Archive for December 18th, 2007
Tuesday, December 18th, 2007The cabinet purchase committee yesterday approved purchase of 74,000 tonnes of rice and 33,000 tonnes of wheat at higher prices, reflecting the upward trend of their prices in the international market.The government's purchase price of rice per kg will be Tk 26.77 to Tk 27.95 and wheat Tk 31.68 to Tk 31.88. The procurement will cost the government Tk 203 crore for rice and Tk 101 crore for wheat.The purchase committee also reviewed proposals for seven rental power projects with a total production capacity of 250 megawatt, and a rehabilitation project for two existing hydropower units of 100 MW capacity. ...
(read more) Tuesday, December 18th, 2007A suspected Islamist militant was killed while two Rapid Action Battalion (Rab) personnel suffered bullet wounds in over an hour-long encounter between the elite crime fighting force and the suspects at Maddhya Badda in the capital early yesterday.After trading over 100 rounds of bullets with the suspects, Rab arrested one of them.The arrestee, Al Beruni alias Sabuj alias Rony, 22, claimed himself as an organiser of a quite unknown Islamist group, Islamic Dal, sources said.Siddiqur Rahman, owner of the house where the gun battle took place, told The Daily Star that he heard Rony telling Rab members after being ...
(read more) Tuesday, December 18th, 2007A freedom fighter yesterday accused Jamaat-e-Islami Amir Matiur Rahman Nizami, Secretary General Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mojaheed and seven of their party men of killing two freedom fighters during the liberation war.Mozaffar Ahmad Khan, Dhaka district unit Muktijoddha commander, filed the murder case, stating that the Jamaat men killed his nephew Osman Gani and fellow freedom fighter Golam Mostafa alias Tukub Ali on November 25 in 1971.Meantime, another Dhaka court will give order today on whether to approve of registering a sedition case against Mojaheed, Abdul Quader Mollah and Shah Mohammad Hannan, former chairman of Islami Bank, as a regular one.On ...
(read more) Tuesday, December 18th, 2007Robbers killed a Rupali Bank manager and looted Tk 15 lakh from him at Garadia under Singair upazila in Manikganj yesterday.Moniruzzaman Khan, manager of the bank's Baira branch in Singair, was carrying the money to Baira from Manikganj on a rented motorcycle. The robbers on two motorbikes waylaid the banker at around 9:30am and fired twice on him.They fled the scene after looting the bag containing the money.Locals took Moniruzzaman to Singair Sadar hospital from where the doctors send him to Manikganj Sadar Hospital at around 12 noon. Here the attending doctor pronounced him dead on arrival.Doctors found ...
(read more) Tuesday, December 18th, 2007The Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) has started collecting information regarding corruption in various service-oriented institutions.ACC Director General (administration) Col Hanif Iqbal during a routine press briefing at the ACC headquarters yesterday confirmed the ACC move taken as part of its drive to root out institutional corruption.Meanwhile, the ACC approved the filing of three cases against three people including one against former home minister Altaf Hossain Choudhury in connection with amassing wealth illegally and concealing wealth information in the statement submitted to the commission.The drive is the first ever initiative by the anti-corruption body in combating institutional corruption."The ACC ...
(read more) Tuesday, December 18th, 2007The Election Commission (EC) is planning to form its own panel of lawyers comprising eminent jurists to defend the commission in courts of law when its activities and decisions on electoral affairs will be challenged."We don't have our own lawyers. We depend on government lawyers whenever we need any legal services. So we are planning to make our own lawyers' panel, like the Anti-Corruption Commission had formed," Election Commissioner Brig Gen (retd) M Sakhawat Hussain told reporters yesterday at his office.He said the EC has already appointed eminent jurist Dr Kamal Hossain to defend the commission regarding the case ...
(read more) Tuesday, December 18th, 2007The complainant, who lodged the case against teachers and students of Dhaka University (DU) for breaching emergency power rules (EPR), during hearing of the case yesterday did not specify who violated the rules.Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Golam Rabbani recorded the deposition of the complainant Sergeant Shawkat Ahmed of Nilkhet police camp as the trial of the case began yesterday. Defence lawyers of one of the accused, Prof Neem Chandra Bhowmik, also cross-examined the complainant.On August 22, the case was filed against some 6,000 unnamed students and teachers of DU and outsiders for violating the EPR, vandalising public and ...
(read more) Tuesday, December 18th, 2007The three nationalised commercial banks (NCBs), converted to public limited companies recently, have so far managed to achieve only 21 percent of this year's target of recovering loans shirked by the top 20 defaulters.During the same period, the first nine months, they have attained 68 percent of the target for other defaulters.The banks--Sonali, Agrani and Janata--have trouble recovering the money from the defaulters since they can easily take out court orders to halt the loan recovery drives, observed bank officials at a meeting with the Bangladesh Bank (BB) governor yesterday.First of its kind since the NCBs were turned into ...
(read more) Tuesday, December 18th, 2007A Dhaka court yesterday issued arrest warrants against Jatiya Party (JP-Manju) Chairman Anwar Hossain Manju, his wife Tasmima Hossain and his cousin Mahmud Hossain in cases filed for taking Tk 1.75 crore bribe from two construction companies.Meantime, Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) pressed charges against detained former chief forest conservator Osman Gani and his wife Mohsen Ara Gani in a case filed for amassing wealth through illegal means.CASE AGAINST MANJU Judge Mohammad Azizul Haque of the Metropolitan Sessions Judge's Court issued arrest warrants against Manju and other two following the prayer of investigation officers (IOs) of the cases.The court passed the order ...
(read more) Tuesday, December 18th, 2007Khaleda Zia-appointed BNP Secretary General Khandaker Delwar Hossain yesterday said it is not possible to hold a meaningful election and create a congenial political atmosphere for this keeping the leaders of two major political parties in jail.Demanding release of political leaders and withdrawal of emergency, he asked the government to handover power to elected representatives of the people by holding a free and fair election without delay.Delwar was presiding over a discussion in observance of the Victory Day organised by the BNP at Engineers' Institution in the capital.Blasting the chief election commissioner (CEC) for his recent remarks on ...
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