Headlines

The first swine flu death officially confirmed Monday and refusal of designated hospitals to do initial diagnosis caused a wave of panic among people with cold and fever and left them in confusion over where to go, patients and relatives said. A 35-year woman died at the city’s private hospital, LabAid Sunday night and the ... Read more

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina yesterday ordered to formulate separate time schedule for schools, markets, offices and banks with a view to easing the nagging traffic jam in the capital. ” Prime Minister gave the necessary directives to set up new separate time tables for schools, markets, offices and banks to ease traffic congestion in the ... Read more

The government has increased land prices in all city corporations and district towns manifold for the next three years while it lowered the land tax, registration and other fees for the same period, Law minister Shafique Ahmed said yesterday. Briefing newsman at his office the minister said the land prices have shot up two and ... Read more

Cabinet abolishes pry scholarship exams Students of class V will have to face a public examination like SSC exams from this year as the cabinet on Monday endorsed the plan to improve the quality of education right from the elementary level. Centrally controlled by the Directorate of Primary Education, the public examination will mark the ... Read more

Khaleda Zia Ziaur Rahman entered into the political arena, incidentally. But his arrival was inevitable. His coming was necessitated by the demands of the nation and the time to fill the void in the leadership. His did not come to join politics through any tortuous path by means of conspiracy in the dark, but his ... Read more

S Asian climate conference calls for fighting together to minimise risks The glaciers of the Himalayas are melting faster than anywhere else changing its ecosystem and causing grave concerns for the region, said the speakers at the South Asian Climate Change Conference in Kathmandu, Nepal. The Himalayas, widely known as the water tower of the ... Read more

Wildlife board suggests govt reduce number to two-thirds; hunting seen as option The Wildlife Advisory Board of the government has suggested downsizing the deer population at Nijhum Dwip to two-thirds as their number in the sanctuary has risen disproportionately to over 15,000 considering the island’s landscape. Now, what comes as a bad news for the ... Read more

The number of bed for cardiac treatment is only one per 1.5 lakh people in the country, according to a statistic of the Bangladesh Cardiac Society. There are only 1,000 beds for cardiac patients both at private and public facilities in the country where about 75 percent people are at risk of the fatal disease, ... Read more

At least 28 people were diagnosed with anthrax in Pabna after consuming beef infected with the Bacillus anthracis, according to IEDCR. ‘Twenty patients were clinically diagnosed with anthrax in Pabna,’ Mahmudur Rahman, director of the Institute of Epidemiology Disease Control and Research (IEDCR), told New Age Monday. ‘There was no casualty and the

A record 54 women won seats in Japan’s weekend election but female parliamentary representation still remains low by developed world standards at 11 per cent, results showed Monday. The opposition Democratic Party scored a historic win over the long-ruling Liberal Democratic Party in Sunday’s vote fielding a high-profile group of female candidates to take on ... Read more

Donors favour plantation of foreign species; locals keep trust in natural forest The Department of Forest is apparently depleting the Madhupur Sal Forest through implementation of different donor-funded afforestation projects, which mainly plant exotic trees of commercial value. The majority of the donor-funded projects in the past or the projects the government and development partners ... Read more

Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP) yesterday launched a special drive “Operation Clean Street” in the city in a bid to ease traffic congestion during the holy month of Ramzan. On the other hand due to the operation clean street the small number of passenger laden vehicles were on the streets putting the home bound people before ... Read more

Essentials’ prices remain unchanged The prices of ingredients used for making iftar items went up yesterday, the first day of Ramadan, while the prices of most essentials remained unchanged at city’s kitchen markets. The prices of aubergine, chickpea and puffed rice continued to rise while the prices of green chilli and vegetables witnessed a fresh ... Read more

It seeks names of bigwigs who got govt plots abusing power The parliamentary (JS) standing committee on public undertakings has observed that the Rajdhani Unnayan Kortripakkho (RAJUK-the capital city development authority) has no transparency in its activities and directed the organisation to report within six months on measures on removal of irregularities in it. The ... Read more

The flood situation of the country excepting the northeastern districts may deteriorate in the next two to three days, according sources in the Flood Forecasting and Warning Centre (FFWC). Sources said the flood situation has started improving in the northern districts gradually but the prevailing flash flood situation in the north-eastern districts may

The High Court (HC) yesterday extended its earlier order by four months staying the government’s notice that asked BNP chief Khaleda Zia to hand over her cantonment house to the military estate office by June 30. The HC bench, comprising Justice Syed Refat Ahmed and Justice Moyeenul Islam Chowdhury passed the order following an extension ... Read more

The current swine flu situation in Bangladesh does not require that educational institutes be shut, the education minister said yesterday, a day after two private schools in Dhaka announced their closures as a precautionary measure. Two of the city’s top English-medium schools-Scholastica and Sunbeams-announced they were suspending their academic activities for an indefinite period from ... Read more

Ashraf on 15-day vacation Mahbubul Alam Hanif, who was not much known to the party leaders even a month ago, is now the acting general secretary of Awami League as Syed Ashraful Islam left for UK on Saturday for a 15-day vacation. Ashraf, also the LGRD and cooperatives minister, will return home on September 5 ... Read more

Country’s Readymade Garment (RMG) sector may face labour unrest during the month of Ramzan over the workers’ demands including payment of festival bonus and arrears, industry owners apprehends. They alleged that instead of minimising labour unrest some members of the present parliament and also Ministers are fuelling the illogical anger of the workers pushing the ... Read more

Iran yesterday accused Argentina of meddling in its domestic affairs after the south American country expressed outrage at the nomination of a man wanted for a 1994 bombing to be the next defence minister. “The positions taken by Argentine officials obviously amount to meddling in the domestic affairs of the Islamic Republic and we strongly ... Read more