Sunday, July 20, 2025

Uninterrupted power for industries at Tk 15 a unit

The Bangladesh Energy Regulatory Commission (BERC) has fixed up the rate of electricity for “Q” categories (for industry) at Taka 13.88 to TK 14.99 per unit on Monday. The ‘Q’ category consumers will get uninterrupted electricity for 24 hours and initially the distributing agencies will provide connection only to the industries. “We create the new ... Read more

Malaysia submits concept proposal

Padma Bridge Project Malaysia submits concept proposal The government intends to sign the final agreement with Malaysia within a couple of months on the proposed Padma bridge project, said the communications minister yesterday after his meeting with a visiting delegation. A 26-member delegation, led by Malaysian Prime Minister’s Special Envoy Dato Seri S Samy Vellu, placed ... Read more

Cyber crimes take their toll

Destroy young lives, break families Cyber crime is on the rise across the country, destroying young lives, breaking families and increasing the number of incidents of fraud, under the very nose of the ministry concerned. Although, the government has enacted the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Act 2009 that stipulated “a maximum punishment of up ... Read more

Pay tax online

Anybody with a debit or credit card and internet access can pay tax from home, instead of queuing for hours at a bank. The National Board of Revenue (NBR) yesterday introduced an online tax payment system at a function at Bangabandhu International Conference Centre in Dhaka. Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina first paid her advance income tax ... Read more

Risky living at hill slopes

Authorities yet to take any effective action to remove houses from Ctg hills despite fatal landslides every monsoon Though monsoon is knocking on the door, the authorities concerned have yet to take any effective step to evacuate thousands of people living on the slopes of hills in Chittagong city with the risk of being victims ... Read more

Minister, Baira at loggerheads

KL Recruitment Right Minister, Baira at loggerheads Expatriates’ Welfare Minister Khandker Mosharraf Hossain yesterday turned down the private recruiting agencies’ demand for allowing them to recruit workers for jobs in Malaysia. “I told Baira leaders that we shall initially send workers to Malaysia at government level. Gradually, when the system is streamlined, we will leave ... Read more

US slates killings, torture by lawmen

HR Report on Bangladesh US slates killings, torture by lawmen The US government yesterday denounced the Bangladesh government over the latter’s “most significant” human rights problems, including killing and torture by security forces and their abuses that are responsible for disappearances and custodial deaths. “An increasingly politicised judiciary exacerbated problems in an already overwhelmed

Catching up with time

Ctg’s giant commodity hub Khatunganj tune itself to tech Chittagong city’s bustling commodity hub Khatunganj, which has given birth to a number of well-known local conglomerates such as Partex Group, Abul Khair Group, PHP Group and TK Group, is changing. Large and medium commodity market leaders are hiring trained executives in top and mid level ... Read more

I ducked death several times

Everest conqueror Nishat tells from base camp; Wasfia waits for final push for the summit “I was close to losing my life several times. One time I was swept around 30 metres away from my tracks and almost into a crevasse.” Nishat Majumder–the first Bangladeshi woman to scale Mount Everest–described her brush with death during ... Read more

16 wholesale shops fined

Chemicals in Fruits 16 wholesale shops fined Three mobile courts yesterday fined 16 wholesale fruit shops Tk 58,000 for selling adulterated fruits. The courts also destroyed 18,000kg of chemical-soaked mangoes and several thousand bananas from those shops. Dhaka district administration and Bangladesh Standards and Testing Institution (BSTI) jointly conducted the drives at fruit markets in Jatrabari, Mirpur ... Read more

Bapex finds oil in abandoned fields

The state-run energy exploration company, Bapex, has found extractable and economically viable oil in two oilfields abandoned two decades ago. The oilfields in Sylhet are able to produce at least 55 million barrels of oil, which could meet the country’s total demand for petroleum for more than two years, officials

1,000 multimedia classrooms start journey

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina yesterday said the country had made good progress in its efforts towards building ‘Digital Bangladesh’ during the last three years as pledged in the ruling party’s election manifesto. “We’ve achieved many successes to this end,” she said, while inaugurating through videoconferencing from her office the multimedia classrooms and digital academic contents ... Read more

Tourism in a shambles

Beautiful Patenga beach blighted by jungle of makeshift stalls, horde of aggressive vendors Although Patenga beach has been attracting thousands of tourists everyday for decades, it does not yet have the suitable infrastructure to help flourish tourism. The beautiful beach, located at the confluence of Karnaphuli River, is only 14 kilometres from the port city ... Read more