Dhaka Mirror

Majority of orphans head towards uncertain life in inadequate and substandard orphanages amid negligence of the government resulting in involvement of a section of them in crime and religious militancy. There are more than 100 orphanages in Dhaka and outskirts most of which cannot provide inmates with required food, clothes, education and shelter due to ... Read more

Buddha Purnima, the biggest religious festival of the Buddhist community, will be celebrated across the country today with due religious fervour. The occasion marks three most important events in the life of Buddha — his advent, enlightenment and nirvana — about 2,500 years back. On this day in 563 BC, Buddha was born as Siddhartha ... Read more

Roundtable thrashes industrialists for mindless river contamination, seeks immediate actions to save waters Industries got a whacking yesterday as experts and environmentalists maintained that rivers around Dhaka are getting polluted wholesale by industrial waste. Even industries with effluent treatment plants do not run those facilities. The capital’s sewage is also mostly untreated and dumped into ... Read more

After rescinding 5th amendment to the constitution four principles of independence including secularism will be retrieved without deleting “bismillah” from it. At a press briefing Law Minister Shafique Ahmed clarified the position of the government amid protest by BNP and its ally Jamaat concerning detrimental effect of 5th amendment saying that “Former BNP law minister ... Read more

Malaysia is set to lift the ban on some 55,000 Bangladeshi jobseekers waiting for jobs there, said the expatriates’ welfare and overseas employment minister, Khandakar Mosharraf Hossain, on Thursday. The Malaysian government on March 10 cancelled the visas of more than 55,000 Bangladeshi workers on the plea of the adverse impact of the global economic ... Read more

Stress govt-opposition partnership in parliament to deal with important issues European envoys here Thursday expressed cautious optimism in appraising the performance of the new government, stressing the need for government-opposition partnership in parliament to deal with important issues like impacts of the global recession, climate change and counterterrorism. Nine European Ambassadors and High Commissioners came ... Read more

Finance Minister AMA Muhith on Thursday said the ADB will provide US$ 200 million to Bangladesh under the next fiscal ‘as special budgetary support’ to pull the economy out of the impact of the global recession. It will be in addition to existing budgetary support programmes to be funded under different projects and development schemes ... Read more

Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) is in confusion whether it will go for tougher movement against the government before party reconstruction. After 29th December election debacle, the party is yet to reorganize politically. In this situation many senior leaders are thinking whether it will able to carry on movement or not. The party has started month-long ... Read more

The High Court (HC) yesterday declared illegal the detention of former deputy speaker Akhtar Hamid Siddiqui. The court also asked the government to release him immediately if he is not wanted in any other case. Upon a writ petition filed by his daughter Faria Tajeen Siddiqui with the HC challenging the legality of the detention ... Read more

The law minister, Shafique Ahmed, and the LGRD and cooperatives minister, Syed Ashraful Islam, on Thursday declined comments on lawmen’s carrying out extrajudicial killing even after government assurance to stop such incidents. A man was killed in the ‘crossfire’ with the Rapid Action Battalion in Dhaka early Wednesday only a day after the ruling party ... Read more

The 148th birth anniversary of Nobel laureate poet Rabindranath Tagore will be celebrated across the country today. The government and socio-cultural organisations have taken up elaborate programmes to celebrate the great poet’s birthday. President Zillur Rahman and Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina have given special messages highlighting the colourful life of the poet and his contributions ... Read more

Today is the World Red Crescent Day and Red Cross Day 2009. This day will be observed in Bangladesh like other countries. A joint statement from the presidents of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies Juan Manuel Suarez Del Toro and the International Committee of the Red Cross Jakob Kellenberger was ... Read more

One lighterage ship sank in the waters of Bay of Bengal when another ship hit  the lighterage ship at the outer anchorage of Chittagong Port at 8.30 am this morning. Sources said, Titu-9, a lighterage ship loaded with 900 MT cement clinker was coming to the jetty of Chittagong port from the outer anchorage at ... Read more

Untreated waste from DEPZ pollutes waters, farmlands since 1983; no CETP installed yet; around 2 lakh people exposed to serious health risk Untreated liquid wastes from Dhaka Export Processing Zone (DEPZ) have been polluting the Bangshi river and other water bodies around, putting around two lakh people of 12 villages in the area into tremendous ... Read more

Medicine Purchase, Foreign Trips Sircar spent Tk 1 crore for non-existing MPs In spite of the absence of parliament, former speaker Jamiruddin Sircar spent over Tk 1 crore in the last two years for purchasing medicines for non-existing lawmakers and sending parliamentary delegations abroad. Of the amount Tk 54 lakh was spent for purchasing medicines ... Read more

A Dhaka court yesterday sent Jatiya Party (JP-Manju) chairman and former communications minister Anwar Hossain Manju and former state minister for law and BNP leader Barrister Shahjahan Omar to jail when they surrendered before the trial court in connection with separate graft cases. Both Manju and Omar, who were convicted in absentia in separate cases ... Read more

BNP secretary general Khandker Delwar Hussain has said the parliamentary probe committee has been formed without any legal procedure and it has no right to summon the former members of the parliament (MPs). “The parliamentary committee has no legal right to summon the former MPs. It is a violation of parliamentary discipline. In fact, the ... Read more

JAN 22 UPAZILA POLLS Irregularities found in 5 of 8 upazilas so far Eight judicial inquiry committees out of the 16 formed to investigate alleged irregularities in the January 22 polls to upazila parishads have submitted reports to the Election Commission till Wednesday recommending re-elections in some polling centres of five upazilas. The five upazilas ... Read more

2001 post-poll violence The High Court (HC) yesterday directed the government to form an inquiry commission within two months to probe the 2001 post-elections violence that included killing, rape, attack, looting and assault on minorities and opposition workers. The HC also asked the authorities to submit the inquiry report within six months of the formation ... Read more