The authorities would divide Dhaka into ten zones and carry out the survey on a single day to prepare the database to ascertain the exact number of beggars and their origins and reasons for begging.

The database is essential for rehabilitation of the beggars whose number is growing at a fast rate throughout the country, specially in capital Dhaka, the NFDDP chief said.
Finance ministry officials said Tk 12.47crore has already been allocated for the project titled ??Beggars Rehabilitation Programme??. Half of the project fund would be spent on survey while rest on rehabilitation.

Although there is no specific data on number of beggars in the capital and others major cities, different government agencies estimate it would be one million countrywide.
The number of beggars in the capital would be around 600,000 who are always found seeking alms at bus stands, railway stations, markets and at traffic signals.

The survey on beggars in Dhaka city would be followed by similar surveys different divisional headquarters, said officials.

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Reuters reports that with this initiative, any citizen will be allowed to file a case against polluters, and the Prime Minister’s press secretary said that offenders can be punished with jail time of up to five years and fine of half million taka (equivalent to $7,000). But because this is mostly directed towards the owners of major industries and businesses, the price that they have to pay may not affect them much.

Called the Environment Court Act 2010, if effective it could not only change practices that lead to climate change in Bangladesh, but may help save the Buriganga river found in the heartland of Dhaka, the capital of Bangladesh. This river has been endangered through pollution as it’s effectively been used as Dhaka’s sewer dump and 80% of the toxic waste poured into it is untreated.

A World Bank report claimed that Bangladesh receives 1.5 million cubic meters of waste water every day from 7,000 industrial units, and 0.5 million cubic meters a day from other sources. Putting controls on this waste may help combat the premature deaths that occur among Bangladeshi children because of pollution.

“The Cabinet gave the final approval to the draft law to help take stringent measures against the polluters of environment. Many persons took lease of vast lands in the name of rubber cultivation, but made cottage for their luxuries. Prime Minister directed concerned authorities to stop such practices,” Abul Kalam Azad, Press Secretary to the Prime Minister told journalists at a press briefing.

The mobile courts throughout the country would be in charge by the hierarchy held in Dhaka, so that anyone who has seen any misuse of land through pollution can report to the government at any time.

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…………………………………………Search result here !!!!

Both the pass percentage and the number of GPA-5 scorers have increased this year compared to that of the last year. The pass rate increased by 1.44 per cent and the number of GPA-5 scorers by 8,682. Last year 72.87 per cent students passed the HSC and equivalent examinations and 20,322 of them obtained GPA-5.

A total of 5, 36,439 examinees, out of 7, 21,941, have passed the examinations this year. Of the successful students, 2, 90,889 are boys and 2, 45,550 girls.

Some 4, 20,057 candidates, out of 5, 84,480 have passed the HSC examination under the eight general education boards with a pass percentage of 71.87 against 70.43 per cent in 2009.

Education Minister Nurul Islam Nahid Thursday disclosed the results before journalists at a press briefing in his secretariat office where chairmen of the ten education boards were present.

Education Minister Nurul Islam Nahid formally handed over the results to Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina around 9:30am.

About the increase in pass rate, Nahid said that hard studies by the students, relentless efforts by the college teachers and guardians, effective initiatives by the education boards and proper monitoring by the education ministry had contributed to the results.

Of the eight general education boards, Sylhet Board has topped the list in terms of pass-rate with 76.12 per cent students passing. Rajshahi Board is in second position with 75.43 per cent students coming out successful and Barisal Board in third position with 74.34 per cent students figuring well.

Comilla Board has become fourth with 73.13 per cent students passing while Chittagong Board is in fifth position with 72.65 per cent, Dhaka Board in sixth position with 72.10 per cent, Jessore Board in seventh position with 67.73 per cent and Dinajpur Board in eighth position with 67.54 per cent students passing.

Meanwhile, Bangladesh Madrasah Education Board has topped the list of all other boards in terms of pass percentage with 86.55 per cent students passing against 84.60 per cent last year. A total of 63,864 students out of 73,790 have passed the Alim examination.

A total of 63,671 students appeared at the examination under the Technical Education Board. Of them, 52,518 examinees have come out successful making the pass-rate 82.48 against 80.74 per cent of the last year.

Some 3,070 examinees, out of 3,857, have passed the DIBS examination-2010, held under the Dhaka Board, showing 79.60 per cent pass percentage.

A total of 25,512 examinees have obtained GPA-5 under the eight general education boards this year against 18,222 of the last year. Of them, 11,020 are under Dhaka Board, 5,602 under Rajshahi Board, 2,236 under Jessore Board, 1,814 under Dinajpur Board, 1,618 under Chittagong Board, 1,457 under Barisal Board, 1168 under Comilla Board and 597 under Sylhet Board.

A total of 2,957 students have secured GPA-5 under the Madrasah Board against 1,894 of the last year, while 202 under the Technical Education Board against 22 of the last year and 333 in the DIBS examination this year.

Some 145 students appeared at the HSC examination from five overseas centres. Of them, 120 examinees have come out successful .

At least 714 educational institutions have achieved hundred per cent success in the examinations this year. On the other hand, not a single examinee from 25 educational institutions has passed the examinations. The number of institutions securing zero pass-rate was 41 in 2009.

A total of 608 examinees were expelled from the HSC, HSC Business Management, Alim and DIBS examinations-2010, held from April 1 to May 18. The number of expelled students was 664 during the previous year.

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The elite anti-crime Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) officials said they discovered a village in southwestern Rajoir sub-district to which a bulk of such crimes all over the country are traced.

“Astonishingly, most male residents of different ages ranging from 14 to 60 of the Lundhi village appeared to be involved in extortion using mobile phones… our officers during investigations in recent months found most of the extortion suspects hailed from the single village,” Lieutenant Colonel Mamun Mahmud said.

A series of raids on Lundhi, 90 kilometres (60 miles) south of the capital Dhaka and home to 2,000 people, led to 11 arrests, including two ringleaders of gangs using mobile phones to extort money.

“We believe 80 percent of extortion-related threats made over mobile phones in Bangladesh originate from this village,” Rapid Action Battalion officer Colonel Mamum Mahmud told Media.

He said officers were “awestruck” to discover nearly everyone — from students aged 14 to elderly school janitors — was involved in mobile phone extortion.

“During calls, they identify themselves as some notorious criminal and then demand their victim send them money or face the consequences — they’ve conned a huge number of people,” Mamum said.

“It’s a very lucrative business. We have identified at least 20 groups who are involved. They have agents in the capital to collect the extorted money and gather personal information about potential targets,” he said.

Extortion using mobile phone has been a huge problem in Bangladesh since around 2001, when phone companies entered a price war and flooded the market with cheap cell phones, which were given out without proper registration.

Last year, scores of people were arrested for mobile phone extortion but successful prosecutions are rare, police say.

Approached for comments, Awami League lawmaker and Shipping Minister Shahjahan Khan, who represents a constituency where the village is located, said he too had heard of the village, the home of an estimated 2,000 people.

“Being the MP from the area I too heard about it… but not all the people there, as you said, are involved in the crime,” he said jokingly, but declined to comment further.
A number of suspects having their origin in Lundhi were arrested in the past several weeks from Dhaka as well as the village under a series of raids, he said.

Extortion using mobile phone has been a huge problem in Bangladesh since around 2001, when phone companies entered a price war and flooded the market with cheap cell phones, which were given out without proper registration.

Home Minister Sahara Khatun last week said the government planned to formulate a policy to check the rising incidents of cellphone crimes including extortion and ban its sale to youths under 18.

“We are framing a policy to be enforced in next two months to curb the crimes and misuse of cell phones,” Khatun told reporters after an inter-ministerial meeting also joined by mobile phone operators.

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Motiur Rahman Nizami, the head of Jamaat-e-Islami party, his deputy Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mujahid and top preacher Delwar Hossain Saydee were arrested in the capital Dhaka, city police chief A.K.M. Shahidul Haque said.

“They were detained after the court issued arrest warrants against them for hurting the religious sentiment of the people,” Haque told Media.

The Jamaat leaders have been charged after they claimed Nizami’s alleged persecution at the hands of the ruling Awami League was akin to the suffering of the Prophet Mohammed, Bangladesh, an Islamic Republic, has an overwhelming Muslim majority population.

Syed Rejaul Haque Chandpuri, secretary general of the Bangladesh Tarikat Federation, filed the case on March 21 with a metropolitan magistrate’s court in Dhaka against five Jamaat leaders.

The case stated that Dhaka City Jamaat-e-Islami Ameer Rafiqul Islam Khan at a discussion in Dhaka on March 17 compared Nizami to Prophet Muhammad (PBUH), which hurt the Muslims

The three leaders had been summoned to appear at a Dhaka court on Tuesday but ignored the order, which lead to an arrest warrant being issued, he said.

Jamaat-e-Islami has been the country’s largest Islamic party since it was allowed to operate and contest in elections in late 1970s. It was a part of the Islamist-allied government led by Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) in 2001-6.

Since winning a landslide in December 2008, the government has cracked down on Islamist groups, with the head of banned Islamic outfit Hizb-ut Tahrir being arrested April on charges of instigating militancy and running a banned group.

Police say Hizb-ut Tahrir is still actively trying to destabilise the government and plot attacks.

Jamaat’s top leaders have also been accused of war crimes by private groups investigating Bangladesh’s liberation war of 1971, including the killing of dozens of intellectuals during the nine-month war against Pakistan.

Jamaat leaders deny the allegations.

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The parliamentary standing committee on labour and employment also recommended taking measures to resolve all the other problems in the garments sector.

The labour minister Mosharraf Hossain informed the committee Thursday that a tripartite meeting involving the ministry, garments unit-owners and workers’ representatives is likely to be held Sunday or Monday.

The meet will discuss the ongoing unrest in the sector, Israfil Alam, chief of the parliamentary body, told The Daily Star newspaper.

As many as 50,000 to 60,000 garment industry workers have been booked for violence over the last weekend in Ashulia, a suburban industrial township on the outskirts of the national capital.

Four cases were lodged at the Ashulia police station by Wednesday evening — one was against 50,000 to 60,000 unnamed people while two were against 180 people on the charge of attacking factories and one against 200 unnamed people.

About the case filed against such a large number of people, New Age quoted the Ashulia police officer-in-charge, Sirajul Islam, as saying: ‘We have taken the decision to avert further unrest in the area.’

The area’s 250 garments units resumed work Wednesday following assurance of protection from the government.

The private garments sector is Bangladesh’s top foreign exchange earner. It netted $12 billion in 2009.

The latest round of violent protests was triggered over wage dispute. The workers want Taka 5,000 ($86) as minimum wage, while the employers are not willing to pay beyond Taka 1,600.

The garments sector has witnessed recurring violence in Bangladesh where wages are low and working conditions are poor for an estimated three million workers, mostly women.

A global survey by the Vienna-based International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), released here last week, has said that the Bangladeshi workers in this sector are ‘world’s most poorly paid’ and that their exploitation was ‘on the rise’

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All recommendations find place on gazette notification; fate depends on implementation

“The government had announced the DAP (Detailed Area Plan) for the capital Dhaka to prevent flooding and ease the traffic congestion in the city…this will require us to reclaim about 3,000 acres of land from the real estate companies,” a spokesman of the regulatory Rajdhani Unnayan Kartripakkha (RAJUK) told Media.

He added that they would launch a campaign to reclaim the land marked as flood flow zone and agricultural land in and around Dhaka while out of the total 590 square miles of jurisdiction area in the area plan, 33.35 per cent was kept for urban and rural residential and mixed purposes, which were expected to house 18.53 million people by 2015.

Several real estate companies, however, already raised high-rise residential projects involving crores while several hundred of such plots have already been sold despite media campaigns against land grabbing for unplanned projects exposing Dhaka, the home of an estimated 10.5 million people, to notorious traffic jams and water logging during monsoon rains.

According to earlier newspaper reports several of the housing project areas were occupied also by ruling Awami League leaders.

The Daily Star newspaper, however, feared that despite Tuesday’s government gazette notification approving DAP certain errant land development projects were likely to remain unscathed due to “legal loopholes”.

Quoting the government high-ups, the report said the authorities might need to take a softer stance in certain cases as the Town Improvement Act, Wetland Conservation Act, and DAP itself provide chances of appeal for violators, and discretionary authority for government high officials.

State-minister for public works and housing Abdul Mannan, who earlier declared a crusade against land grabbers calling real estate companies as “land pirates” told the newspaper that the government might need to accept “violations in certain cases”.

“But we will enforce the law sternly in the worst cases of violation,” he added. Such acceptance of errant land use will be considered only in greater public interest, said RAJUK chief Nurul Huda.

RAJUK officials said the DAP followed a principle in identifying the agricultural land, flood flow zones, water bodies and water retention ponds under a 1997 structural plan for the city.

They said several government establishments like Gazipur upazila or sub-district headquarters, Keraniganj upazila headquarters, Sonakanda BSCIC Industrial Area, Dhaka City Corporations dump at Baliarpur and Bhurulia REB office would also need to be relocated to free the flood flow zones

The committee also recommended stopping creation of a proposed military training ground for 14 Shatantra Engineering Brigade in Keranigaj, as the site is in a flood flow zone.

The private housing projects in flood flow zones recommended for abandonment are Modhumoti Model Town, Eastern Mayakanon, Advanced Angel City, Ashulia Model Town, Dhaka Udyan, Bashundhara Riverview in Keraniganj, New Uttara Model Town, BDDL Natundhara, Neptune housing project, Swarnali housing project, Swadesh housing project, Probashi Polli housing project in Gazipur, Prottasha housing project in Tongi municipality area, Shotabdi housing project, and Adarsha Shikkhok Abashik project in Uttarkawndiya. Some of these projects are not even approved.

The projects which were taken up after Dhaka’s master plan had been approved, but do not affect flood flow zones, the environment, and the livelihoods of local people will be allowed to remain untouched under a category titled ‘overlay’.

But projects marked as non-conforming developments, have to move out over a period.

The review committee identified 2,724 light, general, heavy, and noxious industries and factories as non-conforming.

Light industries include weaving and tailoring; general are food manufacturing, textiles, leather, wood products, paper, and metal; heavy industries are manufacturers of chemical products, rubber products, ceramics, plastic, glass, steel, and pharmaceuticals; while noxious ones are dyeing, tannery, fertiliser, industrial chemicals, salt, and petroleum product manufacturers.

Of them, 709 heavy and 174 noxious industries must move out from their present locations, over a period of time, to designated industrial zones, said Prof Jahan.

The rest may remain as ‘overlay’, as those are not environmentally very hazardous, he said.

Consultants hired by Rajuk submitted a draft of DAP in 2008. But urban planners, architects, and environmentalist groups vehemently opposed it, saying, it was grossly flawed with recommendations for accommodating housing projects based on earth-filling of flood flow zones.

Following the outcry, a 17-member review committee, headed by Prof Jamilur Reza Choudhury, was formed in January last year to find out the planning anomalies in the draft. Finally the six-member committee also headed by Prof Reza made final recommendations that were incorporated in DAP.

In absence of DAP on time, the city’s topographic landscape, natural environment, wetlands, flood retention basins, and open spaces have been destroyed recklessly over the past decade, said urban planners

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Operations resumed on Wednesday at 300 garment factories outside the Bangladeshi capital after owners agreed to a pay review for workers whose protests to demand a tripling of their wages shut down the plants for a day.

Officials said most of the 200,000 employees at the plants in the Ashulia industrial zone had reported for work after owners pledged to raise wages soon. Witnesses said police and security guards were out in force in the district.

Protesters had demanded a rise in their monthly wages of 1,660, equivalent to $24, to a new minimum wage of 5,000 taka.

New wage levels, to be set at talks between workers and the government, would likely take effect from next month, said Abdus Salam Murshedy, president of the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA).

The association, which represents more than 4,500 factories employing 3.5 million workers — most of them women — said it could offer no more than 3,000 taka a month. Workers said they last received a pay rise in 2006.

Murshedy said the government had assured plant owners it would ensure security in the area.

At least 100 people were injured in clashes pitting thousands of workers against security men at Ashulia, one of the country’s major textile manufacturing areas on the outskirts of Dhaka.

Among the plants closed were factories that produce and supply goods for global brands.

Garments, Bangladesh’s biggest export, account for more than 80 percent of annual export earnings of $15 billion, according to commerce ministry

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Information Minister Abul Kalam Azad, replying to lawmakers’ queries, told the House that the new channel, styled “Sangsad Bangladesh” would begin digital terrestrial test transmission in December in Dhaka, Chittagong and Khulna.

Apart from telecasting parliamentary programmes, the new channel will also broadcast different programmes on development, reported BBC Monitoring.

Earlier, the Bangladeshi parliament passed a resolution setting up a separate television channel dedicated to broadcasting the parliamentary proceedings.

The information minister said the government is considering formulation of a time befitting policy to make private radios and television channels more neutral and pro-people.

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Local news reports say demonstrations have centred on the Ashulia manufacturing zone near Dhaka, where owners have been forced to shut all 250 garment factories after workers clashed with security forces.

At least 30 people were injured after security officials fired tear gas and rubber bullets to try to break up the crowds.

Labour unrest is also said to have taken place at another apparel hub in Kanchpur where export-oriented factories are located – although the BBC reports that factories in the Export Processing Zone are still working.

Pay and working conditions in factories in Bangladesh have long been a source of concern, with protestors calling for basic pay to be raised to BDT5,000 (US$72) a month to enable workers to meet their living needs including food, shelter, clothes, education, health care and transport.

Currently, most workers earn just BDT1,662 (US$24) per month – the national minimum wage set by the government back in 2006.

But for many, the situation is thought to be even more desperate. Not only have workers had to face rising inflation over the past four years, but factories have cut wages by 20-30% in a bid to compete for orders with countries such as Vietnam, China and India.

And unskilled workers in the garment sector are even worse off, receiving just BDT800 (US$11.5) a month and often forced to work 14-16 hours a day.

Labour groups also claim that in many cases salaries are not paid on time, with delays of up to two months to receive their pay cheques.

Bangladesh has also been criticised for in the most recent annual survey of trade union rights by the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC).

“The lifting of the state of emergency raised hopes of an improvement in the situation for the Bangladesh trade union movement and better economic conditions for workers, but nothing has changed in practice,” the report says.

It adds: “Six garment workers were killed in attacks by the police or company security guards during strikes or protests linked to wage demands.”

Officials from the country’s Ministry of Labour and Employment and Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA) in April told just-style they were ironing out a deal to increase worker wages – although no details were given about the scale of the rise or when it would be introduced.

Pressure for change is also coming from global retailers, including Walmart, Gap Inc and H&M, who in February urged the Bangladeshi Prime Minister to take “swift action” over low garment worker wages which they fear could taint their reputations as socially responsible companies.

Garments are Bangladesh’s biggest export, with some 4,000 garment factories employing 2m people and accounting for more than 80% of annual export earnings worth $15bn.

But Amin Haque, president of the National Garment Workers’ Federation (NGWF), predicts that further labour unrest is inevitable unless the government takes action to raise the national minimum wage to levels that ensure decent standards of living for workers.

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