a law has passed in the UK under which the maximum sentence can be sev-en-year-imprisonment, though what is essential is a concerted movement

to reform the mindsets of the South Asian communities in Britain and in home countries for any solid improve-ment in social cohesion.

British society in general under-stands marriage without consent is a severe breach of human rights. But the question is: When the notion of ar-ranged marriage is � rmly embedded in the psyche of the Asian communities, how can outlooks be revamped?

A practical idea is to merge Western-style freedom of choice with an arranged marriage format that is more attuned to the age. If the approach is one or the other, failure is inevitable.

Once outside the Sylhet Air-port, signboards of the Foreign and Commonwealth O� ce urging young women to call a number for fast help in cases of forced nuptials underline

a stark gap in assimilating the basic precepts of individual choice.

Surprisingly, parents of young British Bangladeshis are often silent on the matter. Does this mean they give tacit approval to such marriages? Not all surprise marriages arranged by the guardians end up in disaster though, some survive with lasting results, providing the rationale for the custom to survive.

On the other hand, the fear which haunts the South Asian communities is that unless a young girl born in the UK is married to someone from back home, she will eventually leave the cultural con� nes and become “Westernised.”

The term “Westernised” here is used as a pejorative term, carrying all the negative connotations. What is more unnerving is that people staying

in � rst-world states are harbouring and perpetuating some obsolete social no-tions in the name of preserving social and cultural identity.

This is de� nitely not to say that all South Asian families prefer a clois-tered life. Many have blended with the British culture, making, if not a perfect then a practical combination of East-ern and Western values. Unfortunate-ly, a lot of British Asian families still cling on to beliefs that clash with the perspective of their sons or daughters born and raised in the UK.

Faced with the prospect of the new law that stipulates incarceration, many parents now take a di� erent course – indoctrination. The marriageable person, under relentless sermonising, may capitulate only to discover later irreconcilable matrimonial di� erences.

Proselytising has many other rami� cations, leading victims to adopt zealotry in forming their own philoso-phies. Perhaps in addition to the new law, there can be an e� ort to sensitise the South Asian communities, not only in the UK but back in the home states, about a healthy middle path that is not extreme on any side. l

 Towheed Feroze is a journalist currently working in the development sector.

n Syed Ishtiaque Reza

Bangladesh leaves many coun-tries trailing behind when it comes to fatal road accidents.

No one can give precise statistics, but the country is surely at the top when it comes to lives lost in road accidents.

In television newsrooms the ticker is updated periodically, and among the numerous political, economic, business, and crime-related news, they are also updated with frequent news of fatal road accidents every day. In almost every news bulletin, news of accidents occupies a signi� cant portion of airtime. It is high time that the government and the public took resolute actions for road safety.

A study conducted by the Acci-dent Research Centre (ARC) of the Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET) notes that there has been an alarming rise in the number of road accidents, highway accidents chie� y, in Bangladesh over the past few years.

According to the study, road acci-dents claim an average of 12,000 lives every year and lead to about 35,000 injuries. According to statistics from the World Bank, the annual fatality rate from road accidents is found to be 85.6 fatalities per 10,000 vehicles in Bangladesh.

A high growth in urbanisation and the number of cars can be identi� ed as one of the factors leading to the large number of road accidents. But the real reason is issuing driving licenses to those who are un� t to drive. For a na-tion in which the number of vehicles per capita is quite low, the number of deaths is, on the contrary, huge, distressing, and worrisome.

If we observe all the news reports and television talk show deliberations, they all speak of the same thing – drunk driving, speeding, enforcement of rules, the importance of seat belts, the safety of pedestrians and motor cyclists who constitute the majority of those who perish in road accidents, improv-ing infrastructure, and so on. But in the end, nothing gets implemented, result-ing in lives being lost on the roads.

Lawlessness is very widespread in Bangladesh’s transport sector. There are rules, but no one seems to care. The situation seems to be getting worse as our economy grows, along with our growing purchasing power and number of motor vehicles on the roads.

Roads in Bangladesh are always packed with vehicles. Some are too fast, while some are too slow. The roadway infrastructure in some areas of the country is completely outdated. And the drivers, especially bus and truck drivers, act like Neanderthals out on the roads. Many of our country’s

sectors are gradually shedding any semblance of accountability, but the transport sector never really had any.

If the Bangladesh Road Transport Authority (BRTA) really is bent on improving this sector, and wants to re-duce the number of accidents, its only option is to work with a sincere mis-sion. It can reissue all driving licenses around the country in phases. Even those who hold valid licenses, not only those with forged ones, should be issued new licenses.

First of all, the BRTC, and other authorities concerned, can think of changing the license issuance system; everyone is aware of the purchasa-ble driving licenses in our country. There are thousands of drivers who have very little knowledge of tra� c rules. The driving tests conducted by the transport authorities are a farce. Anyone can manage a driving license through bribery. This happens because the system is not there to ensure honesty and transparency. Bus and truck drivers are highly organised and backed by powerful quarters. They can kill thousands on the streets without as much as a slap on the wrist.

The government promotes Informa-tion Technology (IT) all the time. It can employ the use of IT in the transport sector. With help from experts, it can come up with a network of all the licenses issued connected to a central database. Apart from the obvious tragedy, the economic costs of such accidents are also a signi� cant factor. Estimates in Bangladesh show a signif-icant waste in the total national GDP from road accidents, which could’ve been salvaged, had the number of acci-dents been lower.

Another way to reduce the number of accidents would be to randomly check the skills of drivers. Police, along with a magistrate, can do random checks on drivers. They can be asked questions regarding their driving skills and knowledge of tra� c rules. But the real factor would be checking the indi-viduals who issue licenses. If a driver is found to be unknowledgeable of the rules, or does not possess su� cient skills in driving, the next step would be to check the individual who issued a license to that driver. If things are done with a clear mission, a proper system can manifest.

This will surely be a grand under-taking, but the nation needs this in order to save lives. A nation cannot a� ord to allow its people to keep dying out on the streets. Violators must be dealt with judiciously. It is impera-tive to go all-out in preventing road accidents. l

Syed Ishtiaque Reza is Director of News, Ekattor.

The end of an era

11Op-Ed Monday, June 23, 2014DHAKA TRIBUNE

n Quazi Zulquarnain Islam

France did it in 2002, Italy did it twice, and now Spain has followed suit as cham-pions that exited the World Cup at the group phase the

following year. Lumping this all-con-quering Spanish side with the solid but spectacular incarnations of France and Italy is a disservice to the stylish and irrepressible football that Spain has gifted us over the last six years.

But with the man who directed that wonder orchestra, Xavi, missing from its swansong, it was somehow � tting that the Spaniards exited the World Cup to a Chile style playing an aggres-sive, breakneck brand of football. The “death” of tiki-taka is being celebrated and lamented in equal measure, but the truth is that with an ageing team, lacking a little bit in motivation and a tough group, this was always on the cards. But when you have players like Koke, Javi Martinez, David de Gea, Juan Mata, and Thiago Alcantara, be sure that Spain will be back. As an era ends, another is set to begin.

The pressure is affecting not uplifting Brazil Things can change very quickly in football, but as of the � rst week, the pressure of expectation from a home crowd witnessing a World Cup on home soil after 64 years, is proving to be a hindrance rather than a help for hosts Brazil. Full stadiums, despite ongoing protests, have helped the Selecao little or not at all in the tour-nament, both of their games so far have been terribly scrappy a� airs and the team looks functional rather than � amboyant. The 3-1 score line against Croatia was a � attering one for a very innocuous performance that hinged on a non-existent penalty given for a foul on Fred. Against Mexico, Brazil was better, but goalkeeper Guillermo

Ochoa, a free agent soon, ensured that the South Americans were kept at bay. A barely deserved win, and a sketchy draw may not make for good reading, but many World Champions have had worse starts.

Europe is alive and kicking, so farComing into the tournament, there was plenty of talk about how the European teams would cope with the warmer climates of South America and whether a maiden title for a European nation may be possible. On evidence of the � rst week, this could be possible. The Dutch razed Spain to the ground in a daring display of counter-attack-ing football, and Germany, despite not playing well, managed to similarly dispose of Portugal 4-0, in conditions that captain Phillip Lahm described as “brutal.”

Both followed that up with slightly more below par showings in their win and draw against Australia and Ghana respectively. However, the highlights have been France. After struggling in qualifying to even get through to the � nals, France have taken full advan-tage of a relatively kind draw to post two very convincing back to back wins – the second of this a 5-2 thumping of a very good Switzerland side. In contrast to the Europeans, both Argentina and Brazil have struggled, as have Uru-guay, with only Colombia the only side

managing to play up to the expecta-tions so far.

Atomic Flea can go nuclearWhile the focus will readily be on Neymar, in all honestly, everyone expects this to be the tournament which Lionel Messi takes by the scru� of the neck. Argentina came into the tournament with a 4-3-3 formation � ring on all cylinders, with Messi at its centrepiece. But come Brazil, the team looked strangely subdued and despite the two wins from two, looked fairly unconvincing so far. The exception of course has been Messi who was the di� erence maker in both games, scoring two stunning goals both from his favoured area just outside the opponent box. Both were moments of pure inspiration lighting up what was a dull and dreary encounter. It shows that with a truly exceptional player in their ranks, Argentina can go far, may-be even title-clinching far, if the rest of the team can pick up their game.

Goals goals goalsTwenty nine games and a goal average of almost 3 a game at the time of writing – this World Cup has been many things but de� nitely not boring. While the spectators have loved it, the question that has often been raised is how and why this World Cup is suddenly di� erent. Since Italy 1990, World Cups have been participated in a safety-� rst approach with teams generally more aware of not conceding than scoring themselves. This approach is acceptable in a seven-game cup tournament, where margins for error are generally small. Theories are abound as to the reason for this goals monsoon. The most commonly held one is that the hot and humid conditions have made pressing extremely di� cult, which perhaps o� ers more room to attacking players to show their worth.

The talent gap is closingGone are the days when drawing the third CONCACAF or the � fth Asian team in your group meant an almost certain victory. As Iran showed against Argentina, and as Costa Rica so appro-priately showed against Italy, the in-ternational talent gap is perhaps at the lowest it has ever been. With coaching and systems more � uid, and more and more top-� ight coaches taking their ideas and vision cross continent, we have seen a tactical and technical evolution. Costa Rica now play modern football, with men on the back looking to pass out of defence, and initiate play rather than the old-school favourite of putting men behind the ball, two banks of four, and hoping for the best. Foot-ball is richer for the changes, and much more exciting for the unpredictability.

Innovations are good, Refereeing not so muchThis World Cup has seen one key inno-vation – the introduction of goal-line technology. This has proved useful not least for Bryan Ruiz’s header in the 1-0 Costa Rica win over Italy. It was a much needed gesture from FIFA after Frank Lampard’s disallowed goal in the last World Cup, and it looks like it is here to stay. Other innovations include the much talked about foam spray to make sure the free-kick taker does not inch a few yards closer, or the wall doesn’t walk ahead to break the 10 yards barrier. It’s the kind of idea that once you see it, you think why it was not done before. But despite the innovations, the refereeing has been fairly substandard starting from the � rst game. Unfortunately, it is the underdogs who often fall prey to the bad calls – Iran in particular desperate-ly disappointed to not earn a penalty against Argentina. l

Quazi Zulquarnain Islam is a freelance sports writer.

Time up for the old guards? REUTERS

Twenty nine games and a goal average of almost 3 a game – this World Cup has been many things but boring

When the notion of arranged marriage is � rmly embedded in the psyche of the Asian communities, how can outlooks be revamped?

Lawlessness is widespread in the transport sector. There are rules, but no one seems to care

A nation cannot a� ord to allow its people to keep dying out on the streets

Running over lives

British by birth, shackled by customS E R P E N T I N E D E N

Abaji wins hearts again n Punny Kabir

After performing in three concerts in three consecutive years in Dhaka, French-Lebanese musician Abaji has become the darling of the music lovers in the city. Being around Abaji, whose openness is exemplary, is an instantly heartwarming experience. He performed Sat-urday night in at La Galerie, Alliance Française de Dhaka and within a few minutes, had the crowd responding, singing along, clapping, and dancing as enthusiastically as if the barri-er of language did not exist. Undoubtedly this relationship with the audience depended en-

tirely on Abaji’s personality. The multi talented instrumentalist swayed

the audience by playing one piece after an-other titled "For a cloud" played on a bam-boo clarinet, "Traveller" and "Farâché" played on the oud-guitar. Honouring the Dhaka audience, he made a special piece, "Happy Dhaka," which he performed on a bouzouki (Greek long neck lute) with Bangladeshi � ute player Musarrat Jabeen Rahman.

He played "Funny Rhythm" on djembe and mouth harp accompanied by Philip on the traditional instrument khamak.

The special concert marking the occasion

of “Fête de la Musique 2014” globally known as the World Music Day also included local Baul musicians Rob Fakir and Baby Dewan on vocals, Nazrul on harmonium, Sha� que, Paran on khamak and dhol and Jalal on � ute.

Later, on the show, Abaji's collaboartion with the Bauls proved that music has no boundaries.

Born in Beirut, with parents born in Turkey but with Armenian, Greek and Syrian origins, Abaji has a multicultural background that en-ables him to play di� erent types of music in multiple languages. The concert transported the audience to an eclectic musical world. l

EntertainmentDHAKA TRIBUNE Monday, June 23, 201412

FilmX-Men: Days of Future PastThe Amazing Spider-Man 2 (3D), Pompeii, 300 Rise of an Empire, TarkataTime: 10am – 10pmStar Cineplex, Level 8, Bashundhara City

Theatre KhonaBy Bot-TolaTime: 7pm – 9pmStudio Theatre Hall, Bangla-desh Shilpakala Academy

Exhibition Artistic Musings of Great Collector Nasir Ali MamunTime: 12pm – 8pmBengal Gallery of Fine ArtsRoad No 16, Dhanmondi Time LineTime: 11am – 8pmGalleri Kaya

Music Fete de la Musique 2014Time: 6:30pm – 9:00pmLa GalerieAlliance Francaise de Dhaka

TODAY IN DHAKA

n Hasan Mansoor Chatak

“You of Many Days,” an upcoming independent feature � lm, written and directed by Shireen Pa-sha, tells the story of a young woman’s journey for redemption when all hope seems lost.

The � lm is set to be released at � lm festivals next spring and in theaters next fall if the makers get su� cient funds to complete the � lm. It is a completely independent e� ort without govern-ment subsidies or corporate funding fuelled by donations from people all around the world who believe in the story, claims the director in a con-versation with Dhaka Tribune.

The � lm opens in Bombay, as people rush to listen to celebrated writer Jheel Chopra’s new short story over the radio. The audience is un-aware that the story she is about to share is a personal one. Jheel traces her narrative back to 1952, to a small village in Feni, with the young, melancholic Sagor, her uncle and father � gure, who struggles to write compelling scripts for the � lm industry in Dhaka.

South Asia’s cultural diversity is portrayed in the � lm as Shireen said: “Diversity is the reality. I come from a multicultural family. Therefore, I could only work with a story that has multiple languages in the milieu of South Asia’s biological and cultural diversity. Our � lm features Bangla, English, Hindi, Manipuri, Marathi, and Urdu.

Our characters are as multicultural as we are in life, when we are honest about our roots.”

In the � lm, Sagor cares less about money and fame, and more about writing a role for his beloved Ranga, a young Manipuri woman who arrived as second wife of his father, Baki. Baki died in his sleep the week before, so his � rst wife decides to marry Ranga o� to her drunkard son, Shimul- who runs away at the sight of Ran-ga’s large feet the very night of their wedding. Jheel then tells how she was born to Ranga and how her passion for di� erent food and tastes emerged.

Shireen grew up with stories about the many obstacles people faced in the nineteenth and twentieth century in the region and how people overcame these obstacles by having an expan-sive, universal and positive view on life.

As the story progresses viewers learn of the unusual love between Ranga and Sagor, of Ran-ga’s dream to become an actor, and of Sagor’s sacri� ce. However all reveries come to an end when circumstances push Jheel to make the journey to Bombay.

The � lm took 24 days of shooting in Mumbai, Feni, Dhaka and other places, 3 years of location scouting and 11 years of script editing with a cast and crew of 90, enduring passion and patience to come away with a story promises to sway the audiences. l

Channel i Celebrity Football Tournamentn Entertainment Desk

While the whole nation is cele-brating the beauty of football this FIFA World Cup season, big names in showbiz respond with “Chan-nel i Celebrity Football Tourna-ment” at the Mirpur Indoor Stadiumon June 27.

The programme will feature ce-lebrities wearing jerseys of their fa-vourite teams to embrace the football celebration.

Marking the occasion, a new song “Hoi Choi Hottogol, Golemale Gole-

male Golemale Hoye Goal,” written by Major Anisul islam (rtd) and tuned by Farid Ahmed, will be performed at the beginning of the game. Monir, Mehedi, Shoron, Pranti and Zakir who are well known for their participation in “Channel i Shera Kontho,” “Khude Gaan Raj,” and “Sur Doria” will render the song.

Farid Ahmed said: “We will cele-brate the beautiful game of football together with the vivacious sound and rhythmic music. Along with the artistes, we hope to cheer the listen-ers.” l

Season 3 of Dettol Shera Ami Shonge Ma kicks o� n Entertainmnet Desk

“Dettol Shera Ami Shonge Ma,” a popular reality show pair-ing mother and child, is back again. Dettol, the � agship brand of Reckitt Benckiser Bangladesh has created the unique show where mothers and their children explore their talents to be the country’s best mom and child pair.

The registration for the program will take place online on www.DSASM.com and details on the show is available on www.facebook.com/dettolbd.

The program was formally inaugurated through a press conference yesterday. Reckitt Benckiser Bangladesh’s Mar-keting Director Mahbub Baset and Marketing Manager Faria Yasmin, and Syed Ashik Rahman, CEO of RTV, briefed the press about the program. l

Shraddha Kapoor goes method inEk Villainn Entertainmnt Desk

Bollywood actress Shraddha Kapoor recently made her singing debut with the song “Galliyan” in the � lm “Ek Villain” which is going to be released on June 27.

The actor has been praised all over for her melodious voice in the song. She is happy to have grabbed the op-portunity.

On being asked whether she took any extra lessons before hitting the recording room, Shraddha said, “My training for this song has been minimal. I came from a musical fam-ily, I have many relatives from my maternal side who are singers. So I guess I got this little bit of talent from there.”

The actress also confessed to be a Priyanka Chopra fan. “I am a huge fan of Priyanka Chopra. She has made her-self a brand for singing and acting.”

Being an adventure lover, she also learnt to ride a bike for this � lm.

“I learnt to ride a bike just for this � lm. I fell more than 7-8 times from the bul-let I was riding, got burns and bruises too,” she said.

Mohit Suri's “Ek Villain,” is an in-tense love story. The director, who has helmed nine projects so far, has always stayed away from typical Bol-lywood candy� oss romance in his previous � lms like “Zeher,” “Woh Lamhe,” “Awarapan,” “Murder-2” and “Aashiqui 2.”

Ek Villain, Mohit says, is about forbidden love. "The story revolves around a sweet girl-next-door with � re in her heart and an angry young

man hell bent on setting the world on � re. This is an

unconventional mu-sical romance born

out of angst," he ex-plained. l

You of Many Days

n Shadma Malik

A group art exhibition, titled “Waves of Colour” is being held at Gallery Cosmos-2, and will remain on display until June 25. The ex-hibition, showcasing forty seven artworks by twenty artists, were drawn during a three day long workshop, conducted by artist Al-akesh Ghosh,

Artist Sourav Chowdhury por-trayed a river in rural Bangla in an artwork. Based on watercolour, the best medium in depicting land-scapes, the painting is both aesthet-ic and inmate in nature.

Artist Manik Bonik, a nature lover, shows a beautiful moment shared by couple walking under the shadow of trees beside a serene lake.

Khing Sai Mong portrayed a woman outside her mud house in a village, against a brilliant backdrop of blue sky.

Artist Biren Shome has depicted � shing boats � oating on water. Birds are seen � ying

over the river, exuding a sense of freedom.“Artists these days mostly work indoors,

but to make a combination of poetry and beauty, they need to work outside in natural settings,” said artist Alakesh Ghosh.

The inaugural ceremony on June 6, was at-tended by Lee Yun-young, Ambassador of Re-public of Korea to Bangladesh, artists Samarjit Roy Chowdhury and Mustafa Monwar were present. l

Waves of Colour on display

Biren Shome Khing Sai Mong Sourav Chowdhury

Manik Bonik

Soha Ali Khan appears on the ramp in Bangladeshn Entertainmnt Desk

Bollywood celebrity Soha Ali Khan appeared on the ramp for the � rst time ever in “Pond' presents The Lustrous Runway.” Pond's along with In� nity Event Management organized the show to provide a platform for Ban-gladeshi boutiques and fashion houses to showcase their designs. This time 10 international models showcased exclusive collections from Anokhi, Joconde, Libasse, Paera and Tootli Rahman. Mas-terCard, Jet Airways, Oriental Real Estate Limited, BMW, The Olives helped co-sponsor the event that took place on June 19 at Radisson’s Grand Ballroom. l

Rahul Bose to play Priyanka’s estranged husbandn Entertainment Desk

Rahul Bose has long been associated with avant-garde cinema and the experience of work-ing in a big commercial � lm is not entirely a fa-miliar one for the actor.

Recently, Rahul too has joined the starcast of Zoya Akhtar’s upcoming mega project “Dil Dhadakne Do” along with an array of stars including Ranveer Singh, Priyanka Chopra, Farhan Akhtar, Anushka Sharma, Anil Kapoor and others. He will be playing Priyanka’s estranged husband in the � lm.

“They play an incompatible cou-ple. It’s a very stormy relationship. They have lots of � ghts in the � lm. Zoya wanted Rahul to come across as the outsider in Priyanka’s family,” said a member of the “Dil Dhadakne

Do” team. He also added: “Rahul was seen as

the odd one out...you know, the actor from “English August” and “Chame-li.” But he turned out to be the most fun. During the cruise he got along with Priyanka, Farhan and the rest of the cast like a house on � re.” l

Moments of Saturday concert SADIA MARIUM

DHAKA TRIBUNE13Sp rt

Monday, June 23, 2014

107 cricketers to get central contracts

A total of 107 � rst-class cricketers will be o� ered central contract by the Bangla-desh Cricket Board (BCB). BCB tourna-ment committee assistant manager Ar-iful Islam informed Dhaka Tribune that the names of the cricketers have been forwarded to the board which will soon be endorsed by BCB president Nazmul Hasan before the contracts are signed by the cricketers in the upcoming month.

AHM Mostafa Kamal, the former president of BCB, brought 105 crick-eters under the central contract from outside the national team for the � rst time in 2012. It was a major step to-wards the decentralisation of cricket in Bangladesh from its Dhaka-centric structure.

However, that contract expired last December and no visible initiative by BCB regarding the renewal of the con-tract in the last six months has made the cricketers doubtful about their salaries for the months which have al-ready passed.

“There is nothing to worry about that. All the cricketers will get their salaries beginning from January 2014,” said Ariful.

The BCB employee said that the

busy international calendar in the � rst four months of the year kept the board busy which resulted in a delay in the renewal procedure.

BCB took the initiative of bringing in � rst-class cricketers under the central contract in order to create competi-tion among the players in the National Cricket League, the � rst-class crick-et competition of the country played among the divisional sports associa-tion teams.

The renewed contracts will see new names, according to Ariful. “The names are selected taking the recent performance into account. So it is usu-al to have the change,” he said. Dhaka Tribune learnt that a hike in the sala-ries was very much likely which should make the cricketers under central con-tract happy.

According to the previous contract, a cricketer with 11 years of � rst-class experience received Tk 25,000 per month under Category A. Players with 6-10 years of experience received Tk 20,000 per month in Category B and Tk 15,000 per month in Category C for players who have played for 1-5 years. These salaries are in addition to the match fees the players continue to receive. l

Archery C’ship begins tomorrow

A total of 310 archers from 61 teams will participate in the Grameenphone 7th National Archery Championship scheduled to get underway at the Army Stadium, Banani tomorrow.

The 61 a� liated organisations, who will � ght for 15 gold medals, are set to take part in three divisions – bamboo bow, recurve bow and compound bow.

A maximum 256 participants includ-ing 109 women archers will be taking part in the bamboo bow section. The bamboo bow event is a Bangladeshi version and is set to be introduced for the very � rst time for the amateur ar-chers while only 54 archers including 20 women archers will be competing in the international events of the 70m recurve bow and 50m compound bow.

State Minister for Youth and Sports Biren Sikder will inaugurate the four-day long meet as chief guest. l

Mohammedan seal last-gasp win

Mohammedan returned to winning ways after two late goals earned them a last-gasp 2-0 victory over Uttar Baridhara in the Nitol-Tata Bangladesh Premier Football League at the Bangab-andhu National Stadium yesterday.

National striker Zahid Hasan Emily found the net seven minutes before the � nal whistle as his 10th goal of the season gave the Black and Whites a de-serving lead before substitute Yousuf Sifat secured full points in injury time.

Following the victory, the Black and Whites moved back to third spot with 35 points from 20 matches, three behind archrivals Abahani while Uttar Baridhara remained at the bottom of the table with 12 points from the same number of games.

Uttar Baridhara had the � rst shot on target with � ve minutes into the clock. Dulal Hasan dribbled past a defend-er after receiving a cross from Sujon Biswas and unleashed a shot which was saved by Mohammedan goalkeep-er Titumir Titu.

Wahed Ahmed missed an opportuni-ty for Mohammedan in the 42nd min-ute when his header from the middle of the box was safely gathered by the Uttar Baridhara custodian following a lovely cross from winger Zahid Hossain.

A defensive error saw Emily broke the deadlock in the 83rd minute tap-ping home a Jahid Hossain cross.

Substitute forward Sifat doubled the lead in time added on after dodging past the onrushing goalie Osman Goni out-side the box. The former Brothers young-ster slotted the ball into an empty net. l

Maradona lashes out at Argentina FA chief

Diego Maradona has hit out at the pres-ident of the Argentina FA following claims he was acting as a “jinx” on the team at the World Cup.

Alejandro Sabella’s side have been uninspiring in their opening Group F matches, struggling to � nd rhythm in their win over Bosnia-Herzegovina before snatching a scarcely-deserved win over Iran courtesy of a brilliant late strike from Lionel Messi.

Following the underwhelming performance on Saturday, Grondona claimed “the jinx left and we won” after Maradona had left the stadium during the closing minutes, and the former Napoli star has wasted little time in issuing a riposte to the Fifa se-nior vice-president.

“So, someone said that the goal was scored because I left,” he began, before referring to the Grondona as a “moron” and raising his middle � nger to the camera while speaking to Telesur.

He added, bitterly: “My message to Grondona is that I paid for the clothes on my back through hard work.”

Regardless of the unconvincing showings by Argentina, Sabella’s men have ensured quali� cation for the last 16 following their pair of victories.

They are set to battle Nigeria in Porto Alegre in their � nal � rst round match, looking to seal � rst place in

Group F ahead of the Super Eagles, who beat Bosnia-Herzegovina 1-0 in their second match. l

No easy predictions for animal psychics

Paul the Octopus, you are sadly missed.

The goals have been rattling in all week at a sensational World Cup in Brazil but the animal

kingdom seems to be still � nding its feet, � ns and feathers when it comes to the prediction game.

Paul’s unerringly accurate picks from his tank at the Sea Life Centre in Oberhausen, Germany, put him in a league of his own during the 2010 � nals in South Africa and earned him world-wide fame as a soccer psychic.

His death, of natural causes only months after he correctly predicted Spain would beat the Netherlands in the � nal, was much mourned.

There have been many pretenders since, mostly copycat candidates pro-posed by those seeking to boost visitor

footfall or readership, but none with the accuracy or animal magic of the choosy cephalopod.

There are, it seems, no longer any easy predictions in international foot-ball.

Australia Zoo’s Predictaroo, also known as Flopsy the Kangaroo, bounced out of contention when she called Portugal to see o� Germany and the Socceroos to beat the Netherlands.

Paul’s old Singapore-based rival Mani the parakeet has gone quiet while Bern-based guinea pig Madame Shiva was on the money with Switzerland to beat Ecuador but lost all credibility by tipping the Swiss to beat France before the 5-2 rout.

Germans have come up with a turtle in Schleswig-Holstein, Penguin Ronald in Brandenburg, armadillos Taka and Flitz in Erfurt and Chemnitz, Nelly the elephant and an otter called Ferret in Sachsen.

After gobbling up England’s three warm-up games for Britain’s Sun news-paper, Pele the piranha over-stretched himself by forecasting now-eliminat-ed England would rip through Italy in their opener in Manaus.

Big Head, a ‘psychic’ turtle from the Brazilian beach village of Praia do Forte, was more accurate in predicting that Brazil would overcome Croatia last Thursday but it is still early days.

To help identify his choice of nation, workers at the Brazilian Sanctuary pin � ags of the competing teams above hanging � sh.

Whichever � sh the turtle eats rep-

resents his choice of team to win, while there is also a World Cup Brazuca ball over a third � sh which gives him the option of predicting a draw.

It is a crowded marketplace but that has not stopped World Cup host city Curitiba from getting in on the action with their own ‘psychic’ capybara.

“Other predicting animals, they only tell you the results, Capybaras are di� erent,” City Hall spokesman Alvaro Borba con� dently told Reuters Televi-sion.

Di� erent enough to ignore the balls, carrots and goals in predicting the out-come of Brazil’s Monday match against Cameroon.

“That means the ball is going to be stuck in the mid� eld. Nothing is going to happen at that game. It is going to be a game, a really boring game,” declared Borba with a hint of desperation.

“Capybara prediction is a science, you can trust it.” l

Police disperse fans near Argentina team bus

Brazilian police used non-lethal muni-tions on Saturday to disperse a group of World Cup fans who breached a security line protecting the Argentina team bus.

Four Brazilians, three Argentines and one Colombian were slightly wounded in the incident near the sta-dium in the southeastern city of Belo Horizonte, the military police said.

“With the the aim of allowing the bus’s access to the stadium, police had to use non-lethal munitions to disperse the fans who passed the security perimeter,” the military police said in a statement.

The statement did not say what sort of security was around the bus.

It also failed to indicate the type of munitions used, though Brazilian po-lice tend to use rubber bullets, tear gas and stun grenades in protests. l

Fired-up Serena in no mood for small talk

Serena Williams sent a warning to her Wim-bledon title rivals as the world number one completed her prepa-rations for the grass-

court Grand Slam in a feisty mood.With Wimbledon set to get under-

way on Monday, Williams made an appearance at the All England Club’s pre-tournament press conferences on Saturday, but it quickly became clear the American had no time for small talk.

The 32-year-old cut a grumpy � gure for much of her brief session with the media, issuing short answers to many questions and showing little of her usu-ally e� ervescent personality.

Williams has been mired in some-thing of a slump of late following sur-prise exits from both the Australian and French Opens.

Although she has won titles in Bris-bane, Miami and Rome, the � ve-time Wimbledon champion has also suf-fered underwhelming losses to the likes of Petra Kvitova, Jana Cepelova, Ana Ivanovic and Alize Cornet.l

Nadal, Djokovic under Wimbledon cloud

Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic enter Wimbledon plagued by injury fears and self-doubt, leaving Roger Federer con-vinced that this could be a golden oppor-tunity to capture a record eighth title.

World number one Nadal, fresh from a record ninth French Open, was Wim-bledon champion in 2008 and 2010 and runner-up in 2006, 2007 and 2010.

But his last two visits have been hu-miliating disasters.

The Spaniard su� ered his � rst-ever opening round exit at a Grand Slam in 2013 to Belgian journeyman Steve Dar-cis, who was ranked 135 and has not won a main tour match since.

Twelve months earlier, the world’s 100th best player, big-hitting Lukas Ro-sol, put him out in the second round, a defeat which precipitated a sev-en-month absence from the sport for the man from Mallorca.

The 28-year-old Nadal hinted at another Wimbledon letdown in the immediate aftermath of his triumph over Djokovic in the French Open � nal two weeks ago, when he claimed his 14th major, and this weekend hinted at

more trouble to come.“I’ve said before this is really the most

dangerous tournament of the year,” said Nadal, who has been seeded second de-spite his world number one status.

“When I arrive at Roland Garros I have already played for one month on clay. I played a lot of matches. So more or less I can imagine how I am going to play.

“Here, especially the beginning of the tournament, the courts are a little bit fast-er. The feeling on court is a little bit strange for everybody. The match is decided in a few balls, so you need to convert the small opportunities that you have.”

Nadal, who faces Slovakia’s Mar-tin Klizan in the � rst round, su� ered an opening exit on grass at Halle last week, a straight-sets defeat by German world number 85 Dustin Brown.

World number two Djokovic, who won his only Wimbledon title in 2011 and was runner-up to Andy Murray in 2013, has not played a grasscourt warm-up event since 2010.

The 27-year-old Serb won the last of his six majors at the Australian Open in 2013 and his latest thwarted attempt to win a � rst French Open represented his seventh defeat in 13 � nals at the majors. l

Paul’s unerringly accurate picks from his tank at the Sea Life Centre in Oberhausen, Germany, put him in a league of his own during the 2010 � nals

Mohammedan winger Zahid Hossain is about to deliver a cross from the right � ank against Uttar Baridhara in the Nitol-Tata Bangladesh Premier Football League at the Bangabandhu National Stadium yesterday MUMIT M

DHAKA TRIBUNE14 Sp rt

Monday, June 23, 2014

Bosnia & Herzegovina forward Edin Dzeko has had more shots without scoring than any other player at this World Cup.

Nigeria and Mexico are the only teams not to concede a goal at World Cup 2014.

Nigeria (18) are now the top scoring African team at World Cups, with one more goal than Cameroon.

Asamoah Gyan has scored in each of the last three World Cups for Ghana

Asamoah Gyan has matched Roger Milla as the top scoring (5) African in World Cup history.

Germany have won their second World Cup group game on just one occasion since 1994 (D3 L1).

WC STATS TILL DATE

KLOSE’S 15 WORLD CUP GOALSDate Opponent Venue Goals Score

2002 FIFA World Cup, Korea & Japan (5 goals)1 June 2002 Saudi Arabia Sapporo Dome, Japan 3 1–0, 2–0, 5–0 5 June 2002 Rep of Ireland Kashima Stadium, Japan 1 1–0 11 June 2002 Cameroon Shizuoka Stadium, Japan 1 2–0

2006 FIFA World Cup, Germany (5 goals)9 June 2006 Costa Rica Allianz Arena, Munich 2 2–1, 3–120 June 2006 Ecuador Olympic Stadium, Berlin 2 1–0, 2–030 June 2006 Argentina Olympic Stadium, Berlin 1 1–1

2010 FIFA World Cup, South Africa (4 goals)13 June 2010 Australia Moses Mabhida, Durban 1 2–0 27 June 2010 England Free State Stadium 1 1–0 3 July 2010 Argentina Cape Town Stadium 2 2–0, 4–0

2014 FIFA World Cup, Brazil (1 goal*)21 June 2014 Ghana Castelão, Fortaleza 1 2–2

*till Date

ALL TIME TOP SCORERSName Goals

Ronaldo (Brazil) 15Miroslav Klose (Germany) 15Gerd Muller (Germany) 14

Just Fontaine (France) 13Pele (Brazil) 12

Sandor Kocsis (Hungary) 11 Jurgen Klinsmann (Germany) 11 Helmut Rahn (Germany) 10

Gary Lineker (England) 10 Gabriel Batistuta (Argentina) 10

Argentina must turn one-man band into full orchestra

World Cup contenders Argentina ar-rived in Brazil with high hopes but Sat-urday’s last-gasp win over underdogs Iran exposed de� ciencies within the team that need rapid improvement if they are to mount a realistic title bid.

Lionel Messi’s sumptuous stop-page-time strike may have secured a ticket through to the next round with a Group F game to spare but Argentina’s attack and defence looked anything but world class against an arguably much weaker opponent.

Going into the game with one of the most intimidating attacking formations in the business, with Messi joined by Sergio Aguero, Gonzalo Higuain and Angel Di Maria, Argentina were scrap-py going forward and left gaping holes in defence.

The ‘Fab Four’, as the quartet is

known, looked more like a hastily as-sembled tribute act that were com-pletely out of tune for most of the game and their 1-0 victory was barely deserved.

Higuain and Aguero managed only one shot each in the entire game com-pared to Messi’s six.

“We have to have a good look at what happened and try to improve. We have a few causes for concern,” head coach Alejandro Sabella told reporters.

One of those areas is Argentina’s work down the � anks with Aguero and Di Maria, whose combined worth is several times more than that of the entire Iranian team, proving complete-ly ine� ective against their unheralded opponents.

Higuain’s own e� ectiveness as a striker was also brought into question with Sabella taking him and Aguero o� late in the game in an e� ort to revive

his front line.Despite a crowded defence and

three or even four Iranians marking Messi in mid� eld, the ball was circulat-ed out to the wings far too infrequently.

Against tougher defences later in the tournament, their work will only become that much harder.

“We did go down the one side but we did not do it that well over both wings,” Sabella said.

The Argentines also need to improve at the back with central defender Eze-quiel Garay repeatedly caught o� guard when Iran broke forward, especially in the second half.

Garay had laughed o� suggestions before the tournament the Argentine defence was their weak link but that was exactly the case against Iran, who could have scored in a strong second half performance and stunned the two-time World Cup winners.l

Germany on Sunday hailed its ever-green football hero Miroslav Klose af-ter he equalled Ronaldo’s record of 15 goals at World Cup � nals with one of his most important strikes.

The 36-year-old tapped in a crucial equaliser against Ghana two minutes after coming on as substitute. Klose performed his trademark celebratory � ip and the tributes came � ooding in.

“Welcome to the club,” Brazilian great Ronaldo Tweeted. “I can only imagine your happiness!!! What a beau-tiful Cup!!!”

Germany coach Joachim Loew and the country’s media also paid tribute to the Lazio striker, now at his fourth World Cup � nals whose goal even overshad-owed a brilliant Lionel Messi strike against Iran that saw Argentina into the second round.

“Thanks, Old Guy!” headlined the Bild am Sonntag tabloid on its front page, showing a photo of Germany’s all-time record scorer doing his � ip jump.

“Klose rescues Germany,” said the broadsheet Welt am Sonntag highlight-

ing his role in the dramatic game which � nished 2-2. The Berliner Morgenpost proclaimed it’s “world class to have a striker like Klose.”

“I’m incredibly pleased for him, that is another high point in his unparal-leled career,” said Loew.

“It has not been an easy season for him, but he has done it again and got himself in top shape for a tournament. For a coach it is of course great to have options like him on the bench.”

Klose has said next year will be his last in Germany’s white shirt. But he could yet break Lothar Matthaeus’ re-cord of 150 caps. He has so far played in 133 internationals and scored 70 goals.

Klose sat out Germany’s 4-0 thump-ing of Portugal on Monday when Thomas Mueller claimed a hat-trick in his place.

“You really want to come in when the team is winning,” admitted Klose.

“It doesn’t matter whether I play from the start or come o� the bench: all games are important and 15 goals in 20 World Cup games isn’t bad.”

The result left Germany on top of Group G with four points. Ghana, beat-en by the United States in their � rst game, have one point heading into their � nal match with Portugal next week.

Messi curled in a brilliant shot in the � rst minute of injury time as Argentina overcame Iran 1-0 in Group F to enter the second round.

The result broke Iranian hearts. Argentina’s captain was largely anon-ymous for much of the match as Iran frustrated the South American giants at Belo Horizonte’s Mineirao Stadium.l

Bosnia exit with regrets, sense of injustice

Bosnia went out of their � rst World Cup on Saturday with a sense of injustice over a disallowed goal and regrets that they had not performed as well as they can on soccer’s biggest stage.

“They are all depressed, disappointed, silent,” coach Safet Susic said of his players after they lost 1-0 to African champions Nigeria. Bosnia cannot now progress after losing 2-1 to Argentina in their � rst game in Group F.

A tight match hinged on two con-troversial calls in the � rst half from the

o� cials, led by New Zealand referee Peter O’Leary.

Bosnia striker Edin Dzeko had a goal incorrectly ruled out for o� side and Bosnia also felt that their captain Emir Spahic was fouled in the build-up to Pe-ter Odemwingie’s winning goal.

“Had they allowed the (Dzeko) goal, this would probably have changed the match,” said Susic.

“I was told in the dressing room that Dzeko was well onside. As far as the reported foul on Spahic, if the referee didn’t whistle there was no foul.”

Susic said that his own team ulti-mately had to take responsibility for being outfought by Nigeria and pro� i-gate in front of goal.

“It seems they (Nigeria) wanted it a bit more. You see what kind of chanc-es we wasted, like the one in stoppage time,” he added referring to a scu� ed shot from Dzeko which Nigerian goal-keeper Vincent Enyeama de� ected on to a post and away to safety.”

Susic indicated he felt a Bosnian team featuring players of the quality of Manchester City’s Dzeko and AS Roma mid� elder Miralem Pjanic could have produced more. l

German � ght-back delights Loew

Coach Joachim Loew was delighted by Germany’s � ght-back in their 2-2 World Cup draw against Ghana on Saturday despite their below-par performance.

Miroslav Klose equalled Brazilian legend Ronaldo’s record of 15 World Cup goals after coming o� the bench to spare Germany’s blushes with the equaliser.

Mario Goetze had given Germa-ny the lead before goals from Andre Ayew and Asamoah Gyan threatened to cause a major upset for the Black Stars in Fortaleza.

“I’m actually quite pleased because we showed great moral to come back from 2-1 down in these temperatures,” said Loew about the tropical condi-tions.

“We took the lead, then conceded two goals from nothing.

“The players are completely ex-

hausted, but in the end we had a few good chances against a good, combat-ive and skillful team.”

But Loew’s enthusiasm failed to mask several de� ciencies in the Ger-man defence that were exposed by Ghana’s determined counter-attacks.

Gyan, whose goal saw him join Cam-eroon legend Roger Milla as the leading all-time African World Cup scorer with � ve, said that they had played much better than in the 2-1 defeat to the Unit-ed States.

“We believed in ourselves today,” the 28-year-old told the BBC.

“I think tactically we were perfect today.

“Now we de� nitely have to beat Por-tugal. We will have to focus but we be-lieve we can beat them.”

With the USA playing Portugal in Manaus on Sunday, the result breathes life back into Ghana’s hopes of reaching the last 16. l

Klose has equalled Ronaldo’s record of 15 goals at World Cup � nals.

Klose is the third player to net at four di� erent World Cup � nals (after Pele and Seeler).

Klose scored with his � rst touch of the ball against Ghana on Saturday, 112 seconds after coming on as a sub.

‘Old Guy’ Klose hailed for World Cup record

MATCH STATS Nigeria Bosnia Goals scored 1 0 Total shots 20 18 Shots on target 13 10 Corners 4 4 O� sides 3 2 Fouls committed 9 7 Yellow cards 1 1 Red cards 0 0 Ball possession 45% 55%

Ghana cling to hope after draw

Ghana are clinging to hope of reach-ing the World Cup last 16 even though coach Kwesi Appiah admitted their chances were receding after the 2-2 draw with Germany on Saturday.

“It’s not going to be easy to qualify. There’s other games to be played in our group (that can determine the out-come),” he told reporters.

“It was a really good, competitive game. Germany, at the end of the day, are among the best in the whole world and playing against them was going to be di� cult. We had some opportunities but unfortunately playing such a big team, if you don’t take your chances, you always face a problem.”

Defending set pieces proved their undoing as he had anticipated.

“That was one of the major concerns when we were planning tactics against the Germans,” Appiah said.

“Most of them are really tall and de-fending against them is always a di� -cult situation. It’s unfortunate that we conceded one goal out of a set piece.

“Saying that, I had total con� dence and belief in my players and the best way to defend was to attack. That was the strategy we adopted.”l

Nigeria’s players celebrate at the end of the Group F match against Bosnia-Hercegovina at the Pantanal Arena in Cuiaba during the 2014 Fifa World Cup on Saturday AFP

15 World Cup Goals 1520 Matches 19.75 Goal Per Game .793 Assists 47 Headers 115 Inside the Box 134 Tournaments 3

KLOSE RONALDO

DHAKA TRIBUNE15Sp rt

World Cup 2014BTV & Maasranga TV10:00PMAustralia v SpainGazi TV10:00PMNetherlands v ChileBTV, Maasranga TV & Gazi TV2:00AMBrazil v CameroonStar Sports 14:00PMSri Lanka tour of EnglandSecond Test, Day 4

DAY’S WATCH

Monday, June 23, 2014

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Probable teams:

Croatia1-Stipe Pletikosa; 11-Darijo Srna, 5-Vedran Corluka, 6-Dejan Lovren, 3-Danijel Pranjic; 18-Ivica Olic, 7-Ivan Rakitic, 10-Luka Modric, 20-Mateo Kovacic, 4-Ivan Perisic; 17-Mario MandzukicMexico13-Guillermo Ochoa; 7-Miguel Layun, 2-Francisco Rodriguez, 4-Rafael Marquez, 15-Hector Moreno; 22 Paul Aguilar, 6-Hector Herrera, 18-Andres Guardado, 23-Jose Juan Vazquez; 10-Giovani Dos Santos, 19-Oribe PeraltaKey stats:

Croatia have not advanced to the knockout stage of the World Cup since 1998, when they reached the semi-� nals in their maiden appear-ance as an independent nation.

Mexico have reached the last 16 in their last � ve World Cups, but have not reached the quarter-� nals since 1986.

Previous meetingsThe two teams have met three times with Croatia winning twice and Mexico once.Last meeetingJune 3, 2002, Niigata, Japan (World Cup) - Mexico 1 Croatia 0

FACT BOXProbable teams:

Australia1-Mat Ryan; 6-Matthew Spiranovic, 22-Alex Wilkinson, 3-Jason Davidson, 19-Ryan McGowan; 13-Oliver Bozanic, 15-Mile Jedinak, 17-Matt McKay; 11-Tommy Oar, 7-Mathew Leckie, 10-Ben HalloranSpain1-Iker Casillas; 5-Juanfran, 2-Raul Albiol, 4-Javi Martinez, 18-Jordi Alba; 14-Xabi Alonso, 16-Sergio Busquets; 21-David Silva, 8-Xavi, 6-Andres Iniesta; 7-David VillaKey stats:

Australia are on their way home from their fourth World Cup after losing to Chile (1-3) and the Netherlands (2-3) in their previous two games. Leading scorer Tim Cahill, who has � ve of 11 Australian goals at World Cups, is missing through suspension.

Defending champions Spain have also been eliminated after losing their � rst two matches to the Netherlands (1-5) and Chile (0-2). It is the � rst time since 1998 they have failed to make it out of the group.

In 19 matches on the way to winning Euro 2008, the 2010 World Cup and Euro 2012 Spain conceded only six goals, one fewer than they have in Brazil in two games.

FACT BOX Encouraged Aussies smell Spanish blood

Despite Australia already having been eliminated from the World Cup, the Socceroos all-time leading scorer Tim Cahill believes Australian football can take a huge step forward with victo-ry over dethroned world champions Spain on Monday.

Both sides hopes of progression to the last 16 have been ended by succes-

sive defeats to Chile and the Nether-lands, but whilst Spain have endured a nightmare defence of their title in Bra-zil, Australia have taken huge encour-agement from their performances.

Cahill will miss the match in Curitiba having picked up his second yellow card of the tournament in that match, but has backed his teammates to make history.

The post mortem into Spain’s disas-trous exit after winning three consec-

utive major tournaments has already begun with doubts over whether coach Vicente del Bosque will remain in charge.

The former Real Madrid boss has insisted he will take no decision over his future until he is back on Spanish soil, but he is expected to make a raft of changes to the side that failed to match Chile’s intensity in their 2-0 de-feat to the South Americans in Rio on Wednesday.

Captain Iker Casillas, Xavi Her-nandez and Xabi Alonso may all have played their � nal game for La Roja as they are likely to miss out with Pepe Reina, Koke and Santi Cazorla expected to be given their chance to shine.

However, defender Raul Albiol in-sists that pride will motivate the de-throned champions to � ght until the end and assure they don’t return home without even registering a point.

“We are at a World Cup, we may be eliminated but we need to win and take some points so that we are not last in the group,” said the former Real Madrid man.

“We are representing our country and these are the last 90 minutes. Un-fortunately we will be going home af-terwards, but the fact it is a World Cup is enough to motivate us.” l

Brazil conundrum for Dutch, Chile

The Netherlands and Chile will � ght it out for top spot in Group B on Monday and hope they can avoid a fearsome round two assignment against � ve-time World Cup winners Brazil.

Both teams have won their opening two games, putting them into the last 16 with a maximum six points each and sending reigning champions Spain and Australia crashing out.

Only goal-di� erence separates the two, with the Netherlands narrowly

top following their 5-1 win over Spain and 3-2 scrap against Australia.

Brazil are favoured to qualify top in Group A, meaning they will face who-ever � nishes second in Group B -- a match-up neither the Netherlands nor Chile will relish.

But with the outcome of Group A, where Brazil, Mexico and Croatia are separated by just one point, far from clear, Group B’s winners could still end up facing the hosts.

It is a complicating factor that nei-ther the Netherlands nor Chile will want to dwell on before Monday’s game at Corinthians Arena in Sao Paulo.

Arjen Robben clocked 37 kilometres (23 miles) per hour, a record for a foot-baller, as he inspired the Netherlands’ deconstruction of short-passing Spain.

But it remains to be seen if the Bayern Munich � yer will again hit the heights in Monday’s run-out, e� ective-ly a precursor for the knock-out chal-lenges ahead.

Robben and Manchester United’s Robin van Persie have lit up this World Cup with three goals each and more will be needed if the Netherlands are to reach their second � nal in a row.

Coach Louis van Gaal, who will link up with Van Persie at Old Tra� ord next season, will be looking for more solid-ity after some distinctly worrying mo-ments against Australia.

Against one of the tournament’s least fancied teams, the Netherlands were trailing 2-1 early in the � rst half before Van Persie and Memphis Depay spared their blushes.

The Dutch may � nd themselves against an under-strength Chile after Juventus star Arturo Vidal and Interna-cional’s Charles Aranguiz both skipped training on Friday.

Both Aranguiz and Vidal, who is on a yellow card, came o� injured during the 2-0 win over Spain, which sensa-tionally ended the European champi-ons’ title defence.

But Vidal said he had no concerns about picking up a second yellow card which would earn him a one-match ban, ruling him out of Chile’s round of 16 game. l

Croatia relishing ‘� nal’ against Mexico

Niko Kovac says his Croatia side are fac-ing their own World Cup ‘� nal’ against Mexico on Monday with only a win guaranteeing them a place in the last 16.

Croatia bounced back from their opening 3-1 defeat to hosts Brazil in Group A with a 4-0 demolition of Cam-eroon last Wednesday to keep their knock-out dreams alive.

Striker Mario Mandzukic scored two second-half goals as Croatia sent 10-man Cameroon crashing out of the tournament in disarray.

Wolfsburg pair Ivica Olic and Ivan Perisic also got on the scoresheet, but Croatia still remain third in the table behind leaders Brazil and Mexico.

Kovac knows his side face an uphill task against Miguel Herrera’s side in Recife in the wake of Mexico’s con� -

dence-boosting draw with Brazil.Mexican goalkeeper Guillermo

Ochoa wrote himself into World Cup folklore with a string of top-class saves including one from point-blank range to deny Brazil’s Neymar in Fortaleza last Tuesday.

A draw against Croatia would be enough to put Mexico through after their goalless draw with Brazil and 1-0 win over Cameroon.

“The match against Mexico will be like a � nal,” Kovac told Croatian broad-caster HTV.

“Mexico are strong, but so are we.“The Mexico players are very patri-

otic, just like us, and they have a great team spirit.

“They play some aggressive football with a lot of pressing.

“They are strong going forward, but also have some weaknesses in defence, like Brazil showed us.”

Mexico have four points – one more than Croatia – as their draw with Brazil came after their 1-0 win over Cameroon thanks to Oribe Peralta’s second-half winner. But the Mexicans are bidding to � nish the group as winners and want to beat the Croatians to pile the pres-sure on Group A leaders Brazil. l

Netherlands’ players take part in a training session at Flamengo Stadium in Rio de Janeiro on Saturday AFP

Chile were second in scoring only to winners Argentina in South American qualifying with 29 goals in 16 matches

Chile’s win over Spain on Wednes-day eliminated the 2010 World Cup winners from the tournament

Netherlands striker Robin van Persie has scored three goals and picked up two yellow cards in Brazil. He misses the match due to suspension

Dutch winger Arjen Robben has also scored three goals at the tournament

KEY STATS

VNetherlands Chile

Arena Corinthians, Sao Paulo (BRA)23 Jun 2014 - 13:00 Local (10:00PM BST)

VAustralia Spain

Arena da Baixada, Curitiba (BRA)23 Jun 2014 - 13:00 Local (10:00PM BST)

VCroatia MexicoArena Pernambuco, Recife (BRA)

23 Jun 2014 - 17:00 Local (2:00AM BST)

‘Pogba’s omission not a punishment’

Highly-rated young mid� elder Paul Pogba did not start the Group E game against Switzerland for tactical rea-sons, not because he was being pun-ished for his excitable performance against Honduras in the opening game, said France coach Didier Deschamps.

Moussa Sissoko started in the impres-

sive 5-2 win instead of Pogba, 21, and who had been fortunate to stay on the pitch during a � ery altercation with Honduran hardman mid� elder Wilson Palacios in the � rst-half of the previous match.

“It was not a punishment because he could have had a red card (against Honduras),” said Deschamps.

“It was because I preferred to choose Sissoko, who is an excellent player. He

is not the same type of player, he has di� erent qualities.

“Paul has enormous potential, I have con� dence in him. After that, though, there is the reality of the highest level, you have to dig deep. He saw that yes-terday, and he made an impact when he came on (in the 63rd minute and set up Karim Benzema for the fourth goal).He is young but it is no handicap.” l

De Rossi ‘unlikely’ to face Uruguay

Italy’s Daniele De Rossi has a leg inju-ry and is highly unlikely to play in the World Cup Group D showdown against Uruguay on Tuesday, the Azzurri’s team doctor said on Saturday.

The 30-year-old mid� elder played the full 90 minutes in both of Italy’s games in the tournament.

“He has a muscle problem in his leg,” Enrico Castellacci told a news con-ference on Saturday.

“It is highly unlikely that he will be able to play on Tuesday. If I was being positive I would say that it is possible the injury to the muscle would improve but it is highly improbable he will play.” l

Monday, June 16, 2014DHAKA TRIBUNE

16 DHAKA TRIBUNE

Sport

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Monday, June 23, 2014

13 1514 Brazil conundrum for Dutch, Chile

‘Old Guy’ Klose hailed for WC record

Maradona lashes out at Argentina FA chief

Brazil’s Neymar (R) takes part in a training session for the Fifa World Cup in Teresopolis, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil on Saturday AFP

Probable teams:

Brazil12-Julio Cesar; 2-Daniel Alves, 3-Thiago Silva, 4-David Luiz, 6-Marcelo; 8-Paulinho, 11-Oscar, 17-Luiz Gustavo, 16-Ramires; 9-Fred, 10-NeymarCameroon16-Charles Itandje; 4-Cedric Djeugoue, 2-Benoit Assou-Ekotto, 3-Nicho-las Nkoulou, 14-Aurelien Chedjou; 17-Stephane Mbia, 21-Joel Matip, 18-Enoh Eyong, 8-Benjamin Mou-kandjo; 10-Vincent Aboubaker, 13-Eric Choupo-MotingKey stats:

Brazil have played six match-es against African teams at the World Cup, winning them all: Zaire (1974), Algeria (1986), Cameroon (1994), Morocco (1998) and Ghana (2006) - Brazil’s last home defeat in a competitive international was against Peru in the Copa America in 1975, when they lost 3-1 - Brazil are the only team to have taken part at all 20 World Cup tournaments.

Alex Song’s red card against Croatia was the eighth to be shown to a Cameroon player at the World Cup in only 22 matches.

Cameroon are at their seventh World Cup. They reached the quarter-� nals in 1990 and went out in the � rst round on every other occasion, including the current tournament.

Previous meetingsThere have been four with three wins for Brazil and one for Cameroon. Brazil won 3-0 at the 1994 World Cup and Cameroon won 1-0 in the 2003 Confederations Cup on the last occasion the sides met, with a goal by Samuel Eto’o

FACT BOX Selecao aiming to top Group A

Brazil’s perfect record against African teams at the World Cup suggests that Monday’s Group A match against a de-moralised, discredited Cameroon should be little more than a stroll in the park.

Goalless Cameroon have already been knocked out of the competition and would seem to be the perfect op-ponents for the stuttering hosts to � nd their rhythm and sort out their disjoint-ed mid� eld.

Brazil have four points from their opening two games and need a draw to make the last 16, which should be a for-mality against the Indomitable Lions whose seventh World Cup campaign has fallen into disarray in sadly familiar style.

Cameroon’s troubles began before they even left home when the players, having snubbed Prime Minister Phile-mon Yang, then refused to get on their expensively-chartered aircraft for Bra-zil in a protest over money.

After losing 1-0 to Mexico, they were eliminated in a shambolic 4-0 defeat to Croatia where Alex Song was sent o� in the � rst half for striking an opponent and full back Benoit Assou-Ekotto ap-peared to headbutt team mate Benjamin Moukandjo near the end of the match.

Coach Volke Finke described their conduct as disgusting and the Camer-oon federation are investigating. “The behaviour of some of them was not at all satisfying. It’s unacceptable to see that kind of thing,” said Finke.

Brazil have played six matches

against African sides at the World Cup and won each time.

The � rst game was against the for-mer Zaire at the 1974 edition, a game which became famous after a player from the African side broke from the defensive wall at a Brazil free kick, hoofed the ball away and was booked for his pains.

The was followed by a hard-fought 1-0 win over Algeria in 1986 and fairly unremarkable 3-0 wins over Cameroon

in 1994, on the way to Brazil’s fourth world title, and Morocco four years later.

Brazil also won 3-0 when they met Ghana in the round-of-16 in 2006 and comfortably saw o� Ivory Coast 3-1 at the last World Cup. Cameroon did, however, win their last meeting with Brazil when Samuel Eto’o scored the only goal in a match at the 2003 Confederations Cup.

Brazil have yet to � nd the free-� ow-ing form they displayed on the way to winning last year’s Confederations Cup and their 0-0 draw with Mexico on Tuesday ended a 10-match winning run.

Their mid� eld has been short on in-spiration and failed to provide forward Neymar with the space and supply of passes he needs to torment defenders. l

VBrazil CameroonEstadio Nacional, Brasilia (BRA)

23 Jun 2014 - 17:00 Local (2:00AM BST)

Late Origi winner puts Belgium into last 16

Divock Origi sent Belgium into the last 16 of the World Cup when the teenager struck an 88th minute winner to secure a 1-0 victory against Russia in a largely lifeless Group H match at the Maracana on Sunday.

He ri� ed in just minutes after Kevin Mirallas crashed a free kick against the base of the Russian post to give Bel-gium six points from two games.

Russia have one point with South Korea and Algeria meeting in the other Group H match in Porto Alegre later on Sunday.

Apart from a rousing � nale when Belgium � nally awoke from their leth-argy, the match was one of the poor-est in the tournament so far with both teams regularly booed by the 73,000 crowd.

Despite a few � ashes of inspiration from Belgium’s right-winger Dries Mar-tens in the � rst half and their attacking � nish at the end, the match never rose above the largely forgettable. l

This Cup is like groundhog day, only half better. Every dawn I go to bed thinking the same thing. How cruel my editor is, and how the quality of football that I had just witnessed sim-ply could not be improved upon. And every following night I am reminded of how cruel my editor is, and the football gets even more glorious and unpredict-able than the previous night’s fare.

Some people, mistaking me for a football expert, routinely ask me to make predictions. I have resorted to closing my eyes and throwing darts at results and various score lines to produce my clairvoyance. There is simply no rational way of telling what will happen in the next game.

Take Ghana and Germany encoun-ter for example. Everything we had studied up until the starting whistle, including form, ranking, player pro� le, turtles, octopi, and gerbils told us that it would be a walk in the park for the

boys from the land where David Hasselho� is a musical deity (the sheer horribleness of Hasselho� ’s music and the level of its popularity

are both mind blowing). Ozil would score, Muller would

score, Klose would score, Khedira would score, and Neuer would have enough time in goal to trim sensitive hair. The scoreless � rst half told us that fate wasn’t traveling in its projected parabola, yet it did not prepare us for the second half.

Actually anything short of God send-ing me a text saying that I was about to witness one of the � nest halves of football in history could not have pre-pared us for what happened. The Accra army played like men possessed, and the Germans went toe to toe. Words cannot begin to describe the sheer quality of tension that was produced in Fortaleza.

In terms of expectations from the game, the things that threw me o� the most were Gyan’s hair and Muntari’s pants. Let me � rst say that I am not a person given to judge merit by ap-pearance unless I am selecting models in pre-production meetings for soap

commercials, where not judging by the cover would actually be foolish.

I have no problems if some some-one chooses to conduct a corporate presentation wearing spandex, though thankfully I am yet to witness one. Still when I saw Gyan had shaved the sides of his head to produce his favorite number three and dyed the space gold, some part of my father kicked into my consciousness, and I thought “ fatra” or “ru� an!”. Of course Pogba had donned a similarly strange coi� eur the night be-fore but the French are the French and can pull o� things only the French can, like serving you one tiny sliver of chick-en liver, charging you your retirement for it, and making you feel good about it. Gyan’s trim made me feel like he was just not approaching the game with the level of seriousness that was due.

I have had a soft corner for the Ghanian team for a while, and wanted them to do well. Between Gyan’s hair and whispers of internal dispute among his teammates, however, I was getting a distinct feeling of pessimism when the national anthems ended.

The sinking feeling in my stomach was only exacerbated during the � rst

few minutes of the game when I had trouble not focusing on the fact that Sulley Muntari’s shorts were falling a foot below his waistline. It all seemed to portend ugly annihilation.

Perhaps because teams from Africa are named after really masculine and alpha animals like lions and elephants, and African players like my favorite Ghanaian son Michael Essien have nicknames like “the bison”,I do not ex-pect them to demonstrate a high level of subtlety. No Mourinhoesque mind games for these boys. All brute and grimace is what I take to be the order of the African day.

Yet I have this sneaking suspicion that the talk of internal discord within the Ghanaian ranks was part of some secret Accra accord to have us all, and particularly the Germans, expect less from them than they were willing and capable of giving.

Ghana was actually expecting to put on a real show, and WANTED us to be shocked to hell by it. Nothing else explains Gyan’s hair and Muntari’s pants for me. Those and the rumors were the kind of distraction that the Special One would be proud of. l

Done in by Ghana We more than Ze Germans

A child (L) kisses the jersey given by Italy’s defender Leonardo Bonucci during a training session of the Italian team at the Abc Frasqueiro Stadium in Natal on Saturday AFP

MATCH STATS Belgium Russia Goals scored 1 0 Total shots 11 13 Shots on target 7 6 Corners 5 8 O� sides 7 0 Fouls committed 13 9 Yellow cards 2 1 Red cards 0 0 Ball possession 52% 48%

DCCI Entrepreneurship and Innovation Expo beginsn Tribune Report

A two-day “DCCI Entrepreneurship and Innovation Expo” kicked o� in the capital yesterday to create new entre-preneurs especially from the young generation.

The show is being jointly oraganised by Dhaka Chamber of Commerce and Industry (DCCI) and Bangladesh Bank (BB) at the Bangabandhu International Conference Center (BICC) in the city.

The expo aims at showing the path for the new generation and bridging the gap between the entrepreneurs and the � nancial institutions for ensuring � nancial support for them.

The show is a part of the DCCI’s initiative for creating 2000 new entre-preneurs with the help of country’s � -nancial institutions. The DCCI took the initiative last year. Barrister Fazle Nur Taposh MP formally inaugurated the expo, as chief guest, in absence of � -nance minister AMA Muhith, who was scheduled to open the expo.

The chief guest and other high ups of the DCCI also handed over cheques of credit from various banks to nine en-trepreneurs under the DCCI’s initiative of creating 2,000 new entrepreneurs.

Inaugurating the expo, barrister Fa-zle Nur Taposh stressed the need for widening the tax net instead of increas-ing the rate to enhance the overall tax volume.

He also urged the government to simplify the taxation system, which would virtually enhance the govern-ment’s revenue collection.

“Some 3,200 entrepreneurs have

registered their names with the DCCI through on-line, of which 2,200 busi-ness projects under di� erent categories have been selected while 1050 youths received training from the DCCI,” said Shahjahan Khan, President of DCCI.

“So far 75 projects under di� erent categories have so far been forwarded to various banks from DCCI for � nanc-ing and most of the entrepreneurs of those projects have already started their business with their own funds.”

Apart from � nancing problem, lack of awareness, self-con� dence, knowl-

edge in entrepreneurship development and insu� cient trainings are the major obstacles towards entrepreneurship development in the country, said Khan.

A total of 39 bank and non-bank � nancial institutions are taking part in the expo including Bangladesh Bank, Junior Chamber International (JCI)-Dhaka, Bangladesh Association of Software and Information Services (BASIS), Da� odil International Univer-sity, BD Venture Limited, Small and Cottage Industries Training Institute (SCITI), Bangladesh Council of Scien-

ti� c and Industrial Research (BCSIR), CTO Forum, Institute of Diploma Engi-neers, Bangladesh (IDEB), Hackathon, World Bank, the   Future Leaders Ltd (the FLL), UK, Bangladesh Institute of ICT in Development (BIID) and Rotary International.

The inaugural ceremony was attend-ed, among others, by DCCI Founda-tion chairman and chairman of Anwar Group of Industries Alhaj Anwar Hos-sain, former DCCI president and chair-man of E2K project Md Sabur Khan and senior vice -president Osama Taseer. l

www.dhakatribune.com/business MONDAY, JUNE 23, 2014

B3 Small farms making big impact in US agriculture

B4 Oil price risks put in� a-tion back in focus

Promising entrepreneurs pose at a photo session with speakers and organisers at the DCCI Entrepreneurship and Innovation Expo at the Bangabandhu International Conference Center (BICC) in the city yesterday RAJIB DHAR

Muhith asks � nancial sector reform proposal by Augustn Asif Showkat Kallol

Finance Minister AMA Muhith yester-day asked the authorities to prepare a proposal on how the loopholes in the � nancial institutions could be sealed so irregularities like Destiny, Hallmark and Bismillah Group would not take place again.

He asked the secretaries of banking and � nance divisions of the � nance ministry to submit the proposal by Au-gust.The minister gave the instruction at a

meeting with Finance Secretary Fal-ze Kabir, Banking Division Secretary Dr M Aslam Alam, Planning Secretary Bhuiyan Sha� qul Islam, Economic Re-lations Division Secretary Mohammad Mejbahuddin and National Board of Revenue Chairman Md Ghulam Hus-sain at the � nance ministry, said an of-� cial who attended the meeting.

“We have just brainstormed the ideas of reform in the � nancial sector,” he told the Dhaka Tribune after the meeting.

Formulating strict rules on appoint-

ment of bank directors was among the options the meeting considered.

Meeting sources said the banking secretary proposed not to appoint the chairmen and directors in the banks, ir-respective of their political a� liations, without scrutinising their previous works. In response, the � nance minis-ter just o� ered a smile, said one of the o� cials.

“The existing policy is not strong enough to prevent politically a� liated people from appointing,” the minister was quoted to have told the meeting. l

Robi launches HD voice service for � rst timen Tribune Report

Mobile phone operator Robi Axiata Ltd has intro-duced high de� nition (HD) voice service across its 3.5G network for the � rst time in Bangladesh.

The HD technology will o� er clearer voice communication through better noise reduction and lessen listening fatigue during calls, said a press release issued yesterday.Robi 3.5G subscribers, however, will require HD

voice capable handsets at both ends to use the ad-vanced voice service.

“The latest introduction of HD voice is an ini-tiative on our part to bring in the most advanced global standard of voice service for our customers in Bangladesh, which has now been endorsed by GSMA as well ... HD voice will de� nitely set a new standard of service quality in the country,” said AKM Morshed, Robi’s chief technology o� cer.

Robi is the � rst mobile operator in Bangladesh

to be accredited by GSMA, an international asso-ciation of communication service providers and equipment manufacturers, to provide HD voice service, the release said.

It will be among only 109 mobile operators globally to o� er the service.

HD voice uses AMR WB (adaptive multirate wide band) technology to provide voice clarity and intelligibility, leading to a more pleasant experi-ence for mobile users. l

TUs blamed for anti-RMG propaganda abroadn Asif Showkat Kallol

Commerce Minister Tofail Ahmed has brought an allegation that various non-worker labour leaders of the coun-try are spreading misinformation in the USA about the apparel industry of Ban-gladesh. 

He raised the allegation at a press brie� ng at his secretariat o� ce in the capital yesterday, following his visit to the USA from June 11 to 14.

He, however, noted that the USTR will very soon place a bill at the US Con-gress for restoration of the Generalised System of Preferences (GSP), which was suspended following the Tazreen Fashion � re and Rana Plaza collapse.

The minister said the o� cials of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) expressed their satisfaction over the progress of the Action Plan the USA imposed on Bangladesh to im-prove the labour standards and factory conditions.

But, he failed to produce any spe-ci� c statement from the congressmen and the o� cials of the USTR, whom he met during his visit, although the min-ister claimed that a congressman had termed the progress on the conditions to regain GSP facilities as miraculous.

As Bangladesh has been deprived of GSP facilities in the US market from July last year, Bangladeshi products will regain the GSP facilities in the US market unless the political and other issues become the deciding factors, To-fail added.

“The US government has assured us that only stakeholders of garment in-dustries will be called during the GSP hearing although the USTR did never call the stakeholders in the previous years.”       

As the USTR o� cials referred to a letter sent by Geneva-based Industry-All, Bangladesh that mentioned about labour exploitation in the country, the commerce minister explained: “I had been able to remove the misunder-standing of the o� cials about the la-

bour condition created by that letter.” He informed the USTR that

those raising the issues are actually non-workers, and requested the au-thorities in the US to ensure that gov-ernment representatives are allowed to attend the hearings on RMG export from the country, besides the labour leaders.

The Commerce Minister further said IndustryAll Council President Nazrul Islam Khan is a BNP leader, and men-tioned that other union leaders like Kalpana Akhter and Babul Akhter are responsible for creating unrest in the RMG sector.

Regarding the pressure to form a trade union in each factory by United States, Tofail said only 7% of private sector factories have trade unions while 35% of government sector facto-ries have trade unions even in the Unit-ed States.

Labour leaders claim they’re innocentLabour leader Roy Ramesh, who is the

secretary of IndustriAll Bangladesh Council, told Dhaka Tribune that the IndustriAll is one of the biggest labour organisations in world. IndustriAll Bangladesh Council did not send any letter to the USTR.

“I am strongly saying the commerce minister was not even near the truth,” he said, in a sharp reaction. “If he has any document regarding IndustriAll letter, please disclose in front of the nation. Otherwise, the minister should withdraw his statement.”

He further said IndustriAll will hold a press conference within a day or two unless the statement is withdrawn.

Nazrul Islam Khan, chairman of In-dustriAll and member of BNP standing committee, said they have not sent any latter to USTR regarding canceling of GSP facilities.

“Commerce Minister Tofail Ahmed made the statement to cover his fail-ure,” he said. “I will face any punish-ment if the commerce ministry can show the document.” l

Impact of social safety net on poverty negligiblen Tribune Report

The impact of social safety net on pov-erty in our country is negligible, which is the major obstacle to the poverty re-duction as the maximum share of the bene� t of poor households goes to safe-ty net programmes, a seminar was told.

The aggregate amount of bene� t that the poor households get in ex-change of labor is pitifully small. Even the small bene� t that is on o� er is cap-tured mainly by the better-o� house-holds, viewed S R Osmani, a professor of University of Ulster, UK, while ad-dressing a session titled “Poverty Re-duction Strategies and Policies’’ on the concluding day of the 2_day � rst Ban-gladesh Economists’ Forum (BEF) Con-ference held at a city hotel yesterday.

Osmani was presenting a report ti-tled ‘’Social Protection for All: Learn-ing from Lessons of the Ground’’ while Azizur Rahman Khan, a Profes-sor Emeritus, University of California, chaired the session.

Participation in safety net of dis-advantaged households seems to in-crease the probability of being poor as it increases their household consump-tion, observed Osmani in his report.

According to the report, the per-centage of participant in access to safe-ty net is higher among the disadvan-taged groups. The more disadvantaged households are more likely to partici-pate in safety net which led them to the extreme poverty.

In his report, Osmani showed that the impact of safety net assessing three parameters in his presentation. While household consumption increasing with growing participation in safety net, ability to cope with crisis and asset transition decreasing.

He termed three categories of asset transition including “Faller”, “Stayer” and “Mover’’. Access to safety net should increase the probability of be-ing a ‘mover’ and decrease the proba-bility of being a ‘faller’, he added.

Access of participants to safety net among the poverty group, extreme poor is 53.2%, moderate group is 45%, margin-ally non-poor is 42.5% and well-o� 29.3%, according to his presentation report.

He put emphasise on health insur-ance as health-related shocks are the most pervasive type of shock in rural Bangladesh.

Mustafa Kamal Mujeri, Director General of Bangladesh Institute of De-velopment Studies (BIDS), noted that three areas of transformational change would be critical to manage for Bangla-desh including quality of governance, demographic transition and urbanisa-tion and spatial transformation while presententing a report titled ‘’Vision 2030: What Lies Ahead for Bangladesh in a Post-MDGs World’’.

During his presentation Mujeri opined that the future of Bangladesh would de-pend on the quality with which the coun-try could harness and manage the posi-tive outcomes of those changes. l

Microsoft starts anti-piracy driven Muhammad Zahidul Islam

While the traders and ICT market ana-lysts criticise Microsoft’s software price saying it “too high” for the Bangladeshi users, the world’s largest software � rm has recently started drives against pi-rated versions in the city’s malls.

On Thursday, a team from Bangla-desh chapter of International Software Alliance (BSA) conducted a drive in the capital’s one of the most popular ICT products mall Multiplan Center.

However, the drive found no pirated software in the mall during its one and half hours drive.

Subrata Sarkar, Secretary General of the Multiplan Center, alleged a sec-tion of people are “hatching conspiracy against the mall’s reputation.”

Claiming they never sold pirated software, he said: “We protest this drive as this is to tarnish our image.”

According to Subrata, a group is active to destroy their goodwill in the name of drive against piracy.

He also slashed Microsoft’s software price. “This is too much for the country’s users to buy an operating software of Microsoft.” Microsoft has � xed its oper-ating software price at around Tk8,000.

“It should think about the users’ capacity before setting price which is now very high, even beyond the a� ord-ability of common people.”

Mostafa Jobber, former president of Bangladesh Computer Samity (BCS) and member of Anti-piracy Task Force, said Microsoft has no legal authority to conduct drives and this is the duty of the Task Force.

“The Task Force is currently not en-gaged in conducting anti-piracy drives. If Microsoft launched drives, it would not be lawful and logical.”

He, however, said they do not fa-vour piracy. “This is not to mean that we are in favour of pirated software.”

Mostafa Jobbar also alleged Micro-soft software price is “very high.”

He said before � xing the price they

needed to consider the local market situation, the buyers’ a� ordability and their demand.

Bangladesh Association of Software and Information Services (BASIS) Pres-ident Shameem Ahsan echoed him: “We never favour pirated software. But it’s true that Microsoft’s software is be-yond our costumers’ a� ordability.”

The market insiders said if the price is beyond general buyers, it would be hard to stop piracy.

When contacted, Sonia Bosir, newly appointed head of Microsoft in Bangla-desh declined to make any comment regarding the matter. l

ANALYST

B2 Stock Monday, June 23, 2014DHAKA TRIBUNE

DSE turnover sinks to 4-week lown Tribune Report

Turnover at the Dhaka Stock Ex-change (DSE) yesterday sank to its four-week low to Tk223 crore as investors were reluctant to make fresh investments amid shaky con-� dence.

Meanwhile, the price index at the premier bourse ended with marginal fall, showing continuous downtrend that started last week.

“The market is still under selling pressure as investors prefer to stay on the sidelines and waiting to see whether the government changes the detrimental decisions taken in the proposed budget for FY 2014-15,” LankaBangla Securities stated in its regular market commentary.

Market is extremely cautious and warns against pinning much hope before the budget gets ap-proved, said LankaBangla. In-vestors are waiting and watching out how things pan out after next week, it added.

“Opening session absorbed an-other beat with di� erent phases of volatility. Since, investors lack further re-assessment across mar-ket level, sentiment turned worse,” said IDLC Investments’ market analysis.

While, market was upheld with the support of some speci� c scrips, especially Lafarge Surma Cement, Square Pharma and Bangladesh Submarine Cable, it said.

As the bourse showcased ex-tended level of dullness, inves-tors shunned fresh fund injection, which cast shadow on turnover.

Day’s turnover came down to Tk223 crore which was 16.3% less compared to previous session’s val-ue of Tk266 crore.

DSEX, the benchmark index of the Dhaka Stock Exchange closed at 4,322 points, shedding 6 points or 0.14% amid volatile trading.

The DS30 of blue chips stocks declined 10 points or 0.58% to close at 1,594 points while the DSE Shari-ah Index (DSES) fell by 4 points or 0.42% to end at 989 points.

Out of 292 issues traded, 140 advanced, 114 declined and 38 re-mained unchanged at the DSE trad-ing � oor.

Among the major sectors, only two sector – Banks and, food and al-lied were the gainers posting 0.67% and 0.28% growth respectively.

Telecommunications, which represents the � agship stocks of Grameenphone, was the highest loser going down by 1.02%. Phar-maceuticals, NBFIs and, fuel and power went down by 0.80%, 0.35% and 0.11% respectively.

Lafarge Surma Cement was the most traded stocks for the � fth ses-sions with shares worth Tk34 crore.

Monno Sta� ers was the day’s highest gainer, posting a rise of 8.69% while Asia Insurance was the worst loser, plunging by 13.63%. l

News, analysis and recent disclosersMEGHNALIFE: The Board of Directors has recommended 20% cash dividend and 10% stock dividend for the year ended on De-cember 31, 2013. Date of AGM: 17.07.2014, Time: 10:30 AM, Venue: "Muktijuddha Smrity Auditorium", Institution of Diploma Engineers, Bangladesh, 160/A, Kakrail VIP Road, Dhaka. Record Date: 30.06.2014.FUWANGFOOD: Credit Rating Agency of Bangladesh Limited (CRAB) has announced the entity rating of the Company as "BBB3" based on audited � nancial statements of the Company up to June 30, 2013, un-au-dited statement up to March 31, 2014, bank liability position as on April 30, 2014 and other relevant quantitative as well as qualitative information up to the date of rating declaration.APOLOISPAT: Credit Rating Agency of Bangladesh Limited (CRAB) has announced the entity rating (surveillance) of the Com-pany as "BB1" based on audited � nancial statements of the Company up to June 30, 2013, un-audited � nancial statements up to December 31, 2013, bank liability position as on March 30, 2014 and other relevant quantitative as well as qualitative informa-

tion up to the date of rating declaration.AFTABAUTO: (Q3): As per un-audited quarterly accounts for the 3rd quarter end-ed on 31st May 2014 (Mar'14 to May'14), the Company has reported consolidated net pro� t after tax (excluding non-controlling interests) of Tk. 43.60 million with consol-idated EPS of Tk. 0.46 as against Tk. 70.76 million and Tk. 0.74 respectively for the same period of the previous year. Whereas consolidated net pro� t after tax (excluding non-controlling interests) was Tk. 193.82 million with consolidated EPS of Tk. 2.02 for the period of nine months (Sep'13 to May'14) ended on 31.05.2014 as against Tk. 257.60 million and Tk. 2.69 respectively for the same period of the previous year.MICEMENT: The Company has informed that the Board of Directors of the Company has decided to purchase 392 decimals of land at west Mukterpur, Panchasor, Munshiganj at a cost of Tk. 15.56 crore only (approx.) including the registration cost.NORTHRNINS: The Company has informed that it has credited the bonus shares for the year ended on December 31, 2013 to the respective shareholders' BO

Accounts on June 19, 2014.SANDHANINS: As per Regulation 30 of DSE Listing Regulations, the Company has informed that a meeting of the Board of Directors will be held on June 29, 2014 at 3:00 PM to consider, among others, audit-ed � nancial statements of the Company for the year ended on December 31, 2013.IPO Subscription: Far East Knitting & Dyeing Industries Limited subscription date 15-19 June 2014, NRB upto 28 June 2014. @ taka 27, face value taka 10 and market lot 200. Shurwid Industries Limited subscrip-tion date 08-12 June 2014, NRB upto 21 June 2014. @ taka 10, face value taka 10 and market lot 500. Saif Powertec Limited sub-scription date 06-10 July 2014, NRB upto 19 July 2014. @ taka 30, face value taka 10 and market lot 200. Ratanpur Steel Re-Rolling Mills Limited subscription date 13-17 July 2014, NRB upto 26 July 2014. @ taka 40, face value taka 10 and market lot 200.

Dividend/AGMDELTALIFE: 11% cash and 25% stock, AGM and EGM: 20.07.2014, Record date for AGM and EGM: 25.06.2014.

CSE LOSERS

Company Closing (% change)

Aver-age (%

change)

Closing average Closing Daily high Daily low Turnover

in millionLatest

EPSLatest

PE

Asia Insur. Ltd.-A -11.62 -11.41 21.35 21.30 22.00 20.80 0.139 1.84 11.6Da� odil Computers -Z -7.56 -3.30 11.13 11.00 11.20 11.00 0.045 0.68 16.4Aftab Auto.-A -7.41 -6.84 75.94 75.00 79.00 74.50 6.531 2.69 28.2PrimeFin. 1st MF-A -7.41 -7.57 17.47 17.50 17.50 17.20 0.096 1.64 10.7Sonargaon Tex -Z -4.65 -4.65 8.20 8.20 8.20 8.20 0.008 -0.92 -veEBL First M F-A -4.62 -4.35 6.15 6.20 6.20 6.00 0.040 0.45 13.7Federal Insu.-A -4.41 -4.51 19.48 19.50 19.50 19.30 0.080 1.36 14.3Salvo Chemicals-B -4.29 -2.20 20.47 20.10 21.00 20.10 1.423 1.16 17.6ICB Emp. PMF-A -3.64 -3.28 5.30 5.30 5.30 5.30 0.003 0.68 7.8Meghna Life Ins. -A -3.60 -3.23 113.05 112.60 120.00 111.70 2.176 6.45 17.5

DSE LOSERS

Company Closing (% change)

Aver-age (%

change)

Closing average Closing Daily high Daily low Turnover

in millionLatest

EPSLatest

PE

Asia Insur. Ltd.-A -13.64 -14.33 20.81 20.90 21.50 20.70 2.206 1.84 11.3GeminiSeaFood-Z -7.33 -7.33 125.10 125.10 125.10 125.10 0.006 -11.90 -veAftab Auto.-A -7.30 -6.11 76.01 74.90 81.00 73.00 42.833 2.69 28.37th ICB M F-A -5.05 -1.28 99.71 99.70 101.10 97.50 0.349 12.01 8.3Kay & Que (BD) -Z -4.55 -3.41 12.75 12.60 13.00 12.50 0.051 -0.92 -veKarnaphuli Insur -A -4.00 -2.65 19.47 19.20 21.00 18.50 0.823 1.40 13.9BD Fixed Income MF-A -3.80 -1.52 7.75 7.60 8.10 7.60 0.062 0.56 13.8BGIC -A -3.29 -2.44 20.75 20.60 21.10 19.50 0.393 1.36 15.3Salvo Chemicals-B -2.87 -1.91 20.53 20.30 20.90 18.90 8.877 1.16 17.7LankaBangla Fin. -A -2.82 -0.74 41.69 41.30 42.50 38.30 17.194 1.24 33.6

CSE 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 69,200 20.73 12.72 298.60 -1.22 302.30 304.00 294.30 299.54LafargeS Cement-Z 200,500 16.05 9.85 81.30 0.25 81.10 83.00 77.80 80.03BEXIMCO Ltd. -A 422,239 11.18 6.86 26.70 0.00 26.70 27.00 25.90 26.48The Peninsula CTG.-N 313,800 11.10 6.81 35.20 2.03 34.50 36.00 34.20 35.37BSRM Steels-A 80,130 6.76 4.15 84.10 -2.32 86.10 85.50 83.20 84.38Aftab Auto.-A 86,004 6.53 4.01 75.00 -7.41 81.00 79.00 74.50 75.94National Bank - B 503,092 5.25 3.22 10.60 3.92 10.20 10.60 10.10 10.43BD Submarine Cable-A 24,029 4.34 2.67 181.70 1.51 179.00 182.90 178.60 180.79Mithun Knitting -A 36,600 4.16 2.56 109.40 -1.97 111.60 115.00 109.00 113.78UNITED AIR-A 348,280 4.01 2.46 11.50 -2.54 11.80 11.90 11.40 11.52UCBL - A 132,726 3.53 2.17 26.70 0.75 26.50 26.90 25.80 26.63Square Pharma -A 11,986 3.31 2.03 275.40 -0.86 277.80 278.00 275.00 275.99Beach Hatchery -A 115,000 2.75 1.69 23.80 1.28 23.50 24.20 23.50 23.95AramitCementA 58,000 2.46 1.51 42.50 -0.70 42.80 42.70 42.10 42.40LankaBangla Fin. -A 55,500 2.31 1.42 41.40 -2.36 42.40 42.10 41.10 41.65

DSE TURNOVER LEADERS

Company Volume shares

Value in million

% of total turnover

Daily closing

Price change

Daily opening

Daily high

Daily low

Daily average

LafargeS Cement-Z 4,303,000 342.61 15.39 82.00 0.37 81.70 83.50 78.10 79.62Square Pharma -A 460,950 127.44 5.72 275.40 -0.79 277.60 280.00 254.00 276.47Grameenphone-A 343,800 101.91 4.58 296.50 -1.20 300.10 302.00 293.90 296.43BD Submarine Cable-A 371,935 67.20 3.02 181.90 1.68 178.90 183.00 163.00 180.68BEXIMCO Ltd. -A 2,499,279 66.51 2.99 26.70 -0.74 26.90 27.00 24.30 26.61BSRM Steels-A 736,280 62.33 2.80 84.20 -2.09 86.00 88.00 80.00 84.65Meghna Petroleum -A 233,749 59.96 2.69 259.50 0.15 259.10 262.90 236.50 256.50The Peninsula CTG.-N 1,652,800 58.36 2.62 35.10 2.33 34.30 35.90 34.40 35.31ACI Limited- A 208,075 54.16 2.43 261.90 0.34 261.00 266.00 240.00 260.27Renata Ltd. -A 51,424 43.10 1.94 832.60 -0.81 839.40 840.00 830.50 838.19Aftab Auto.-A 563,533 42.83 1.92 74.90 -7.30 80.80 81.00 73.00 76.01Olympic Ind. -A 144,500 31.43 1.41 219.80 -0.41 220.70 220.90 215.90 217.47Mithun Knitting -A 277,750 30.81 1.38 109.20 -1.89 111.30 113.80 102.00 110.92Golden Son -A 714,751 30.74 1.38 42.90 -0.46 43.10 43.40 38.80 43.01Beximco Pharma -A 789,925 30.40 1.37 38.40 -1.54 39.00 39.90 35.10 38.49

CSE GAINERS

Company Closing (% change)

Aver-age (%

change)

Closing average Closing Daily high Daily low Turnover

in millionLatest

EPSLatest

PE

3rd ICB M F-A 11.65 4.55 230.00 230.00 230.00 230.00 0.035 22.19 10.4Sandhani Life -A 9.93 18.57 83.00 83.00 83.00 83.00 0.025 2.39 34.7Apex SpinningA 7.71 7.71 81.00 81.00 81.00 81.00 0.016 1.85 43.8National Life I -A 6.03 6.21 350.58 350.00 355.00 345.00 0.175 12.46 28.1R. N. Spinning-Z 5.38 4.90 27.20 27.40 27.70 26.50 1.598 3.12 8.7Reliance1 M.F.-A 4.71 4.71 8.90 8.90 8.90 8.90 0.009 1.86 4.8Rangpur Foundry -A 4.48 4.48 100.30 100.30 100.30 100.30 0.150 3.08 32.6B I F C -A 4.13 4.56 12.60 12.60 12.60 12.60 0.013 0.24 52.5National Bank - B 3.92 2.15 10.43 10.60 10.60 10.10 5.248 0.92 11.3Standard Insurance-A 3.57 14.96 28.97 29.00 29.00 28.90 0.043 2.88 10.1

DSE GAINERS

Company Closing (% change)

Aver-age (%

change)

Closing average Closing Daily high Daily low Turnover

in millionLatest

EPSLatest

PE

Monno Sta� lers -A 8.69 8.69 352.52 355.20 355.30 338.00 2.732 1.12 314.8Renwick Jajneswar-A 5.72 5.18 260.68 262.30 266.70 251.00 6.165 3.92 66.5Monno Ceramic -B 5.32 6.54 28.02 27.70 28.60 26.70 2.715 0.28 100.1Rangpur Foundry -A 5.17 4.55 105.03 105.70 106.50 99.70 15.440 3.08 34.1Sandhani Life -A 4.73 5.00 87.55 88.60 90.00 84.20 12.343 2.39 36.6R. N. Spinning-Z 4.60 5.55 27.21 27.30 27.70 23.90 8.611 3.12 8.7Continental Insur. -A 4.23 5.48 22.15 22.20 22.40 21.00 0.454 3.00 7.4Eastern Lubricants -A 3.85 3.56 455.68 456.10 464.00 442.00 0.843 6.95 65.6CMC Kamal Tex. -A 3.67 2.89 22.44 22.60 22.90 20.00 11.852 1.32 17.0Dhaka Bank -A 3.17 1.79 19.33 19.50 19.70 18.00 10.291 2.00 9.7

SECTORAL TURNOVER SUMMARY

Sector DSE CSE TotalMillion Taka % change Million Taka % change Million Taka % change

Bank 254.72 11.44 18.02 9.47 272.74 11.29NBFI 46.56 2.09 3.48 1.83 50.04 2.07Investment 30.21 1.36 2.54 1.34 32.75 1.36Engineering 254.52 11.43 18.60 9.78 273.12 11.30Food & Allied 89.35 4.01 8.62 4.53 97.97 4.05Fuel & Power 168.11 7.55 11.49 6.04 179.60 7.43Jute 0.44 0.02 0.00 0.44 0.02Textile 178.03 8.00 19.04 10.01 197.07 8.15Pharma & Chemical 335.85 15.08 9.93 5.22 345.78 14.31Paper & Packaging 0.11 0.01 7.78 4.09 7.89 0.33Service 21.46 0.96 1.11 0.58 22.57 0.93Leather 16.77 0.75 9.38 4.93 26.15 1.08Ceramic 8.51 0.38 0.26 0.14 8.77 0.36Cement 384.26 17.26 20.46 10.76 404.71 16.75Information Technology 11.35 0.51 0.75 0.40 12.10 0.50General Insurance 19.47 0.87 0.46 0.24 19.93 0.82Life Insurance 62.28 2.80 4.49 2.36 66.77 2.76Telecom 169.11 7.60 25.07 13.18 194.19 8.04Travel & Leisure 90.12 4.05 15.42 8.11 105.53 4.37Miscellaneous 84.78 3.81 13.27 6.98 98.05 4.06Debenture 0.37 0.02 0.01 0.00 0.38 0.02

Daily capital market highlights

DSE Broad Index : 4322.26154 (-) 0.14% ▼

DSE Shariah Index : 988.79796 (-) 0.42% ▼

DSE - 30 Index : 1593.87723 (-) 0.60% ▼

CSE All Share Index: 13338.74600 (-) 0.32% ▼

CSE - 30 Index : 10917.45910 (-) 0.48% ▼

CSE Selected Index : 8234.56880 (-) 0.37% ▼

DSE key features June 22, 2014Turnover (Million Taka)

2,226.37

Turnover (Volume)

51,042,035

Number of Contract 55,533

Traded Issues 155

Issue Gain (Avg. Price Basis)

131

Issue Loss (Avg. Price Basis)

155

Unchanged Issue (Avg. Price Basis)

8

Market Capital Equity (Billion. Tk.)

2,,245.43

Market Capital Equity (Billion US$)

27.22

CSE key features June 22, 2014Turnover (Million Taka) 166.85

Turnover (Volume) 4,611,241

Number of Contract 6,842

Traded Issues 183

Issue Gain (Avg. Price Basis)

67

Issue Loss (Avg. Price Basis)

110

Unchanged Issue (Avg. Price Basis)

5

Market Capital Equity (Billion. Tk.)

2,170.75

Market Capital Equity (Billion US$)

26.31

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

Market is extremely cautious and warns against pinning much hope before the budget gets approved

B3BusinessDHAKA TRIBUNE Monday, June 23, 2014

Dollar edgesdown in Asian AFP, Tokyo

The dollar edged down in Asia Friday, extending losses in New York that were driven by dovish comments from the head of the US Federal Reserve that indicated interest rates will not go up until next year.

In afternoon Tokyo trade, the dollar bought 101.84 yen, down from 101.94 yen in New York on Thursday.

The euro � rmed to $1.3623 from $1.3606 and to 138.75 yen from 138.70 yen.

The dollar began sliding after the Fed on Wednesday said it would fur-ther cut its stimulus programme while keeping rates at record lows, and made no mention that it would bring forward plans to tighten monetary policy.

Fed chief Janet Yellen said the economy was growing steadily and dismissed a fresh uptick in in� ation as "noise" re� ecting some short-term dis-tortions.

This suggests that the Fed still sees a low-in� ation environment for the next year or more.

Junya Tanase, chief foreign ex-change strategist at JP Morgan, told Dow Jones Newswires that it was tough to see how the dollar-yen rate will "break outside the current range to show a clear trend, at least for near term".

Investors are also keeping an eye on the Iraq crisis after government troops recaptured a major re� nery and the US said it was sending in military advisers to train local forces.

The dollar was broadly higher against other Asia-Paci� c units, rising to Sg$1.2493 from Sg$1.2483 on Thurs-day, to 1,019.22 South Korean won from 1,018.60 won, and to 11,967.00 Indone-sian rupiah from 11,923.80 rupiah. l

IFC to ramp up operations in Bangladeshn Tribune Report

International Finance Corporation would enhance its operations in Ban-gladesh to boost job creation and eco-nomic competitiveness.

IFC Regional Director for South Asia Serge Devieux said this at a meeting with Bangladesh Bank Governor Atiur Rahman, rea� rming IFC’s commit-ment towards building momentum for rapid, inclusive, and sustained growth in the country, said a press release yes-terday.

The private sector arm of the World Bank Group is working on expanding job-creation opportunities, building critical infrastructure – including pow-er, energy, and transport – and support-ing better working conditions in the

readymade garments sector to improve Bangladesh’s competitiveness, he said.

IFC’s work in Bangladesh supports the World Bank Group’s goals of ending extreme poverty and boosting shared prosperity.

In the last two years, IFC invested over a $1bn in the country. In the cur-rent � scal year, IFC has committed nearly $400m for 12 projects till date.

These include supporting natural-gas resources development, funding an independent power project to en-sure the supply of electricity is reliable and a� ordable, and expanding trade � -nance and e� cient working capital so-lutions for domestic private industry.

Bangladesh, which accounts for 5% of the world’s poor, is one of IFC’s largest country-speci� c advisory pro-

grammes. IFC has a growing pipeline of invest-

ment projects in sustainable energy, power generation and distribution, economic zones, sea ports, inland transport, and the � nancial sector.

It is also implementing new advi-sory programs such as the Partnership for Cleaner Textiles, with support from Netherlands; the Better Work initiative with the International Labour Organ-isation to improve the rights and safety of workers in the garment industry; and the South Asia Regional Trade and Investment project for enhanced eco-nomic integration.

In addition, IFC is scaling up its ad-visory work on public-private partner-ships to help mobilise � nancing for and build essential infrastructure. l

Small farms making big impact in US agriculturen AFP, Logan

As a teenager, Danelle Myer wanted nothing more than to leave her family's farm in Iowa and become a big-city ad-vertising executive.

Now, the 42-year-old juggles orders for cabbage and deals with hail damage on her patch of land.

After building a career in public rela-tions, Myer returned three years ago to her rural roots in the US farm belt - the tiny Iowan town of Logan, less than 40 miles (60 kilometers) north of Omaha, Nebraska."In my 20s, my health was not the greatest. I started realizing what we put in our body matters. I became more health-conscious," Myer said.

"What pushed me over the edge was the land owned by my family," said the � fth-generation farmer, as she sat cross-legged among her plants in a pink tank top and � ip-� ops. "It is an im-mense privilege and I should do some-thing about it."

But she had no intention of taking up the conventional farming practices of her parents, who raise corn, soy-beans and cattle. For her, it would be a truck farm on a small, sloping piece of land "all pesticide- and GM-free," she said, referring to genetically modi� ed seeds that dominate much of US corn and soybean crops.

In the heart of the Midwest, the breadbasket of the United States and known for agricultural productivity, Myer's story is no longer so unusual.

Small farms boomingIn the land of industrial-scale agri-culture, "truck farming" - small-scale fresh fruit and vegetable production - is booming, encouraged by the rising consumer interest in food grown lo-cally, an industry worth $7bn.

The country has 8,100 farmers' mar-kets, and nearly 150,000 farmers and ranchers sell their products directly to consumers. Some 44% of schools have links to local farms for student meals.

To encourage the trend, the US government on June 9 launched "Lo-cal Food, Local Places", a program that provides experts in agricultural, trans-portation, the environment and the re-gional economy to rural communities

to help them build local food systems."The changes are tangible and inspir-

ing," said Alice Topalo� , a young French-American agricultural engineer work-ing in Iowa. "The development of local farms is catching on, and in a more spec-tacular way than in France," she said.

"Certainly that is because people are distancing themselves from farms with thousands of acres (hectares) and where food culture isn't as anchored

to locally grown food." But it is a tough row to hoe.

The � rst year, in 2010, Myer sold $2,200 worth of vegetables. Her tar-get this season is $20,000. Even if she makes that, it will not be enough to pay the bills. She works part-time in public relations to get by.

"To make a good standard of living for a conventional corn and soybean farm, it takes up to 2,000 acres (800

hectares). If you want the same stan-dards of living on a vegetable farm, you could probably do it on 10 acres," said Craig Chase, an economist at Iowa State University who has been watching the rise of sustainable, organic, and local farming in the US since the 1980s.

A jump in land prices in the Midwest in recent years is also a major reason why young people are setting up veg-etable and small farms, Chase said.

For the children of farmers who can-not split up the farm without making it less pro� table, and for immigrants and organic farmers wanting their own op-eration, the price of land is out of reach, he said. "If your land is $10,000 an acre and you want to begin farming, you are looking for a high-value crop versus a high-volume, lower-value crop."

'People just like the taste'Consumers' desire for healthier, more � avorful food is a driver. Topalo� said food security also plays a role. Unlike in Europe, she said, "here, people are not particularly worried about genetically modi� ed foods."

"By contrast, because the agri-food industry is concentrated in the hands of three or four companies, people are concerned that a terrorist attack could have a giant impact."

Bending over to pull out weeds from her new greenhouse, Myer insisted she would not trade anything in the world for the hours spent among her radishes, sweet potatoes and chamo-mile, specially raised for a herbalist in Omaha. She seemed exhausted but de-termined. Smiling broadly, Myer said she gets lots of encouragement – from some because she is a woman, from others because she is a "hometown girl" or because she grows organically.

"Some people just like the taste of my food," she said. l

Oil mixed in Asia amid Iraq supply fearsn AFP, Singapore

Oil prices were mixed in Asia Friday but retained support near a nine-month peak as dealers track the unfolding sec-tarian con� ict in Iraq fearing it could cause a major supply disruption.

Brent crude for August fell four cents to $115.02 in afternoon trade, after rallying to $115.06 in London, its highest since early September.

US benchmark West Texas Interme-diate for July delivery rose 15 cents to $106.58. "Oil saw support from the risk of con� ict in Iraq disrupting oil supplies, as the US said it would send military ad-visers to the country," Singapore's Unit-

ed Overseas Bank said in a note.US President Barack Obama on Thurs-

day announced that he was ready to send 300 advisers to Iraq and if necessary to take "targeted" and "precise" military ac-tion to counter radical Sunni � ghters.

"We will help Iraqis as they take the � ght to terrorists who threaten the Iraqi people, the region and American interests as well," he said.

Washington has already positioned an aircraft carrier in the Gulf and is also considering using drone strikes against the militants. A Congressional source has said US Secretary of State John Ker-ry will travel to Iraq "soon".

The militants have captured swathes

of the country's north but have yet to directly threaten the key oil-producing region in the south.

The crisis has rocked the global oil market because Iraq is the second-biggest producer within the 12-nation Organis ation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC).

The country has more than 11% of the world's proven resources and pro-duces 3.4 million barrels a day.

Aside from concerns about Iraq, French bank Credit Agricole said "the market today should be relatively quiet heading into the weekend" with no sig-ni� cant data release and the conclusion of a key US central bank meeting. l

MI Cement eyes future expansionn Tahmidur Rahman

MI Cement Factory Limited, manufac-turer of the brand Crown Cement, has recently disclosed its board’s decision to purchase more land adjacent to its factory located in Munshiganj.

The declaration came at the com-pany’s 141st meeting held at its head o� ce on Saturday.

The board said the land is about 392 decimals at West Mukterpur, Pancha-sor in Munshiganj, which will approxi-mately cost a total of Tk15.56 crore, in-cluding the registration fees.

The company previously bought lands adjacent to its factory premises of 53.22 decimals worth Tk3.28 crore in 2012 and 27.67 decimals worth 1.63 crore in 2012.

The purchase of land is for expansion of the capacity in future, and therefore, investors would have to wait to enjoy yields from the investment, said Md Mozharul Islam, the company’s secretary.

Replying to a question whether the investment would reduce the chances of paying out cash dividend, he told the Dhaka Tribune that it would not a� ect the dividend.

On May 18, the company announced its intention to set up two packing units that would cost approximately Tk21 crore, including civil construction.

Earlier on March 31, the cement pro-ducer had a cash and equivalent hold-

ings of Tk319 crore, according to the third unaudited quarterly statements in FY14. Of the amount, Tk306 crore is deposited with banks and Tk13 crore kept in hand and banks.

Analysts believe the cash holding ratio against term deposit caused a fall in pro� t in the Q3 of FY14 against the same period of FY13.

The company has reported a quar-terly pro� t drop of 12% for the quarter ended on March 31 against the same pe-riod last year.

The � nancial statement shows the quarterly pro� t of FY14 dropped to Tk13.6 crore from Tk15.5 crore during Q3 of FY13 due to increased � nancial expenses on bank loans – Tk10.3 crore in Q3 of FY14.

In contrast to quarterly perfor-mance, the company’s last nine-month pro� t is Tk47.1 crore against a pro� t af-ter tax of Tk44.6 crore during the same period of the previous � scal, FY13.

The disclosure about land purchase, published at the country’s bourses yes-terday, however, failed to move the company’s share prices as investors took the stance of wait-and-see, said a broker.

It might be because the disclosure is unlikely to boost the company’s pro� t-ability any time soon, he added.

The stock’s closing price remained same at Tk83.6 each as its closing price at the end of last week. l

NRB Bank Ltd recently held its � rst annual general meeting that was presided over by the bank’s chair Iqbal Ahmed

Phoenix Insurance Company Ltd recently held its 28th annual general at Institute of Diploma Engineers in Dhaka. The meeting was presided over by the company’s chair Mohammed Shoeb where the shakeholders approved the proposed 20% cash dividend for the year 2013

NCC Bank recently concluded a month long foundation training course for its o� cers on Thursday at the bank’s training institute. The bank’s MD and CEO Golam Ha� z Ahmed distributed certi� cates to the participants as chief guest

Dhaka Chapter of Old Faujians Association (OFA) recently held the election of its working committee along with its executive conference (2014/16 tenure) at a local club in Dhaka. Dhaka Chapter’s former president Md Mahmudul Haque made discussions while Brigadier General Moazzam Hossain, the election commissioner announced the newly elected working committee

An opening ceremony titled 'Long Live Japan-Bangladesh Friendship' of RTM International Shikhha-o-Manob Sampod Unnayan Kandra was held recently. Japan Ambassador Heroki Nimani was present at the programme among others

MasterCard yesterday launched a ten-day long campaign of “Spend and Win” in Bangladesh called ‘Char Chakka Hoi Hoi’ for MasterCard debit and credit cardholders at a press conference held at a hotel in Dhaka. Syed Mohammad Kamal, country manager of MasterCard, Bangladesh was at present at the conference among others

42-year-old Danelle Myer, washes the radishes she just picked in her � eld AFP

US jobs, factory data point to strengthening economyn Reuters, Washington

The number of Americans � ling new claims for jobless bene� ts fell last week and factory activity in the mid-Atlantic region accelerated in June, more evi-dence the economy was strengthening after a disastrous � rst quarter.

“The economy has improved mark-edly in recent months,” said Jim Baird, chief investment o� cer at Plante Mo-ran Financial Advisors in Kalamazoo, Michigan. “Signs point to continued growth in the coming quarters, and further improvement in labour market conditions.”

Initial claims for state unemploy-ment bene� ts slipped 6,000 to a sea-sonally adjusted 312,000 for the week ended June 14, the Labour Department said on Thursday.

The four-week moving average for new claims, considered a better mea-sure of underlying labour market con-ditions as it irons out week-to-week volatility, fell 3,750 to 311,750, not far from a seven-year low touched in May.

Separately, the Philadelphia Federal Reserve Bank said its business activity index jumped to 17.8 this month, the highest level since September, from 15.4 in May. Any reading above zero in-dicates expansion in the region’s man-ufacturing.

Gains were driven by a surge in new orders, as well as an increase in factory employment and working hours. l

B4 Back PageDHAKA TRIBUNE Monday, June 23, 2014

DILBERT

Oil price risks put in� ation back in focusn Reuters, Brussels

Iraq will be foremost in investors' minds in the coming week as oil price risk has returned to markets, complicating the task for central banks whose policies are beginning to diverge for the � rst time since the global � nancial crisis.

Oil prices neared nine-month highs late last week, touching $115 a barrel, and the rapid advance of militants in Iraq, the second-largest OPEC produc-er, is destabilising oil markets.

That has implications for in� ation in the United States and Europe, as well as Asia's export-oriented economies that are large net importers of oil.

Investors will be watching a range of data, from German and Japanese con-sumer prices to � rst-quarter U S GDP, to see how the Federal Reserve, the Euro-pean Central Bank (ECB), the Bank of England and the Bank of Japan respond.

"Just as oil prices had become in-creasingly stable, we reckon the risk for an oil price spike is now the highest since the global crisis," said Christian Keller, an economist at Barclays. "We think a further price spike of 10 to 15% from here is not implausible," he said.

Until now, falling energy prices have partly been responsible for the euro zone's low level of consumer price in-� ation, which the ECB considers to be in its "danger zone".

A rise in the in� ation rate would be welcome but economists and the In-ternational Monetary Fund believe the ECB still needs to consider U.S.-style money printing to support the bloc.

Euro zone sentiment readings and preliminary purchasing managers' sur-veys for June on Monday may give the ECB a sense of how much more help the euro zone economy needs. The re-

covery from a two-year recession lost pace in April and manufacturing has lost momentum. Germany's in� ation reading on Friday will give a taste of the euro zone-wide reading that is due the following week.

"Although higher near-term in� a-tion may reduce the likelihood of more ECB easing in the short term, lower eco-nomic growth and core in� ation down the line would, in fact, support the case for further policy accommodation at a

later date," Luigi Speranza and Gizem Kara of BNP Paribas said in a note.

EU leaders will discuss economic policy at a summit on Thursday and Friday in Brussels.

In the United States, investors will be looking to the third and � nal read-ing of US � rst-quarter GDP � gures on Wednesday to see if there is a revision of the 1% contraction already printed and which followed disappointing March trade � gures.

Federal Reserve chief Janet Yellen cited reasons for optimism about the world's biggest economy last week, in-cluding household spending and a bet-ter jobs market. Economists generally agree that the e� ects of unusually bad winter weather will fade later this year.

Core U.S. consumer prices have ris-en 2% over the last year. If the in� ation rate went much higher, it would put pressure on the Fed to consider moving to raise rates.

For now though, the impact of events in Iraq and an oil-driven in-crease in in� ation seem to be less pressing for the Fed.

Yellen said interest rates could stay "well below longer-run normal values at the end of 2016".

Some of America's largest money managers interpreted her comments as signalling that rates will remain low throughout 2016.

A speech by Federal Reserve Bank of

Philadelphia President Charles Plosser in New York on Tuesday will also be in focus.

"Following last week's Fed meeting and amid renewed concern over in� a-tion, U.S. news � ow might actually be rather sobering," said Rob Carnell, ING's chief international economist.

There is also talk of additional stim-ulus in Japan in the coming months. Japan's annual exports declined for the � rst time in 15 months in May, hurting the world's third-biggest economy just as consumption is being crimped by an increase in national sales tax.

This week, much of the focus will be on core nationwide in� ation for May and Toyko's core reading for June as well as the government's growth strat-egy, which is under discussion and may be formally decided by Friday.

The Bank of Japan's monetary stim-ulus helped weaken the yen by a � fth last year. But the currency has stabi-lised this year versus the dollar, limit-ing gains in the value of exports.

Among other big industrialised pow-ers, � rst-quarter British GDP on Friday will show a di� erent picture.

Economists polled by Reuters ex-pect growth to be revised up to 0.8 percent due to a better showing from construction.

That would bring annual growth to 3.1%, the strongest since before the start of the global � nancial crisis.

The Bank of England could become the � rst major central bank to raise in-terest rates since the crisis.

"Markets now more or less fully price in a 25 basis point rate hike by year-end, consistent with our view," Michael Saunders and Ann O'Kelly at Citi said in a note. "We expect growth will remain strong even while rates rise." l

China's wealth management products total $2.1tnn Reuters, Beijing

China's wealth management products totalled 12.8tn yuan ($2.06tn) as of the end of May, state media said, quoting the vice central bank head.

China's market of wealth manage-ment products had grown at a rate of between 60 and 80% annually for a few years before it decelerated to 30 to 40% in 2013, Pan Gongsheng said in remarks published on Xinhua news agency on Saturday.

Fuelled by savers' and companies' thirst for higher returns, China's wealth management sector has exploded in re-cent years. But the opaque nature of the sector has fed concerns about the industry's health.

Pan said the authorities would do more to ensure the value of people's

� nancial assets are preserved and in-creased, according to Xinhua.

Regulation of the wealth man-agement products market "should be strengthened to control risk andpush forward the healthy develop-ment of the sector", Pan was quoted assaying.

With China's growth expected to slow to a 24-year low of 7.3% this year, there are growing concerns about the level of risk associated with the � nan-cial sector.

In May, a deputy governor of Chi-na's central bank, Liu Shiyu, said China should reorganise its wealthmanagement industry as it is un-duly raising funding costs andencouraging savers to behave like gam-blers by chasing after lucrative short-term returns. l

NY Times top 3 paid generously given its results, size

n Reuters, New York

While the New York Times Co has shrunk by more than half in the past eight years, the compensation of the top three executives at the company has held steady. Measured against some key metrics of � nancial perfor-mance at comparable US media compa-nies, their pay is among the most gen-erous, a Reuters analysis shows.

The collective total compensation of Times Co Chairman and Publisher Ar-thur Sulzberger Jr, CEO Mark Thomp-son and Vice Chairman Michael Gold-en, including the value of stock awards and incentive payments, was $11.9m in 2013, according to the company's an-nual proxy statement.

That has not changed much over the past eight years; the top three in power at the company in 2006 received $10.9m. But when pay is looked at as a percentage of four key � nancial met-rics, Times Co is more generous than eight out of nine other media compa-nies on three or all four of the scores and is tied 2-2 with one of them, ac-cording to the Reuters analysis.

Depending on the metric, the results vary. As a percentage of revenue, Times Co's compensation is more generous than at six companies and less gener-ous than at three. But as a percentage of free cash � ow, it far outranks every

company, in many cases by a long way.The company's approach to the

compensation of its top editors has drawn attention from media pundits in recent weeks after a controversy over the ousting of Executive Edi-tor Jill Abramson by Sulzberger. This has included allegations in The New Yorker magazine last month that one of the reasons Abramson was � red was because she complained she was paid less than her male predecessor. Sulz-berger has denied her compensation was lower.

Of course, the Reuters analysis illus-trates a wider phenomenon in corpo-rate America: executive compensation tends to go up when companies expand by buying assets but rarely declines when they sell them.

Times Co said in a statement: "New York Times executives were paid ac-cording to their performance-based executive compensation program,

which was approved by the compen-sation committee and our board ofdirectors and is consistent with market practice."

Sulzberger and Golden did not re-spond to requests seeking comment. Thompson, who was previously direc-tor-general of the BBC and was hired in 2012, also did not respond.

Times Co has been making strides in recent years. Its � rst-quarter results exceeded expectations, and it now de-pends less on advertising revenue and more on readers' wallets because it now charges people to fully access its digital products. As a result, the board has reinstated a dividend after a � ve-year dry spell.

The company has shed a lot of busi-nesses, turning a sprawling media em-pire into a publisher with one major asset, the � agship newspaper. Among the assets sold were The Boston Globe newspaper and a series of TV, radio and regional newspaper holdings. That and the pressure on advertising sales have cut Times Co revenue to $1.58bn in 2013 from $3.29bn in 2006.

In its report in the Times Co's 2014 proxy statement, the board's compen-sation committee said the company had "made noteworthy progress on strategic growth initiatives intended to enhance long-term stockholder value."

Five compensation experts shown

the Reuters analysis said the Times Co's basis for deciding compensation, such as the way performance targets are set, seemed appropriate. But most of them asked whether the current size of the company meant it should con-sider either reducing the number of top executives paid at higher levels or com-pensate them less generously.

In particular, Golden's compensa-tion raised questions, given his job as head of the Times Company's human resources and modest international op-erations. That is because the top three in many companies includes the chief � nancial o� cer and/or the head of a very large division.

"The key question for the board is, 'do we need that much management in what is today a much smaller and sim-pler company?'" said Paul McConnell, managing director at executive com-pensation � rm Board Advisory.

Paul Hodgson, a compensation ex-pert at corporate governance advisory � rm BHJ Partners, said: "The levels of compensation don't seem to match the company's current size."

Both Sulzberger and Golden are members of the Ochs-Sulzberger fam-ily, which has controlled the company for more than a century. Only own-ers of "B" shares, about 90 percent of which are held by the family, are al-lowed an advisory vote on executive compensation.

The owners of the ordinary "A" shares do not get a vote, although the board's compensation committee says it does consult with signi� cant share-holders. l

'Nestle aims to double direct commodities suppliers'n Reuters

Swiss food giant Nestle aims to boost its share of direct commodity purchases to ensure it keeps a tight grip on quality and supply chains, Chairman Peter Bra-beck told an Austrian newspaper.

"The consumer now wants to know where the co� ee in the Nespresso cap-sule comes from. We want to double the ratio of commodities we buy di-rectly - so not via traders - in the years ahead, especially for co� ee and cocoa," he told Kurier.

This is "not because of the price, but rather due to quality and traceability. Of course also because the consumer demands this in the age of social me-dia," he added.

Nestle now has 670,000 farmers un-der contract, he said.

Asked if Nestle would soon do more than half its business in Asia, he said: "In terms of volume, yes, but in terms

of value, no, because of the exchange rate e� ects. China is already our sec-ond most important market after the United States." Around two-thirds of its sales in China come from brands it bought there, he said.

Brabeck said he was concerned about the emotional debate being waged over a proposed free-trade pact between Europe and the United States, saying it was time for a factual discus-sion over a deal that could give econo-mies a major boost.

"At a time that we � ght for every tenth of a percent of growth, we should at least discuss the topic objectively," he said, dismissing critics' concerns that a deal could weaken European food safety standards.

"As far as I know, no one has died in the United States from eating American products. If that is our fear then we also shouldn't go on holiday in the United States." l

Smoke rises from a oil re� nery in Baiji, north of Baghdad, in this picture taken through the windscreen of a car, June REUTERS

Arthur Sulzberger, Jr, chairman of The New York Times Company, listens at the Reuters Global Media Summit in New York REUTERS

New York Times executives were paid according to their performance-based executive compensation program, which was approved by the compensation committee and our board of directors and is consistent with market practice

The key question for the board is, 'do we need that much management in what is today a much smaller and simpler company?