An in-depth study of the impact of radiation emanating from cellphone towers on human health and environment is yet to be conducted in the country, even though the number of cellphone towers established by different operators has increased significantly in the last few years, following the expansion of mobile networks on a large
Other Headlines
MKA replaces Shahara
Cabinet put through major reshuffle With only a year left in her government’s tenure, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina yesterday reshuffled the cabinet in an apparent bid to reshape an administration plagued with a number of problems. The shake-up came following the induction of seven new members in her council of ministers last Thursday. It saw ... Read more
26kg ‘heroin’ seized at Dhaka airport
Customs officials yesterday seized a consignment of 26.2 kilograms of powder, preliminarily detected as heroin, at the export cargo village of Shahjalal International Airport. Talking to The Daily Star, Customs Commissioner Zakiya Parveen confirmed the haul. The powder was packed in eight packets, which were put in four
A friend of nature
Khurshida Begum, a young widow from Teknaf in Cox’s Bazar, has been selected for the Wangari Maathai Award 2012 for her co-management efforts and leadership in conservation of natural resources. She started her natural resource conservation activities in 2006, during the inception of Nishorgo Network, through forming a female Community Patrol Group (CPG) with 28 ... Read more
Watch city high-rises
Experts want urban plan respected For a livable Dhaka, the government must ensure that high-rises are constructed in compliance with the capital’s Detailed Area Plan (DAP) said experts at a seminar yesterday. Authorities should permit a site to construct a high-rise only after taking into account the DAP, existing population density, traffic impact, utility service ... Read more
Value inflated abnormally
Hall-Mark’s Mortgaged Land Value inflated abnormally Savar police, admin always turned a deaf ear to complaints of land-grabbing against Hall-Mark in Janata Housing project The controversial Hall-Mark Group now claims an abnormally inflated price for the 47 acres of land it has mortgaged to Sonali Bank for the Tk 2,686-crore loan it has taken using ... Read more
2 top passport men involved
MRP Pilferage 2 top passport men involved Finds probe; 11 MRP project staff still in hiding A probe pointed finger at 13 people, including two passport office high-ups, for the pilferage of machine readable passports (MRP) at Agargaon office. The names of Major Mohammad Shariful Islam, an assistant director of MRP project, and Mohammad Abdullah ... Read more
No, thanks!
Tofail, Menon decline to be ministers; MK Alamgir, Inu, 5 little-known others take oath Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina yesterday expanded her council of ministers by inducting seven new members — most of them little known public figures except for Mohiuddin Khan Alamgir and Hasanul Haque Inu — with many wondering about the reasons behind the ... Read more
Strong signal sent out
Tofail Ahmed and Rashed Khan Menon’s negative response to the offer of berths in the cabinet is a clear hint of a lack of confidence in the Awami League’s style of governance. A similar notion came from the Jatiya Party (JP) four to five months ago, when the Awami League offered to make JP chief ... Read more
Migration Cost for KL: Tk 40,000 a worker
Media told after discussion with Malaysian minister Bangladeshi workers will have to spend a maximum of Tk 40, 000 each for jobs in Malaysia that resumes recruitment under state arrangements in a few months, ending a nearly four-year ban. “This is an indicative cost that would not be more than Tk 30, 000 to 40,000,” ... Read more
Cabinet expanded to appease rebels: BNP
The acting secretary general of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party, Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir, on Thursday said the cabinet had been expanded in a bid to ‘contain rebellion’ in the Awami League-led alliance government. Talking with reporters at the graveside of Ziaur Rahman, he said the government’s days
More time needed to file cases against bank officials, Tanvir: Sonali MD
Sonali Bank managing director Pradip Kumar Dutta on Thursday said that the bank needed more time to file criminal cases against some of its officials and Hallmark Group’s managing director and chairman in connection with swindling of more than Tk 3,606 crore from the bank. The bank has already appointed two lawyers and continued the ... Read more
The 7 new ministers
Of the seven new faces in the council of ministers, five are lesser-known figures as they are either local level leaders or relatively new in politics. Ministers AH Mahmood Ali and Mostafa Faruque Mohammad joined politics after they retired from the foreign service more than a decade ago. They were elected lawmakers for the first ... Read more
Bail cancelled, bail reinstated
5 Destiny High-ups Bail cancelled, bail reinstated After a Dhaka Court judge Wednesday cancelled bail of five Destiny Group officials accused of money laundering, another judge of the court in a surprising move granted them bail yesterday. And this too came after another anomaly. On August 6, the Chief Metropolitan Magistrate’s (CMM) Court gave bail ... Read more
Sultana describes Ghulam Azam’s role in ’71 as like as Hitler
Rights activist Sultana Kamal on Thursday compared Jamaat’s former amir Ghulam Azam’s role during the War of Independence in 1971 with that of infamous dictator Adolf Hitler in Germany before and during the Second World War. Sultana made the above statement in the International Crimes Tribunal-1 during
Al-Badr was a half-secret organisation: Shahriyar
Writer and journalist Shahriyar Kabir, the first prosecution witness against Jamaat’s detained secretary general Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mojaheed, on Thursday told the International Crimes Tribunal-2 that Al-Badr was a half-secret organization during the War of Independence in 1971. ‘No name of any Al-Badr bigwig was published in 1971 as it was a half-secret bahini,’ said
NBR freezes 3 mobile co accounts
The National Board of Revenue on Thursday put a freeze on bank accounts of three mobile operators—Robi, Banglalink and Citycell—for not paying Tk 393.49 crore as supplementary duties and value added tax on SIM and RIM card sales, a senior NBR official said. The large taxpayers unit (LTU-VAT) of NBR sent a letter to all ... Read more
Road bridge, if need be
PM tells JS on Padma project funding Expressing her government’s firm determination to construct the Padma bridge, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina yesterday told parliament that if better funding was not available, the government would build only the road bridge, excluding rail facilities, with its own money in the interest of quick construction. “We picked a ... Read more
Hallmark laundered Tk 1,000cr
The Anti-Corruption Commission has found that the Hallmark Group had laundered Tk 1,000 crore illegally by using at least 50 bank accounts in the last three years, an ACC official told New Age on Tuesday. He said that the group’s 18 companies used at least 30 local public and private as well as foreign banks ... Read more
Sonali Bank to file case against its officials, Hallmark MD
Sonali Bank management will file criminal cases in a day or two against some of its officials and Hallmark Group managing director and chairman in connection with swindling of more than Tk 3,606 crore from the bank, a top official of the bank told New Age on Tuesday. ‘We have already made the first information ... Read more