SECOND EDITION

LATIF SIDDIQUE RESIGNS FROM PARLIAMENT PAGE 3

TOP COURT QUESTIONS LEGALITY OF SECTION 57 PAGE 32

INTERNET SUBSCRIBERS CROSS 50M MARK PAGE 15

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015 | Bhadro 18, 1422, Zilqad 17, 1436 | Regd No DA 6238, Vol 3, No 139 | www.dhakatribune.com | 32 pages | Price: Tk10

n Abu Bakar Siddique

It took Sajjad Talukdar six hours – from 11am to 5pm – by bus to reach Azimpur from Uttara, a journey that does not usually take more than two hours even on a busy working day given Dhaka’s heavy tra� c.

When he reached Mohakhali around 2pm, which was about halfway through the jour-ney, the idea of getting o� the bus and walking came across his mind. But he decided against it when he saw the road ahead submerged in several feet of water. Even the pavements were under water.

IT professional Shakib Ari� n started from in front of the British Council on Dhaka Uni-versity campus at 1pm and reached his home in Mirpur area at 7pm yesterday. Usually, this journey should not take more than an hour.

Shakib’s journey began on a CNG autorick-shaw but had to change vehicles four times – all of them rickshaws thereafter to cover the 10km distance in six hours.

The Met o� ce recorded 61 millimetres of rain in Dhaka city yesterday. It was not an all-day a� air – it started as a drizzle before 12 noon, came down incessantly as heavy down-pour over the next hour.

In that one hour, the Met o� ce recorded 42mm rainfall, which they said was not en-tirely unusual for Dhaka.

But thanks to the crumbling drainage sys-tem in the country’s capital, almost entire

PAGE 2 COLUMN 1

Rain accelerates � ood crisisn Abu Bakar Siddique

The frequent spells of rain which began on Sunday night across the country, especially the northern and northeastern districts, have accelerated the � ood crisis and are causing massive damage to crops.

The � ood situation is expected to deterio-rate over the next two days while the low-ly-ing areas of the capital might get � ooded gradually, said the Flood Forecasting and Warning Centre yesterday.

“In the next 48 hours, the overall � ood sit-uation in the north, central and northeastern parts of the country may deteriorate,” said Md Arifuzzaman Bhuiyan, the on-duty forecast-ing o� cer at the centre.

He added that the low-lying areas of Dhaka as well as Narayanganj, Dohar and Munshi-ganj might be � ooded in the next three or four days as water comes down from the Brahma-putra through the Padma.

In a bulletin yesterday, the � ood warning centre said the Brahmaputra-Jamuna were seeing a rising trend which is likely to con-

tinue for the next 72 hours. At the same time, the water level of the Ganges is likely to fall further, while the Padma water may remain steady over the next 48 hours.

In Meghna basin, the northeastern rivers are experiencing a rising trend that might con-tinue for the next 72 hours, while the rivers around Dhaka city are also seeing rising trend which may continue for the next 72 hours.

Damage to cropsThe heavy rainfall, meanwhile, continues to submerge more and more crop � elds in the � ood-a� ected zones.

On Monday, Department of Agriculture Extension said around 200,000 hectares of Aman paddy have been submerged. Yester-day, it said further areas were going under water with increasing water levels.

In a bulletin yesterday, Bangladesh Meteor-ological Department said that under the in� u-ence of the monsoon, heavy rainfall is likely to occur at places over Dhaka, Barisal, Chittagong and Sylhet divisions during the next 24 hours.

PAGE 2 COLUMN 1

An hour of heavy rain paralyses Dhaka

A physically challenged hawker holds on to his belongings, sitting in his makeshift wheelchair while his assistant, in blue shirt, pushes the wheelchair through the nearly waist-high water on Green Road in the capital yesterday. More photos on Page 5 SYED ZAKIR HOSSAIN

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

Rain accelerates � ood crisisAt the same time, the Indian Meteorologi-cal Department continued its heavy rainfall warning in Assam and Meghalaya states.

Bangladesh Water Development Board yesterday measured that 60 out of its 85 measuring stations in di� erent rivers showed rising trends of water � ow.

Of them, 26 stations in rivers Dharla, Teesta, Padma, Jamuna, Atrai, Dhaleshawri, Surma, Kushiyara and Kansha � owed above danger level – which were more than the previous day.

In addition, the met o� ce measured more than 100mm rainfall in six stations in the � ood-a� ected zones. Of them, Sylhet had 209mm of rain, Sunamganj 135mm, Cox’s Bazar 218mm, Narayonhat 172mm, Kanaighat 149mm and Chittagong district 127mm of rainfall.

Port city woesHeavy showers inundated the low-lying are-

as in Chittagong city yesterday with knee to waist-high water.

Motor vehicles were scarce on the port city streets, while commuters had to choose between paying extra for rickshaw rides or to wade through the murky waters.

According to Chittagong Met O� ce in Patenga O� ce, around 149.1mm rainfall was recorded in the city during the 24 hours since 3pm Monday.

Atiqur Rahman, meteorologist at Patenga Met O� ce, told our Chittagong correspondent that light to moderate rain or thundershow-ers accompanied by temporary gusty wind is likely to occurr at the most places in Chit-tagong over the next two or three days.

Meanwhile, Chittagong City Corporation sources said landslides and wall-collapse oc-curred at Tigerpass and Lalkhan Bazar areas, but no one was injured. l

DNCC starts demolishing illegal billboardsn Abu Hayat Mahmud

In a late night drive, Dhaka North City Corpo-ration began demolishing illegal billboards on the road from Bijoy Sarani intersection to the Chandrima Udyan.

The advertising agencies, who own the billboards, alleged that the DNCC does not have the authority to remove them because they are placed on Air Force’s property.

The drive began around 9:45pm led by DNCC Chief Executive O� cer BM Enamul Haque. Chief Waste Management O� cer Bi-pon Kumar Saha was also present.

DNCC Mayor Annisul Huq was scheduled to join the drive but he had not until � ling of this report.

Bipon Kumar said: “No one can set up billboards without the city corporation’s per-mission and therefore the billboards here are illegal...We will demolish all illegal billboards within the corporation’s jurisdiction.”

The advertising agencies on the other hand claimed that they had got the billboards’ space on lease from the Air Force. Moajjem Hossain Amirul, head of Dalas Advertisement, told re-porters: “We do not know the source of his [May-or Annisul] power... It’s a smirch for the army.”l

An hour of heavy rain paralyses Dhakacity got inundated, some places under several feet of stagnant rainwater.

The obvious consequence was a severe tra� c gridlock that brought the city to a standstill, keeping people stuck until very late in the evening.

Imtiaz Ahmed, deputy commissioner (traf-� c) of Dhaka West, said most of the areas of the city went under stagnant water which caused the severe tra� c congestion that ate up the working hours.

Things were particularly excruciating for people living or travelling on the roads in Dhanmondi, Farmgate, Green Road, Karwan Bazar, Kalabagan, Panthapath, Bijoy Sarani, New Market, Shantinagar, Rampura, Mirpur, Gulshan and Badda.

Many people were already on the road when the downpour turned heavy and they were still on the road many hours after rain stopped. They watched helplessly how the roads went under water in less than an hour and they were still stuck in the middle of no-where.

Many vehicles broke down in the middle of roads as water caught the engines, making it di� cult for the other vehicles to manoeuver their way.

Around 2:30pm, businessman Mahbub Hossain was seen pushing his car through the water on Dhanmondi Road 16.

“I remained static on the road for over an hour. Then my car broke down as water got

into the engine. Now, I am pushing the car to a nearby service centre. I do not know if I would ever be able to reach there,” he said while pushing his car.

For years, Dhaka did not have a mayor; now there are two – Annisul Huq for Dhaka North City Corporation and Sayeed Khokhon for south. But none of them received calls from the Dhaka Tribune yesterday; they could

not be reached in any other way either.The two had, however, heavily cam-

paigned their plans on resolving Dhaka’s wa-ter stagnation problem while seeking votes in the mayoral election in April this year.

Dhaka Water Supply and Sewerage Author-ity (Wasa) and the city corporations are jointly responsible for managing the city’s waste and drainage systems.

When contacted, Wasa Managing Director Taqsem A Khan refrained from talking on the issue. “I will not make any comment on that,” he said.

Shah Alam, director of Bangladesh Meteor-ological Department, told the Dhaka Tribune that 42mm rainfall in an hour can be consid-ered heavy, but this can happen at this time of year.

“Water stagnation that crippled the city was the result of the drainage system failure. The system failed to dispatch the heavy load of rainwater within a short time,” he said.

However, it is also true that this year, high monsoonal behaviour is persisting for an ex-tended period compared to normal, he said, adding that rainfall has been 40% higher than average.

The Met o� ce recorded a total of 1,810mm of rainfall all over the country yesterday.

Our Chittagong bureau has reported an al-most similar picture in the port city as well. Until 3pm yesterday, the Chittagong Met of-� ce recorded 149.1mm of rainfall.

As a result of the heavy downpour, the low-lying areas in and around the port city went under knee- to waist-high water causing severe troubles for the residents in the form of transport crisis and tra� c gridlock.

The dilapidated roads, which has been a longstanding problem for the port city dwell-ers, only added to the misery. l

For people who use the Banglamotor-Karwan Bazar road everyday, this is a very usual scene, although many other places in Dhaka yesterday experienced similar tra� c tailbacks because of water stagnation following a heavy shower around noon RAJIB DHAR

Dhaka North City Corporation evicts illegal billboards near the Bijoy Shoroni intersection in Dhaka late yesterday night MAHMUD HOSSAIN OPU

NEWS2DT

NEWS 3D

TWEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015

Latif Siddique resigns from Jatiya Sangsadn Mohammad Al-Masum Molla

Expelled Awami League leader and former minister Abdul Latif Siddique yesterday ten-dered his resignation as a lawmaker.

He said he was doing this as per the will of his leader.

He entered the house after the Maghrib prayers yesterday – the � rst day of the 10th parliament’s seventh session. Prime Minister and Leader of the House Sheikh Hasina was not present at the time.

When he asked whether he would read out the resignation letter, Speaker Shirin Sharmin

Chaudhury said there was no need for this. Earlier, he sent the letter to the Speaker

through the parliament sta� . Before that, he met the Speaker in her o� ce around 6:30pm.

“I am a Muslim. I am a Bangali. I belong to the Awami League. Nobody in this world has the power to erase these identities because this is my spirit and has been the path of my life...” Latif told the House.

When Latif was delivering his speech, sev-eral parliament members appreciated him by thumping their desks. Industries Minis-ter Amir Hossain Amu was one of them, but Commerce Minister Tofail Ahmed, who was

sitting next to him, stopped Amu by holding his hand.

Regarding his resignation, Siddique said: “Today marks the end of me. I have no objec-tion against anyone. I bow down to everyone and apologise. I believe in getting the love of people...My leader [Sheikh Hasina] does not want me to be a lawmaker anymore.”

Having � nished his 14-minute speech that was full of emotions, Latif left the chamber. Before that, he shook hands with Road Trans-port and Bridges Minister Obaidul Quader, Re-ligious A� airs Minister Matiur Rahman, junior energy minister Nasrul Hamid and some of

his other former colleagues.In September last year, the now-former

Tangail lawmaker and then telecom minis-ter Latif faced severe criticism from di� er-ent quarters after making untoward remarks about Hajj and Tabligh Jamaat at a programme in the USA.

A number of lawsuits have been � led against him in the country for hurting reli-gious sentiments. Later he was expelled from the Awami League and � red from the cabinet.

Recently he came out on bail after having stayed nine months in jail in several of those lawsuits. l

Bangladesh, Myanmar agree to work on reducing tension at bordern Sheikh Shahariar Zaman

Myanmar has agreed to work with Bangladesh in managing the frontier to reduce border tension between the countries.

The neighbouring country is also likely to enhance secu-rity cooperation at the policy level to combat drugs and hu-man tra� cking and increase defence cooperation.

“Bangladesh proposed My-anmar to sign an instrument on security dialogue and co-operation and Myanmar has agreed to it,” said a senior of-� cial of the Foreign Ministry.

Dhaka sent a draft of the MoU on the security dialogue last September, but Myanmar responded positively just a few days back, he added.

Bangladesh has recently helped Myanmar in its � ood re-lief operations and conducted operations against separatists.

“These activities and pru-dent diplomacy helped melt-ing the ice, and trust between the two countries are build-ing,” he said.

Myanmar will hold a parlia-mentary election in Novem-ber. It is expected that the in-strument will be signed during any ministerial visit.

The security dialogue deal has wide areas of cooperation including defence coopera-tion, border security manage-ment, terrorism � nancing, unauthorised crossing, hu-man tra� cking, prevention of smuggling, armed robbery and theft on ships, and unin-tentional maritime boundary crossing by � shermen.

Under the deal, a dialogue

can be held at any level deter-mined and agreed by both the parties. It will be held once in a year and if necessary it can be held more than one in a year.

When asked about border con� ict, another senior For-eign Ministry o� cial said the incidents occurr because of faulty border management.

“It does not mean that Bangladesh and Myanmar have negative policies towards each other,” he said.

For e� ective border manage-ment, both the countries agreed to sign an instrument on land border cooperation, he added.

It is di� erent from securi-ty dialogue instrument as the land border cooperation main-ly deals with � eld-level opera-tions.

Under the deal, both the countries would appoint des-ignated contact persons who would exchange real-time in-formation about the border.

“It will smoothen border management at the � eld lev-el,” he said.

The land border coopera-tion memorandum of under-standing has been proposed by Myanmar. “Myanmar has sim-ilar arrangement with India and it is working very well,” the o� cial added.

About the recent detain-ment of BGB Naik Abdur Raz-zak, he said: “We want to avoid such incidents in the future and for that we need deep en-gagement at the � eld-level.”

The o� cial said for the last couple of years Bangladesh and Myanmar have engaged each other bilaterally and re-gionally. l

Tribunal exonerates Zafrullahn Tribune Report

The International Crimes Tribunal 2 yesterday exempted freedom � ghter and Gonoshasthaya Kendra founder Zafrullah Chowdhury from the con-tempt of court charges brought against him for criticising its judges.

The tribunal led by Justice Obaidul Hassan also asked Zafrullah to be cau-tious while making remarks about the judges and the judicial system of the country, and cautioned him heavily to not recur his behaviour in the future.

The judges also termed Zafrullah “extremely wrong-headed” for his June 10 remarks.

Earlier, the tribunal 1 had found Zafrullah’s comments on the trail pro-cedure contemptuous, but later par-doned him with a serious caution.

While pronouncing the order, the tri-bunal chairman said: “The contemnor

herein has proved himself a precarious and extremely wrong-headed person.”

Justice Obaidul said: “The court thinks that if Zafrullah is not prevented he will be continuing with his illegit-imate, arrogant actions in tending to derogate the judiciary and the rule of law of the country.”

At that time, Zafrullah was in the dock, silent. He did not even speak to media after the verdict.

The Magsaysay Award winner had o� ered an unconditional apology be-fore the tribunal on August 9.

After serving one-hour imprison-ment in courtroom and � ned Tk5,000 for criticising the conviction of Bangla-desh-based UK journalist David Berg-man on contempt charges, Zafrullah on June 10 told reporters: “Today’s contempt of court verdict is a proof of the mental illness of the three judges...Ensuring justice is not possible if the

judges cannot take criticisms. When they cannot stand criticisms and lack rationality, they hide themselves under the cover of the law.”

Following this remarks, a petition seeking contempt proceedings was � led against the public health activist by three freedom � ghters and two or-ganisers of Gonojagoron Moncho. In response, the tribunal sought explana-tion from Zafrullah. He also � led a pe-tition with the Supreme Court refusing to pay the � ne imposed by the tribunal. After hearing, the apex court quashed the tribunal’s judgement as he ten-dered unconditional apology.

The freedom � ghter gained promi-nence after playing a key role in formu-lating the Bangladesh National Drug Policy in 1982. In 1971, he was one of the organisers of the 480-bed Bangladesh Hospital for freedom � ghters and the ref-ugees during the 1971 Liberation War. l

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015NEWS4DT

Bill proposing 1% surcharge on mobile phone usage placed in JSn Tribune Report

A proposal seeking imposition of a 1% sur-charge on mobile phone usage was placed in the National Parliament yesterday.

Finance Minister Abul Maal Abdul Muhith tabled the Development Surcharge and Levy Act 2015 and the proposal went to the parlia-mentary standing committee on Finance Min-istry for further scrutiny.

The new law got the Cabinet’s � nal approv-al on March 30 this year.

The 1% surcharge will be imposed on the amount charged on users by mobile phone operators for its services and it will come into e� ect with the passage of the act.

Another proposal on forming a new commission, which will regulate the non-governmental organisations (NGOs) operating in the country, was placed in the house yesterday.

Agriculture Minister Matia Chowdhury tabled the bill “The Foreign Donations (Vol-untary Activities) Regulation Act, 2015”, au-thorising the NGO A� airs Bureau to cancel the licence of NGOs for irregularities and cor-ruption.

The proposal was sent to the Standing Committee on Law, Justice and Parliamentary A� airs for scrutiny.

NGO’s are operating their activities in the

country following the Foreign Donations (Vol-untary Activities) Regulation Ordinance 1978 and Foreign Contributions (Regulation) Ordi-nance, 1982.

The proposal was made merging these two ordinances.

The proposed law prohibited political parties, Supreme Court judges, government and semi-government o� cials and employees, lawmakers, and candidates of national and local body elections taking any foreign donations.

Under the act, no NGO will be able to un-dertake any project and implement it with foreign donations without the approval of the NGO A� airs Bureau.

Individual will have to take approval from the bureau and make it clear about the source of the foreign donation and its areas of utilisa-tion if engaged in any research project.

Warning would be issued for violation of the law in the � rst step while the registration which covers 10 years would be nulli� ed and � ne would be imposed in the later phases for the violation of the law.

But, in case of criminal o� ence like � nanc-ing or patronising terrorism and militancy, human tra� cking and drug smuggling, crimi-nal procedures will be followed.

The agriculture minister also placed the Bangladesh Economic Zones (Amendment) Act-2015 bill, which would allow foreign countries to set up economic zones in Bang-ladesh on government-to-government (G2G) basis.

The bill was also sent to the Standing com-mittee on Law, Justice and Parliamentary Af-fairs for � nal scrutiny.

The proposed amendment has the provi-sion of establishing Economic Zones in city corporations, municipalities and cantonment board areas for only IT and ICT related indus-tries.

“There are restrictions in setting up eco-nomic zones within these areas in the current act. That is why the amendment was pro-posed,” Matia told the house. l

JaPa walks out protesting gas, power price hiken Mohammad Al-Masum

Molla

Leader of the opposition in parliament Raushan Ershad yesterday staged a walk out protesting the price hike of electricity and gas.

“When the price of oil in the international market is falling, power and gas prices are hiked in Bangladesh. People thought as the price of oil dropped in the international market, pric-es of electricity would be re-duced,” she told parliament speaking in a point of order.

Raushan said: “Life is be-coming expensive. Petrobangla made Tk2,080 crore pro� t in the last � ve years. When that is happening, why is the price of electricity increased?”

The Jatiya Party MP also said: “We want the price hikes revoked. This is what the peo-ple also demand.”

She alleged that load-shed-ding was still a serious problem. “In the Gulshan and Banani ar-eas, we face two to three power cuts every day. It means there is a shortage in power supply.”

After that, Raushan, along with her opposition bench colleagues, walked out of the

Jatiya Sangshad.Industries Minister Amir

Hossain Amu later said: “With-out hearing what the govern-ment has to say, they left. This is not democratic.”

Taking � oor, State Minister for Power, Energy and Mineral Resources Nasrul Hamid said that the price of electricity was not increased for the low-er-income people who con-sume between one to 50 units per month, also for irrigation pumps.

The price was hiked for only those who belong to the higher middle-class and higher class, he said.

Claiming that the price of gas for household consump-tion is the cheapest in Bangla-desh, the junior minister said 12% of the generated gas is now being used in households and the government has take steps to reduce this gradually.

The state minister also said that 82% of the generated gas is used for producing electricity.

On August 27, the gov-ernment raised the price of electricity and gas 2.93% and 26.29% respectively on an aver-age at the consumer level with e� ect from September 1. l

Rana’s mother sent to jail upon surrendern Md Sanaul Islam Tipu

A Dhaka court yesterday sent to jail Morzina Begum, mother of Rana Plaza owner Sohel Rana, in a case � led by the ACC for violating the building code that caused the death of over 1,135 workers in 2013.

Dhaka’s Divisional Court Judge M Atoar Rahman rejected her bail petition. Earlier, she surrendered before the court. The court also set October 11 for indictment hearing.

The ACC � led the case with Savar police on June 15 last year against 17 including Sohel Rana for constructing the building illegally.

The charge sheet says Savar municipality initially approved six-storeys but later per-mitted four more � oors. The municipality has no authority to approve beyond six-storeys.

The authorities also approved setting up garment factories on the top six � oors, al-though it was supposed to be a shopping mall.

The building that housed � ve garment fac-tories collapsed on April 24, 2013 killing over a thousand workers injuring 2,500 others. Dozen others still remain missing.

The accused include Savar Municipality Mayor Mohammad Refatullah; Associate Pro-fessor of Khulna University Abdur Razzak, who was the architect of the building; former chief executive o� cer of Savar Municipality Uttam Kumar Roy; former Savar ward com-missioner Mohamamd Ali Khan; and Rana’s parents Abdul Khalek and Morzina Begum. l

The 1% surcharge will be imposed on the amount charged on users by mobile phone operators for its services and it will come into e� ect with the passage of the act

SPOTLIGHT 5D

TWEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015

The pictures above tell the story of how people in the capital cope with a situation that arises almost every monsoon, and are left thinking who to blame.

Yesterday, city dwellers witnessed a case of water stagnation in di� erent parts of the capital along with a horrendous tra� c congestion following anhour-long downpour. People were seen riding on rickshaw vans to avoid the waist-high water. Rickshaw-pullers waded through submerged streets. Roadside food stalls, though halfway underwater, tried to operate as usual. A man in his 60s was seen to take help from two men to get on a rickshaw van.

The photos were taken at Sukrabad, Green Road, Kakrail, Farmgate and Old Airport Road SYED ZAKIR HOSSAIN/ MAHMUD HOSSAIN OPU

NEWS6DTWEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015

Six currency counterfeiters arrested in Dhakan Kamrul Hasan

Police arrested six money counterfeiters, caught with a large number of fake notes and with equipment, from Dhaka’s Mirpur area on Monday night.

Police said the arrestees had also produced counterfeit foreign currencies and distributed them throughout the nation through their lo-cal associates.

These arrestees are Badsha Miah, Abdul Jalil, Joynak Khandekar, Bayejid Bostami, Mo-hsin Wasim and Sohag.

Joint Commissioner of Dhaka Metropolitan Police Detective Branch unit Monirul Islam said the raid was conducted by the Detective Branch

on Monday night in di� erent areas of Mirpur.“Fake currency worth Tk12 million and var-

ious counterfeiting equipment and supplies were recovered from them,” he said.

He added that police also recovered equip-ment that proved they had made counterfeit foreign currencies, as there is a high demand for them in the city.

These fake currencies include Indian ru-pees, dollars and various European currencies.

Counterfeiting syndicates target festivals like Eid and Puja, when there is a large ex-change of money, to circulate their fake notes, the law enforcers said.

Associates of Badsha Miah provided the re-quired paper to maintain the marks of money.

Badsha, along with the other arrestees, print-ed Tk500 and Tk100 notes using the papers.

Later, Mahabub Mollah, Selim Miah, Hanif Gazi, Jaman, Imon, Saju and others distrib-uted the money throughout the country, the o� cial said.

According to the DB, some 25 gangs with 10-12 members in each are active throughout the country. Among them, some 45 members were arrested in the last year. Many of them are now on bail and involved again in the same crime.

To stop the distribution of counterfeit mon-ey, DMP Commissioner Asaduzzaman Miah on Monday afternoon said to reporters that police have set up fake currency detection machines at the cattle markets. l

EC decides to issue NID to under-18 citizensn Mohammad Al-Masum Molla

The Election Commission has taken an initia-tive to issue national identity cards for Bang-ladeshi citizens under 18 years.

In response to a query, Law Minister Anisul Huq told parliament that a project is expect-ed to get underway to issue national identity cards for citizens aged under 18.

Election Commission sources said work on the project will start soon. Currently a project titled “Identi� cation System for Enhancing Access to Services (IDEA)” is in progress to is-sue national voter cards. l

Mosharraf’s Gatco case to continuen Tribune Report

Lifting a stay order on the Gatco graft case proceedings, the High Court has ordered for-mer BNP minister AKM Mosharraf Hossain to surrender before a trial court within 60 days of receiving the order’s copy.

The bench of Justice Bhabani Prasad Sin-gha and Justice SM Mozibur Rahman passed the order yesterday. The case was � led during the caretaker regime in 2007 for incurring a loss of Tk145.63m by awarding Gatco container handling works at the Dhaka Inland Container Depot (ICD) and the Chittagong port.

Investigators later brought charges against 24, including former PM Khaleda Zia and sev-eral ministers of the BNP-Jamaat government.

Mosharraf had moved the High Court against the case, and the court issued a rule that stayed the trial proceedings against him. Yesterday, resolving the ruling, the HC lifted the stay order. l

Police foil Chittagong BNP’s founding anniversary programme n Tarek Mahmud, Chittagong

Chittagong Metropolitan Police yesterday foiled Bangladesh Nationalist Party’s 37th founding anniversary programme at Biplob Udyan of the port city, claiming that the party had not taken permission from the authority concerned.

BNP and local sources said police barred Chittagong BNP leaders, activists and its di� er-ent associate bodies from carrying out any ac-tivities at the venue from morning until noon.

Law enforcement agencies were seen cor-doning o� the entire area.

In this regard, CMP Assistant Commission-er (Panchlaish circle) Dipak Jyoti Khisha said the party did not take any permission from the police to hold its programmes and there-fore they were not allowed to enter Biplob Udyan as per the rules.

BNP Organising Secretary Golam Akbar Khandakar, along with some party men, came to the venue around 10am to o� er � oral wreaths at the Liberation monument in Bi-plob Udyan but police locked the gates of the venue, said eyewitnesses.

Later, the party men left the place.

Around 11:30am, Monwara Begum Moni, president of the city unit of Jatiyatabadi Ma-hila Dal in Chittagong, along with activists attempted to enter the venue but police also barred them, sources said.

Following that, the activists locked in an altercation with the law enforcers and lat-er brought out a protest procession led by Monowara Begum.

Till � ling of this report, the whole of Biplob Udyan area was under surveillance and no further programmes of BNP was observed in the venue. l

Shajahan: Do not overload launches during Eid rushn Adil Sakhawat

Shipping Minister Shajahan Khan has warned launch owners and o� cials to not overload the vessels during the Eid-ul-Azha rush, add-ing that the BIWTA would maintain strict sur-veillance to ensure there are no extra passen-gers being allowed on the roof.

“In the last Eid-ul-Fitr we had no ship-ping accidents, so we do not want any kind of casualties in the upcoming Eid-ul-Azha,” Shajahan told a ministry meeting on ensuring safe journey during Eid.

The shipping minister also termed 2015 a successful year for the water transport sector as only � ve shipping accidents have taken place so far this year, compared to last year’s total of 31.

Yesterday’s meeting decided on starting the sale of Eid tickets from September 15, while authorities concerned were instructed to prevent any passenger from boarding ves-sels without tickets.

Also, no trucks or covered vans will be al-lowed to use the ferry services during the three days before and after Eid-ul-Azha; however, such vehicles carrying passengers, onions or cattle would be excluded from the restriction. l

Detectives yesterday arrest four currency counterfeiters in a raid in the Mirpur area in Dhaka and seize fake notes of Tk1.2 crore and a huge stash of note counterfeiting equipment and materials RAJIB DHAR

Awami League leader shot dead in Lakshmipurn Our Correspondent, Lakshmipur

An Awami League leader was shot dead by some unidenti� ed assailants in Chandraganj upazila, Lakshmipur yesterday.

Quoting witnesses, police said a group of 4/5 miscreants in a CNG-run auto-rickshaw swooped on Omar Faruk, vice-president of Chandraganj union unit of Awami League and

son of late Abdul Mannan of West Latifpur vil-lage in the upazila, while he was having tea at a tea stall in Mostafa shop area around 9:30am.

The attackers opened � re on the Awami League leader, leaving him critically injured. Lat-er, he died on the way to Noakhali Sadar Hospital.

On receiving information, police recovered the body and sent it to Sadar Hospital morgue for an autopsy.

Mohammad Arjun, o� cer-in-charge of Chan-draganj police station, said the reason behind the killing could not be known immediately.

Meanwhile, Kazi Mamunur Rashid Bablu, joint convener of Chandraganj thana unit of Bangladesh Chhatra League, said Omar Faruk helped police to arrest some listed criminals.

Meanwhile, family members alleged that members of Nasir and Jisan Bahinis killed the

Awami League leader.Meanwhile, local leaders and activists of

Awami League and BCL brought out a proces-sion in the area protesting the murder.

They demanded immediate arrest of those involved in the killing. On December 23 last, a gang of miscreants shot Omar at the same place. Later, he received treatment from Dhaka Med-ical College Hospital and a hospital in India. l

Abducted child rescuedn Our Correspondent,

Barisal

A child, abducted from Bogra eight months ago, was rescued from a cafe in Barisal city yes-terday.

Shakhawat Hossain, o� cer-in-charge of Kotwali police station, said Talha, 4, son of Sajedur Rahman Saju, worker of Bogra Municipality, was ab-ducted on February 10.

Later, the father of the boy � led a case in this connection with Bogra police station.

On the day, police rescued the boy from the Cafe Ammajan in Hospital Road area of Barisal.

Farid Hossain, owner of the cafe, said some unknown peo-ple left the boy at the cafe. He

informed the incident to police immediately.

Mahmuda Begum, wife of Farid, was given responsibil-ity to take care the child after registering a general diary. The child was renamed as Shahin by the couple.

On other hand, police in Bogra recently arrested Helal alias Lachan, son of Nurul Is-lam of Banaripara Barisal, as a suspected abductor.

In the interrogation on 10-day remand, Lalchan con-fessed that he abducted the child and later left him at the Cafe Ammajan in Barisal.

On information, parents of child rushed to Barisal. The police handed over him to his parents, said police sources. l

1 jailed for stalkingn Our Correspondent,

Kurigram

A mobile court yesterday sen-tenced a young man with one year’s imprisonment for stalk-ing a schoolgirl in Kanthal Bari area under the sadar upazila of the district.

The arrestee is Moula Mia, 25, son of Afsar Ali of Shon-nashi in Holokhana.

Police said Moula was stalk-ing the class 10 student of Kan-thal Bari Girls’ School in the neighbourhood.

Locals caught him while he was harassing the girl on her way home in the morning and informed the police.

Police o� cers went to the spot and arrested Moula.

He was later produced in a mobile court, led by executive magistrate Maruf Shohel. The magistrate sentenced him fol-lowing a hearing.

In speaking with O� cer in-Charge (OC) of Kurigram Sadar police station Morshadul Karim, the OC said the young man was sent to jail in the afternoon. l

Youth dies after falling from trainn Our Correspondent,

Gazipur

A youth died and another was injured yesterday after falling from a rooftop of a train on Dhaka-Rajshahi Rail route in Mahishbathan area under Kali-akoir upazila in the district.

The deceased Mohammed Sohel, 22, was son of Mo� z Ud-

din in Mirerbedka area of Tan-gail Sader upazila. Assistant Sub-inspector of Joydebpur Railway police out post Dadon Mia said Sohel and his friend Jibon fell from the rooftop of a Dhaka bound local train from Chapainababgonj in the area while they were going to Dhaka. Sohel died on the spot while Ji-bon became critically injured. l

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015NEWS 7

DT

Source: Accuweather/UNB

D H A K ATODAY TOMORROW

SUN SETS 6:16PM SUN RISES 5:41AM

YESTERDAY’S HIGH AND LOW

34.7ºC 23.6ºC

Chandpur Sylhet

SourceL IslamicFinder.org

F O R E C A S T F O R T O D A YDhaka 31 26Chittagong 30 26Rajshahi 35 25Rangpur 30 24Khulna 34 26Barisal 32 27Sylhet 29 25Cox’s Bazar 30 26

PRAYER TIMESFajr 4:24am

Sunrise 5:39amZohr 11:59am

Asr 4:27pmMagrib 6:17pm

Esha 7:34pm

WEATHER

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2

THUNDERSHOWER WITH RAIN

Joydebpur-Mymensingh 4-lane misses deadline againn Shohel Mamun

The long-awaited Joydebpur-Mymensingh Highway construction work has missed its deadline again.

According to a report prepared by the Roads and Highway Department (RDH), about 70% physical works of the Joydebpur-Mymens-ingh four-lane upgradation project has been � nished. But the construction of upgradation of two-lane to four-lane was supposed to be completed by June this year.

In February last year, Road Transport and Bridges Minister Obaidul Quader told report-ers that the project would be � nished by De-cember of that year. In the middle of June last

year, he had said: “The four-lane project work will be completed by March 2015.”

Additional Chief Engineer of the RHD (My-mensingh circle) Md Sahabuddin told the Dhaka Tribune that the construction work was delayed due to heavy rain in the last three months. He also claimed that construction of the four lane was going on smoothly.

“Finally the construction of the upgrada-tion of the Dhaka-Chittagong Highway will be � nished with in a couple of months,” he said.

The infrastructure project began in July 2010 under the supervision of the RHD with acquisition of some 8.66 hectares of land. Due to extension of the project deadline twice, the cost was re-estimated too. Finally, the cost

is estimated at Tk1,815.12 crore, he said. The project work comprises four packages.

Construction of the � rst package is 12.25km from Joydebpur intersection-Rajendrapur inter-section while the second package is 17.6km road from Rajendrapur intersection to Nayanpur.

Bangladesh Army’s Special Works Organi-sation (west) is implementing rest two pack-ages. Though the projects began in July 2010, the army was entrusted with the duty in 2012.

According to the report, the army has been working smoothly, but the third package that involves 29.6km Nayanpur-Raimoni, 60% work has been � nished while 80% in the fourth package of 27.32km stretch between Raimoni and Mymensingh. l

Ruet celebrates its founding anniversary n Our Correspondent, Rajshahi

Rajshahi University of Engineering and Tech-nology (Ruet) yesterday celebrated its 12th founding anniversary with enthusiasm and festivity.

Ruet Vice-Chancellor Prof M Ra� qul Alam Beg inaugurated the programme at about 9am hoisting national and university � ags.

Later, a colourful procession with banners and festoons was brought out on the campus led by the vice-chancellor.

On the occasion, all the buildings of the university were decorated with colorful lights.

Later, a discussion was held at gymnasium centre where speakers vowed to establish a violence-free campus.

Ruet VC urged students to play a greater role in promoting the spirit of the Liberation War.

In the morning, the university authorities launched a month-long tree plantation with a view to protecting greenery of the campus.

The university started its journey as Ra-jshahi Engineering College with only six de-partments and 122 students 1964. Later, the university is upgraded as Rajshahi University of Engineering and Technology in September, 2003 to enhance the technical education and research.

At present, the university has 14 depart-ments, 200 teachers and 3,000 students un-der three faculties. l

Six members of Sahadat Bahini held while realising extortion n Kamrul Hasan

The Rapid Action Battalion arrested six mem-bers of Sahadat Bahini from the capital’s Mir-pur area while they were collecting extortion from a shop.

Sentu Mia Prokash alias Sentu, 24, Milon alias Shooter Suman, 24, Yameen Sarkar alias Monty, 27, Babu Ahmed, 36, Masud Rana, 27, and SM Solaiman Quader alias Pavel, 23, were arrested when they went to a shop “Lakhmi-pur Banijyalay” located at Mirpur 11 around 9pm on Monday night, said Commanding O� cer of RAB 4 and also Additional Deputy Inspector General Khandakar Lutful Kabir in a press brie� ng.

But their another accomplice Mamun man-aged to � ee from the spot, said the additional DIG, adding that they had been demanding Tk10,00,000 from the owners of the shop, Ra� qul Islam and his brother Ismail Hossain for long.

Earlier, they realised Tk50,000 from them at gun point on August 22. Later, the brothers informed RAB 4 about the matter.

When the gang entered the shop, the brothers informed the elite force about the incident. Being informed by them, RAB per-sonnel went there and arrested the six.

During preliminary interrogation, the ar-restees confessed to killing medicine trader Jahedul Islam Rasel. They said they had killed Rasel at night on June 10 as he refused to pay extortion.

They also told the law enforcers that they were the members of Shahadat Bahini.

Shahadat is accused of 24 cases, including murder and extortion.

In March this year, a Dhaka court sentenced Shahadat to death in absentia for killing Awami League leader Manir Uddin Manu.

According to media reports, Shahadat has been living in India for long. But, he is still op-erating criminal activities by his accomplices in Mirpur.

There was also a rumour that Shahadat was arrested in Kolkata in 2012 with two AK-47 as-sault ri� es, but neither the Bangladesh police nor Indian law enforcers con� rmed it then. l

Two held with 1,500 yaba tablets n Tribune Report

Police in separate drives arrested two drug peddlers with 1,500 yaba tablets in Chittagong city yesterday.

Mohammad Moshin, o� cer-in-charge of Bakalia police station, said police arrested Mohammad Yusuf, 40, of Bhola district and Rahima Begum, 35, of Cox’s Bazar district.

Yusuf was arrested with 5,00 yaba tablets from a bus of S Alam Paribahan and Rahima was arrested with 1,000 tablets from a mi-cro-bus in Shah Amanat Third Karnaphuli Bridge area, he said.

Moshin said the arrested were attempting to smuggle the contraband items from Cox’s Bazar to Dhaka.

Yaba peddling and carrying through pas-senger bus is being increased nowadays, he added.

The OC said member of law enforcers seized more than 90,000 yaba tablets from passenger buses in last eight months.

According to the Department of Narcotic Control, around 50 yaba factories are at Mon-gdu in Myanmar which is close to Teknaf at Cox’s Bazar.

More than 90 percent of smuggled contra-band enter into the country crossing the Naf River. l

A procession is taken out in Khulna city yesterday marking the founding anniversary of Khulna University of Engineering and Technology DHAKA TRIBUNE

Schoolgirl dies in Cox’s Bazar landsliden Our Correspondent, Cox’s Bazar

A schoolgirl was killed in a landslide in South Mohoripara area, Cox’s Bazar yesterday.

Farzana Rashid, 14, was the daughter of Abu Taher and a class VII student of College Gate Ilias Mia High School.

Sadar upazila Chairman GM Rahim Ul-lah said: “The landslide took place around 11:30am due to heavy rain in the area since Monday night.”

On July 27, � ve people, including three women, were killed in a landslide triggered by incessant rain. Four dwelling houses were also buried in that landslide. l

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015NEWS8DT

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015

Germany braces as vanguard of giant migrant wave n DPA, Berlin

The � rst arrivals of what promises to be a � ood of new migrants began arriving at Ger-man train stations Tuesday as the German government’s estimates of the funds it would need for integrating the new arrivals jumped by billions of euros.

Train stations in Stuttgart and Frankfurt announced a total of about 200 arrivals Tues-day. Stuttgart o� cials, who took the migrants o� a train headed from Munich to Dortmund, said they had never seen such a large group of migrants arrive at once.

O� cials are bracing for even larger num-bers in the coming days.

It is expected that many of the migrants coming from war-torn areas like Syria and Iraq or repressive regimes like Eritrea will eventually win asylum.

German Labour Minister Andrea Nahles said Tuesday that the � ood is creating the need for more funding for social spending and pro-grammes to integrate migrants into the work-place as she requested an additional €1.8bn to €3.3bn ($2bn to $3.7bn) for such spending.

German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schae-uble said the crisis is showing the need for a concerted European response. l

Big guns in east Ukraine fall silentn Reuters, Kiev

A fragile truce between Ukrainian govern-ment forces and pro-Russian separatists ap-peared to be holding on Tuesday as both sides made a renewed e� ort to silence their guns and make the much-abused ceas� re work.

Sporadic shelling and shooting, which each side has blamed on the other, had en-sured a steadily mounting death toll despite the cease� re called as part of a peace plan worked out in Minsk, Belarus, in February.

Government and separatist representa-tives agreed last week to strive to end all vio-lations from Tuesday.

A Kiev military spokesman said � rst signs were that parties to the Minsk deal were ad-hering to the call for a more e� ective truce to mark the start of a new school year.

“As of 12pm (local) there were no reports of violations by the illegal armed groups. Now the situation is calm,” the spokesman, Olek-sander Motuzyanyk, said.

However, two more guardsman have died from wounds sustained in violent protests outside Ukraine’s parliament, the national guard said.

The Minsk agreement, brokered by the leaders of Ukraine, Russia, Germany and France, is regarded as the bedrock of interna-tional e� orts to end the con� ict in Ukraine’s eastern regions. More than 6,500 people have been killed since a separatist rebellion erupt-ed there in April 2014.

Several explosive devices, including smoke bombs and one grenade, were thrown from the crowd at the parliament during a rowdy debate on constitutional amendments On Monday that would give greater self-governance to re-bel-held areas in the east. One guardsman was reported on Monday as having been killed in the unrest and nearly 90 wounded. l

UK to make EU referendum question more neutraln Reuters, London

The UK government will change the wording of the question in its planned referendum on whether to stay in the European Union to make it more neutral following a recommendation by the Electoral Commission on Tuesday.

Prime Minister David Cameron has prom-ised to renegotiate Britain’s ties with the EU and then, by the end of 2017, hold a referen-dum on whether to stay in or leave.

Under the government’s initial proposal, voters were to be asked to say “yes” or “no” to the question “Should the UK remain a mem-ber of the European Union?”

Some who want Britain to leave the 28-member bloc said that was unfair as it would allow the campaign to stay in to brand itself as the more positive “yes” camp.

“Whilst voters understood the question in the bill, some campaigners and members of the public feel the wording is not balanced,” said Jenny Watson, chair of the Electoral Commission.

Following a public consultation, the commission recommended the question be changed to: “Should the United Kingdom remain a member of the European Union or leave the European Union?” The two possible answers would be: “remain a member of the European Union” and “leave the European Union.”

A spokeswoman for Cameron said the gov-ernment would follow the commission’s ad-vice and amend the legislative bill.

In last year’s referendum on Scottish inde-pendence, the phrasing of the question was such that those in favour of independence had to answer “yes” while those who wanted to stay in the United Kingdom had to answer “no.” l

ANALYSIS

Anti-Muslim Buddhist group moves towards Myanmar’s mainstreamn Reuters, Yangon

Swathed in crimson robes, 77-year-old Ashin Tilawkar Biwonsa shu� es through a crowded conference room with the help of an aide, his supporters standing in respect as he takes a seat at the head of a table under a portrait of his own image.

It is from here, at an unremarkable road-side monastery just outside the city of Yan-gon, that the abbot is propelling the radical Buddhist group he co-founded into the main-stream of Myanmar’s politics.

Four bills drafted by his Committee for the Protection of Race and Religion, better known as Ma Ba Tha, have been passed by parliament and signed into law. Critics say the new laws e� ectively legalise discrimination against women and the country’s minority Muslims.

Along with political clout, Ma Ba Tha is also ratcheting up its public image ahead of elections in November that will be the � rst free vote in Myanmar in the last 25 years. The radical Buddhist group has regular pro-

gramming on one of the country’s most pop-ular satellite TV channels and has launched a magazine.

“There should be lawmakers in parliament who are reliable for the country,” Ashin Ti-lawkar Biwonsa said in an interview. “There might be some people, especially Muslims, who are working on weakening Buddhism, so we need strong people for our religion.”

Ma Ba Tha has shown no signs of contest-ing elections itself but says it will “remind” the public of candidates who opposed its four laws. These include Nobel peace laure-ate Aung San Suu Kyi and her opposition Na-tional League for Democracy (NLD), which is going head to head with conservatives and military � gures in the polls.

Established two years ago, Ma Ba Tha sprang from the “969” movement, a loose collection of monks linked to a wave of vio-lence against the country’s Muslim minority in 2012 and 2013.

Senior Ma Ba Tha o� cials said the 969 movement had raised awareness about threats to Buddhism from a burgeoning Mus-

lim population, but was disorganised and lacked leadership.

Now, a growing number of professionals are o� ering their expertise on everything from media relations to legislation, helping to shape Ma Ba Tha into a slick organisation with popular support and real political clout.

Myanmar’s revered and in� uential monks led many pro-democracy protests during nearly half a century of military rule in the Buddhist-majority nation. But after a qua-si-civilian, reformist government took power in 2011, some outspoken monks claimed Is-lam was eclipsing Buddhism and weakening the country.

In contrast to long-delayed legislation on banking, mining and property, the Ma Ba Tha-backed “race and religion” bills moved swift-ly through parliament.

One bill requires some women to wait at least three years between pregnancies. An-other requires Buddhist women to seek o� -cial permission before marrying a non-Bud-dhist man.

Suu Kyi and her NLD opposed the laws. l

Scores of Clinton emails released, many retroactively classi� edn AFP, Washington, DC

The US State Department released over 4,000 more of the emails former secretary of state Hillary Clinton kept on a private server Mon-day and revealed that some 150 others have been retroactively classi� ed.

Reporters and Clinton’s rivals as she cam-paigns for the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination began scouring 7,000 additional pages of messages from the mails she handed over earlier this year after coming under � re for operating the uno� cial server.

But perhaps the greater danger to her, with no smoking gun emerging immediately as the hunt began, lay in the mails which o� cials said had now seen their security status up-graded to “classi� ed” or above, implying they should not have been sent.

“I think it’s somewhere around 150,” State Department spokesman Mark Toner told report-ers, adding that the process of reevaluating the remaining unreleased emails was continuing.

Last month, o� cials said that 63 other mails had also been “upgraded in some form.”

Clinton has been criticised for using a pri-vate server rather than an o� cial government domain for all her emails during her time at the State Department.

Critics allege that she used the so-called “homebrew server” – physically located at a private Internet provider – to avoid political scrutiny of her time as the top US diplomat.

They also charge that she put national security at risk by taking classi� ed informa-tion out of supposedly secure government systems and putting it onto an unauthorized network that could be prey to hackers.

Clinton, for her part, insists none of the mails on the private server was formally

marked “classi� ed” nor any higher designa-tion such as “top secret.”

If the probe reveals that classi� ed or secret information was shared on un-secured net-works or with individuals without a security clearance, Clinton or her sta� could face legal consequences.

Toner con� rmed that the review, being overseen by the Intelligence Community In-spector General, has so far found no mails di-rectly marked “classi� ed.”

But while the material reviewed so far was not marked “classi� ed,” the number of mails containing sensitive information that are now in hindsight thought worthy of classi� cation is on the rise. Toner added that the latest de-classi� cation, added to previous such publica-tions, brought the proportion of mails released or redacted as classi� ed to more than 25%.

The mails that were released – some of them banal, some cryptic, some heavily re-dacted and some potentially enlightening – did not immediately throw up any proof of wrongdoing as reporters began to scan them.

But the mails do show that Clinton’s team was deeply interested in media coverage of the secretary and her work – regularly shar-ing articles both critical and favorable – and that they were in regular touch with outside friends and consultants.

Critics will be keen to discover if the mails shed any light on suggestions that the sec-retary’s government work was too entwined with that of the wealthy Clinton family foun-dation, set up by Clinton’s husband, former president Bill Clinton.

She remains the frontrunner to be named the 2016 Democratic contender for the White House, but pollsters say the email scandal has dented public trust in her. l

WORLD 9D

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WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015WORLD10D

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Indian law commission for abolishing capital punishmentn AFP, New Delhi

India should “move towards” abolishing the death penalty and im-mediately restrict it to cases relating to terrorism and “waging war,” the country’s law commission said in a report published on Monday.

The Law Commission of India said the criminal justice sys-tem was in “deep crisis” due to a lack of resources and an over-stretched police force, making the administration of capital pun-ishment “fallible and vulnerable to misapplication.”

“The notion of ‘an eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth’ has no place in our constitutionally mediated criminal justice system,” it said in a 270-page report to the government.

“The commission accordingly recommends that the death penalty be abolished for all crimes other than terrorism-related o� ences and waging war.”

It said that while the death penalty was no more of a deterrent than a life sentence, it was recommending an exception for ter-ror-related cases because of concerns raised by lawmakers.

But it said the time had come for India to “move towards” aboli-tion of the death penalty.

The Supreme Court has already said capital punishment should only be carried out in “the rarest of rare” cases in India, among a dwindling group of nations that still have the death penalty on their statute books.

The execution last month of Yakub Memon for his role in a series of co-ordinated attacks that killed hundreds of people in Mumbai in 1993 triggered fresh debate over capital punishment-Memon was the only one of 11 people found guilty over the atroc-ity to have his death sentence upheld on appeal.

A recent study conducted by the National Law University in New Delhi found that 94% of all those sentenced to death were low-caste Dalits, members of religious minorities or those from economically disadvantaged sections of society.

The Commission said India’s reliance on the death penalty “diverts attention from other problems ailing the criminal justice system such as poor investigation, crime prevention and rights of victims of crime.” l

5 protesters killed in fresh Nepal violencen Reuters, Kathmandu

Nepali police shot dead at least four protesters and killed a � fth on Tuesday as demonstrators threw stones and petrol bombs, angry at a new planned constitution.

The government and major political parties hope that the con-stitution, in the works for seven years, will provide much-need-ed political stability and bolster economic development in the Himalayan nation, which is still reeling from two devastating earthquakes that killed 8,900 people this year.

Protesters in Nepal’s southern plains have been agitating for weeks against plans to divide the small area into several provinc-es, part of an overhaul envisaged under a federal constitution that politicians are now � nalising.

More than 20 people have died in protests since those plans were unveiled two weeks ago, with members of two large plains communities demanding greater autonomy under the charter.

Police o� cial Kamal Singh Bam said police shot and killed four demonstrators in the town of Birjung in Parsa district, 60km south of Kathmandu, when a police post was attacked with stones and petrol bombs.

In a separate clash with police, a � fth demonstrator was killed in the neighbouring district of Bara, police o� cial Lokendra Mal-la said, without giving details.

Under the constitutional proposals, 22 districts in the south-ern plains, also known as the Tarai, would be joined with prov-inces that are dominated by mountain dwellers.

The protesters - mostly from the Madhesi and Tharu minor-ity communities - demand that their narrow strip of homeland should not be divided into more than two states. l

11D

TEDITORIALWEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015

INSIDE

We are moved by the sight of the noted educationist and writer, Prof Muhammed Zafar Iqbal, sitting alone in the rain to protest the beating up and harassment of sta� at Shahjalal University.

He is right to say that it was shameful for the Chhatra League thugs involved to chant “Joy Bangla,” the quintessential slogan of the Liberation War, while attacking a group of SUST teachers who have been peacefully campaigning against alleged irregularities by the vice-chancellor.

The government must ensure � rm action against its supporters who were involved.

Just as important, the government needs to sit up and take note when public interest concerns are raised by eminent citizens such as Professor Iqbal. It is one thing for its supporters to discount concerns raised by independent newspapers or foreign NGOs who they can accuse of political motivations, quite another to ignore concerns raised by those who are among its own support base.

As a lifelong defender and promoter of the values of the Liberation War, the professor is known for instinctively being a supporter of the AL. It is in the government’s own interest to take heed and listen when such a person and prominent intellectual speaks out.

Professor Iqbal has given valuable service to the nation by devoting his career to building education and popularising science in Bangladesh.

No good is served when, as some AL supporters have done, they abuse or seek to malign the reputation of citizens like Zafar Iqbal. This notoriously happened when the ruling party MP Mahmud Us Samad Chowdhury said he wanted to whip the distinguished professor. Similar abuse followed in public forums from AL supporters when Professor Iqbal said the government was not doing enough to defend free expression and protect bloggers from violent extremists.

The government harms its own credibility when it indulges such abuse of friendly critics like Professor Iqbal.

It would be better advised to curb such unacceptable behaviour and start listening carefully so it can respond constructively to legitimate public concerns.

It is in its own interest to respond constructively to legitimate concerns raised by friendly critics

Government needs to listen to its friends

Kings of swing

Resilience is not uselessAcceptance and calm by most people seems a rational response towards helping them cope with daily life. Why indulge in mood swings when it won’t change anything?

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PAGE 14

The best way to honour BangabandhuHe epitomises Bangladesh like nobody else does with all its charm and agony, and remains an icon for us. No appel-lation is too much for this great man of Himalayan stature. But then, he was a human being

Now, in Bangladesh, Rubel Hossain has had some success at reverse swinging the ball -- his pace and his rather round arm action help his cause. It is impera-tive that Bangladesh take good care of him and groom other bowlers of his type

But is it resilience?I would like to believe that we are good at ‘unemotionally’ dealing with all the chaos we are dealt. Unfortunately, it seems more likely that we deserve the chaos we get

OPINION12DT

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015

n Abak Hussain

We Bangladeshis are a peculiar bunch.

When World Cup football season is here, we gleefully

hoist Brazilian and Argentine � ags onto our rooftops, and hit the streets when our team wins. Sometimes we even end up in street clashes over our support for countries we know very little about, and have very little in common with.

When a convicted war criminal doesn’t get the death penalty we think he deserved, we occupy the streets of Shahbagh and sloga-neer day and night at the top our lungs until the ruling changes.

When we catch petty crooks, muggers, thieves, or homicidal drivers on the streets, we routinely beat them up in murderous rage on the spot. Passers-by who have no personal stake in the matter often have no qualms about joining in.

When we win one single cricket match against a team like India, we go berserk. Our nationalistic vitriol knows no limits, as we proceed to tastelessly bash a country of over a billion people, simply because we had one measly victory.

When we lose in the same sport, we can’t shut up about how it was all rigged against us, going on never-ending cuss-� lled rants about how we were robbed, how unfair the world is, how we’re such victims, how the big bad bullies have cheated us.

When it is time to have elections, instead of negotiating to work out a grown-up solution, our opposition party goes on a spree of destruction, burning buses, vandalising property, and killing people in the equivalent of a temper tantrum.

When we read something online that we don’t like reading, or we stumble upon a blogger whose opinions we disagree with, we decide to hack them to death. These murders

get a frightening amount of support from the so-called educated community as well. Somebody wrote something that rubs you the wrong way? Kill them!

When the birthday of a long-dead poet comes along, we construct stages and podi-ums and sing his songs all day and eulogise him on the airwaves till our ears bleed. We dare not suggest that our national heroes were mere mortals who are fair game for criticism. We take devotional fervour to a new level.

Maybe the Gallup poll results showed that Bangladeshis are really a resilient bunch, putting up with ups and downs in life that would have worn down people from anywhere else. That no matter what disaster strikes us, we withstand it with a Dude-in-Big-Lebowski-like sense of equanimity. I would like to believe that we are good at “unemotionally” dealing with all the chaos we are dealt. Unfortunately, it seems more likely that we deserve the chaos we get. l

Abak Hussain is Op-Ed Editor, Dhaka Tribune.

But is it resilience?

n Niaz Alam

There’s nothing I can say or do to persuade people that Gallup’s labelling of Bangladesh as the country with the “least emotional”

people sounds inaccurate. It seems a bit o� to me as well. But while I believe it is wrong to

stereotype entire national populations on the basis of opinion polls, there’s no denying surveys like this have traction. Advertisers, corporations, and the authors of business best-sellers like Freakonomics mine this type of data all the time to try and sell their products.

Perhaps rather than getting outraged at the headline, we should embrace our inner Spock and search for the true meaning of the survey’s results.

After all, few people are complaining that people in Greece, Iraq, and Iran reported the highest percentage of negative daily experiences, or that Middle Eastern nations recorded the most angry people and Latin America the happiest. Take a look at the � rst four of the survey’s � ve questions:l Did you feel well rested yesterday?l Were you treated with respect all day yesterday?l Did you smile or laugh a lot yesterday?l Did you learn or do something interesting yesterday?

It may be easy for readers of this newspaper to answer yes to these questions, but can you really be surprised that Bangladesh, with its large numbers of people stuck in repetitive jobs, working long hours, and often treated without courtesy or respect, had the smallest percentage saying yes? How many workers in a typical factory, farm, urban rickshaw, or domestic service can honestly say yes is true?

Given this, it doesn’t surprise me that relatively few people answered in the a� rmative to the � nal question which asked if they experienced enjoyment, physical pain, worry, sadness, stress, a lot of the previous day.

I appreciate the stress part sounds incongruous to anyone stuck in tra� c. The noise pollution from anti-social drivers using horns as signals is stressful enough. But on the whole, acceptance and calm by most people seems a rational response towards helping them cope with daily life. Why indulge in mood swings when it won’t change anything?

I’m not saying this is a wholly good thing. Numbness and passivity rarely improve anything. I was upset for instance by the lack of uproar when the tiger statue in Dhaka’s Karwan Bazar fell down killing a bystander. As some wag pointed out on the Tribune’s comments board, imagine the hullabaloo if the same thing happened with the Statue of

Liberty or Nelson’s Column? Such things can happen anywhere, people

said. And we’re not proving very successful at protecting real tigers, why be upset if we can’t save a fake one? You get the idea. Cold, logical responses. Rebuild and carry on.

In other words, resilience.And who can say that Bangladesh’s people

are anything but resilient? Over the last � ve decades, Bangladesh has experienced war, famine, � oods, genocide, coups, and dictatorship. But not only is it still standing, most social and economic indicators are better than people in 1971 expected.

When politicians and talk show guests talk in apocalyptic terms of people trying to reinstate Baksal, or take us back to 1971 or 1975, they’re ignoring the very real changes and strides Bangladesh has made since independence.

This is all down to the perseverance of ordinary hard-working Bangladeshis. They have to prove every day that they can cope and survive in the hope of building a better life for themselves and their families.

Resilience is a good thing. Don’t knock it. We’re going to need a lot more to keep improving living standards and cope with the impacts of climate change. l

Niaz Alam has worked on ethical business issues since 1992 and is a former vice-chair of War on Want. He is Chief Editorial Writer at the Dhaka Tribune.

Resilience is not useless

I would like to believe that we are good at ‘unemotionally’ dealing with all the chaos we are dealt. Unfortunately, it seems more likely that we deserve the chaos we get

Acceptance and calm by most people seems a rational response towards helping them cope with daily life. Why indulge in mood swings when it won’t change anything?

Strong emotions are all around us

Who can say that Bangladesh’s people are anything but resilient?

Is hopelessness an emotion?

BIG

STO

CK

OPINION 13D

TWEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015

n Brig Gen (Retd) Shamsuddin Ahmed

This year’s observance of Bangabandhu’s death anniversary has been marked by a blistering attack on the JSD, a coalition partner

of the AL government, by some prominent AL leaders. This was done for the role this party had played as the then opposition party in denigrating Bangabandhu and the AL government, thus creating a volatile political situation, a suitable recipe for the dastardly military coup which took place and changed the course of our history for a while.

This is, perhaps, the � rst time that AL leaders have come out against the JSD for its anti-AL role leading up to the August 15 tragedy. True, the JSD -- then headed by Major (Retd) MA Jalil, who later died in Pakistan -- had launched a broadside on Bangabandhu and the AL government,some of the left-leaning � rebrandscoming down upon Bangabandhu with all sorts of invectives, hurling them at thisgreat man.

Newspapers of those days will certainly bear this out. Since then, many political chameleons have changed their colours and

have become great admirers of Bangabandhu and Sheikh Hasina.

It is my understanding that military coups take place where the government is autocratic and hugely unpopular for riding roughshod over the sentiments of the people, because, to succeed, coup leaders need some sort of political backing and a good measure of public support. Where there is genuine democracy and rule of law in place, there is no scope for a military coup.

In the event, the JSD, intent on � ghting the AL government on the streets head-on and bringing it down forcefully, and the Khondakar Mostaq-led AL faction plotting against Bangabandhu, provided the coup leaders the political space and support they needed.

The great man also may have lost touch with the people because of Baksal, a one-party rule. When Gen Ershad removed the newly-elected BNP government of Justice Sattar and captured power, he could see muted jubilation in the AL camp at the removal of the BNP government.

There is no denying that Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman is the founder of this country. He united the 75 million people of this country and made them take up arms and � ght for our independence from Pakistan. “Joi Bangla, Joi Bangabandhu” used to be our battle-cry as our freedom � ghters launched assaults on the Pakistan occupation army.

He epitomises Bangladesh like nobody else does, with all its charm and agony, and remains an icon for us. No appellation is too much for this great man of Himalayan stature.

But then, he was a human being and therefore made mistakes. Baksal was the only mistake he made, one which people of this country could not come to terthe ms with.

The way the AL leadership is trying to cash in politically on observing the birth and death anniversaries of Bangabandhu could end up eroding his popularity and distancing the AL from the people. Too much of anything is bad. Declaring the whole month of August as a month of mourning can hardly be justi� ed.

It will only help corrupt party members to make money as they go about collecting funds from the public in the name of mourning. Displaying placards and billboards

with large pictures of party leaders is another pro� table business.

Besides, holding ceremonies, in which the prime minister and the president lay wreaths at the grave of Bangabandhu in Tungipara with a large entourage of dignitaries and security personnel moving from Dhaka and back, entail huge expenditure from the government exchequer.

This spending could be curtailed if only the president and the prime minister could � y together in a helicopter to place wreaths at Bangabandhu’s grave.

As a developing country with the LDC tag still attached to our name, trying to break out of the scourge of poverty and unemployment, we at state-level must work hard, practice austerity, and wage a crusade against corruption. Let us have more working hours and less public holidays.

Many of us are maybe not aware that we observe as many as 25 public holidays in a year. The US observes just 12 public holidays and South Africa, 13. I mention these two countries because, what Bangabandhu is to us, General George Washington and Nelson Mandela are to the people of the USA and South Africa respectively.

If Begum Khaleda Zia, the BNP chairperson, wishes to celebrate her birthday by cutting a huge cake in the company of her party leaders and well-wishers, why should we raise our eyebrows?

Millions of men and women have been born on August 15 and many more millions of people will continue to be born on this day. People must have the right to celebrate their birthdays and those of their near and dear

ones.The best way to pay homage to the

memory of Bangabandhu is to establish genuine democracy and rule of law, and create a social order free from exploitation, in this country. These are the goals Bangabandhu had fought for throughout his political career in Pakistan. But he could not achieve these goals in this war-ravaged country when he was at the helm of a� airs. There were far too many people to loot and let loot. There were far too few to help him stop them. l

Brig Gen (Retd) Shamsuddin Ahmed is a former Military Secretary to the President of Bangladesh.

The best way to honour BangabandhuLet us practice genuine democracy and rule of law as a testament to Bangabandhu’s great ideals

He epitomises Bangladesh like nobody else does with all its charm and agony, and remains an icon for us. No appellation is too much for this great man of Himalayan stature. But then, he was a human being

We should try and uphold the legacy Bangabandhu left behind SYED ZAKIR HOSSAIN

OPINION14DT

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015

n SM Shahrukh

When it comes to bowling, Pakistanis have always been innovators. Pakistan had their � rst great bowler in Fazal

Mahmood, a medium-fast bowler of great skill and accuracy. Even though many con-sidered him a medium-pacer, Neil Harvey and Richie Benaud di� ered from the rest and Benaud con� rmed that Fazal bowled around the pace of Michael Kasprowicz, a recent Aussie bowler who bowled in the mid-130ks.

He had a lethal leg-cutter which Benaud called “a very fast leg break.” Neil Harvey considered him a greater bowler than many famed pace bowlers of the 1950s, and Frank Tyson said he was “like Bedser but better.” According to Benaud, there never was a better bowler on matting wickets prevalent in the sub-continent in the early days, especially after Fazal and Khan Mohammad demolished the Australians at Karachi in 1956, with Fazal taking 13 wickets and Khan seven in the match. Fazal apparently rede� ned swing bowling on matting wickets and was quite successful on normal wickets too.

The recent trend in quick bowling, in the last few decades, has been reverse-swing, another Pakistani innovation.

Conventional swing bowling means that a newish ball after delivery will swing away from the shiny side. Fielding sides always shine one side of the ball to create two dissimilar semi-spheres. A bowler trying to swing the ball away from a right-handed batsman will keep the shiny side facing the batsman so that the ball will swing away from him after dropping and go towards the slips.

An out-and-out fast bowler like Je� Thom-son or the quartet of quicks engaged by the West Indies from the mid 1970s till the 1990s,

bowled as fast as they could, using bumpers at will and various changes of length and pace. The yorker or a full-length delivery proved lethal, landing near the toes of the batsman after a prior short-pitch bouncer was trying to knock the batsman’s head o� . Ask Brian Close, who faced Michael Holding in 1976.

Conditions of the pitch, grass on it or lack of it, and the ambient conditions, aided conventional fast bowlers to swing the ball at various degrees. The bounce o� ered by the wickets also aided them. But after about 35 or 40 overs with a cricket ball, swing became non-existent unless one were playing in a typical green top at Headingley, Leeds. Bowl-ers like Dennis Lillee, John Snow, Kapil Dev, or Richard Hadlee could swing the ball when it was still quite new, but had to revert to bowling quick or disciplined line and length stu� with the older ball.

Ian Botham, in his heyday, could generate conventional swing with an older ball longer than many, hence his successes in the � rst � ve or six years of his career.

On the wickets of England or New Zea-land, because of the green nature of the pitches, and in the West Indies or Australia or

South Africa, because of the natural bounce, fast bowlers remained e� ective throughout a cricket match. The sub-continental wickets are a totally di� erent matter. With low and slow pitches which tend to break up with the natural wear and tear of bowlers running up and landing on spots which get battered, and the condition of the soil used, and the sun baking the wickets, cracks are easily formed. The balls also lose their newness faster and more often because of rough out� eld condi-tions. Spinners have traditionally called the shots in these conditions and fast bowlers just made up the numbers.

Fast bowlers had to do something to remain e� ective with the older ball. The answer was the reverse swing.

“Reverse swing” means that the ball swings towards the shiny side. For this to happen, the asymmetry of the old ball has to be more pronounced. Teams work feverishly to keep the shiny side shiny, while letting the other side “go to the dogs” as it were. The resulting extreme asymmetry allows the reverse swing, the changed aerodynamic allowing the ball to swing unconventionally and, more often than not, the swing is more pronounced. There is one caveat though: The

ball has to be delivered at quite high speeds. Reverse swing can prove even more deadly as, in extreme cases, the ball swings conven-tionally in the air and then unconventionally o� the wicket.

A case in point, Wasim Akram’s delivery to Allan Lamb in the � nal of the 1992 World Cup, one of the greatest deliveries in record-ed history. The ball, delivered from round the wicket, swung in the air towards the batsman and then cut back to hit Lamb’s o� -stump. The bemused face of Allan Lamb was some-thing to behold.

The credit for “inventing” reverse swing is claimed to this day by the maverick Sarfraz Nawaz of Pakistan, even though it is claimed by many Pakistanis that he “pinched” the new innovation from some lesser known bowler in the Pakistani domestic cricket circuit. But his use of the new style of swing came to light in Melbourne in 1979. Austral-ia chasing 381 run to win was comfortably placed at 305 for three, with Allan Border and Kim Hughes going great guns. In came Sarfraz to bowl and he took seven wickets for one run in no time, and the Australians were all out for 310.

Sarfraz passed the knowledge to his fast-bowling partner Imran Khan, who was a faster bowler and used it to great e� ect to defeat � rst the Australians and then the Indi-ans, at home, taking 40 wickets in the latter series in the dead wickets of Pakistan. This new type of swing bowling raised eyebrows, and the world paid close attention. When the Pakistani pair of Wasim Akram and Waqar Younis bamboozled England on their own soil in 1992 they were outright accused of ball-tampering.

It was later revealed that they were using the bottle tops to make the rough side of the ball rougher. Those were extreme measures, but the world of cricket could not overlook this new technique. And since the late 90s, many non-Pakistani bowlers have used the reverse swing to great e� ect, especially in dead pitches, which are becoming more prevalent the world over. Dale Steyn and James Anderson are two current successful proponents of the reverse swing.

Now, in Bangladesh, Rubel Hossain has had some success at reverse swinging the ball -- his pace and his rather round arm action help his cause. It is imperative that Bangla-desh take good care of him and groom other bowlers of his type. The current Bangladeshi sensation, Musta� zur Rahman, is banking on conventional swing and cutters, but he is still very young and he has time to become a genuine fast bowler.

There is no reason to not believe that one day he will not be able to reverse swing like the great Wasim Akram. This is of utmost importance: Developing bowlers who can reverse swing the older ball, as the world of cricket, swayed by the crash and bang of T-20, is producing dead pitches for Test matches as well, and a fast bowler must develop the ability to reverse swing the ball to remain e� ective and make an impact. l

SM Shahrukh is a freelance contributor.

Kings of swingThere is more to the science of bowling than simply throwing a ball

Now, in Bangladesh, Rubel Hossain has had some success at reverse swinging the ball -- his pace and his rather round arm action help his cause. It is imperative that Bangladesh take good care of him and groom other bowlers of his type

Young bowlers like Musta� zur Rahman might soon be able to swing like Wasim Akram MAINOOR ISLAM MANIK

15D

TBusiness WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015

Why $40 oil is killing Iraq, Venezuela and others, but not Russia

17 Aman Feed makes unusual debut19

Government: China manufacturing index slumps in August

16Ecnec approves new water treatment plant at Sayedabad

20

Tehran ready to negotiate gas pipeline project with Dhakan Sheikh Shahariar Zaman

Tehran is ready to talk to Dhaka about ex-tending the Iran-Pakistan-India gas pipeline to Bangladesh.

Iranian Ambassador to Bangladesh Abbas Vaezi said Iran had negotiated the project with Pakistan and India, and it could de� nite-ly be extended to Bangladesh.

Speaking at a discussion by Diplomatic Cor-respondents’ Association, Bangladesh at Na-tional Press Club yesterday, the ambassador said the Iranian government had already spo-ken to Bangladesh government in this regard.

“But they must have a feasibility study,” he said.

Iran has invited Power, Energy and Mineral Resources Minister Nasrul Hamid to visit Teh-ran, during which all energy-related issues including the tri-nation gas pipeline can be discussed, the ambassador said.

He said due to the sanction on his country, Pakistan and India could not progress with the project but now that the sanction is go-ing to be lifted very soon, both the countries would start constructing the pipeline.

Iran has built the pipeline up to its border with Pakistan, and now Islamabad and New Delhi are working on building pipeline on their territories.

About the import of crude oil from Iran, Vaezi said Tehran has already expressed its

willingness to sell oil to Bangladesh at a spe-cial rate.

He proposed that even a barter system is possible under which Iran can export crude oil and in return import di� erent products from Bangladesh, as such arrangement is al-ready in place between Iran and India.

About modernising Eastern Re� nery in Bang-ladesh, he said the issue would be discussed during the energy minister’s visit to Tehran.

Iran is capable of rebuilding and increasing the capacity of the re� nery, he said.

Eastern Re� nery, the sole oil re� nery in Bangladesh, was built with assistance from Iran.

About expansion of trade, he said both the countries enjoy good trade relations but it is much below the expectation.

“Now Iran is ready to have cooperation and trade relations in many � elds.”

Iran needs a huge amount of jute for its carpet industry and RMG products for its 77 million people.

The ambassador said Iran procures Bangla-deshi RMG products from Europe or some oth-er countries. “But now we can do it directly.”

When asked about the future prospect of recruiting manpower from Bangladesh, he said at present there are some technicians working in some areas including telecommu-nications, but more opportunities will be cre-ated to recruit Bangladeshi manpower after the sanction is lifted. l

Internet subscribers cross 5cr landmark n Tribune Report

With more than 5 crore internet subscribers, the country’s telecom industry crossed a milestone in the month of July this year.

Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulato-ry Commission (BTRC) on Tuesday o� cially announced that the sector crossed the land-mark of 5 crore internet subscribers.

According to BTRC website, the telecom-munication industry has made this achieve-ment in July with the increased number of 5.07 crore internet users.

A total of 5.07 million subscribers used in-ternet in the month compared to 4.83 crore at the end of June, 2015.

The number of � xed-line internet users 12.93 lakh in July while the number of Wimax subscribers stand at 1.74 lakh compared to 1.8 lakh a month earlier.

The total number of Bangladesh’s mobile

phone subscribers reached 12.87 crore at the end of July 2015, said the telecom watchdog in its website.

Grameenphone led the market with 5.39 crore mobile phone subscribers, compared to 5.31 crore, a month earlier.

Banglalink’s customer base inched up to 1.8 lakh from 3.22 crore while Robi ended June with 2.73 crore, up from 2.79 crore users in July.

Airtel’s customer base was 87.43 lakh in June and it reached to 90.8 lakh in July.

Customer base of the state-owned Teletalk was 42.16 lakh in June and ended up with 5 thousand more subscribers in July.

The oldest mobile phone operator Cityce-ll with the lowest subscriber base contains11.61 lakh subscribers from its earlier 11.87 lakh � gure.

The number of Citycell subscribers has been declining for the last couple of months. l

This minor boy looks for a dry place wading through an inundated road in Dhaka yesterday with a thermal carafe containing tea he vendors to the pedestrians. Many parts of the capital went under knee-deep to waist-deep water after an afternoon heavy shower, causing immense su� erings to the commuters and hampering all sorts of business. The picture was taken from Dhanmondi area SYED ZAKIR HOSSAIN

visit our website @www.dhakatribune.com

BUSINESS16DT

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015

CORPORATE NEWS

Chairperson of Navana Group, Sha� ul Islam Kamal has recently launched Caltex’s new campaign. Under the campaign, customers will be given 1 litre can free with the purchase of its 4 or 5 litre products

AML department and training institute of Mercantile Bank has recently organised a training programme on anti money laundering and combating � nance against terrorism for mutual evaluation in Sylhet. The bank’s additional managing director, Monindra Kumar Nath was present at the programme among others

Jamuna Bank Limited has recently opened its 175th ATM at Malir Aunko Bazar in Munshiganj Zila. The bank’s deputy managing director, AKM Saifuddin Ahamed presided over the ceremony

Concord Pharmaceuticals Ltd has recently launched a new oral antidiabetic drug named Dapazin (Dapagli� ozin), for the � rst time in Bangladesh that may reduce insulin dependency of diabetic patients. Diabetes specialist and president of Bangladesh Diabetic Association, Prof Dr AK Azad Khan inaugurated the launching of Dapazin at a hotel in Dhaka

Government: China manufacturing index slumps in Augustn AFP, Beijing

Chinese manufacturing activity fell into con-traction in August, with an o� cial index yes-terday slumping to a three-year low in the latest sign of a slowdown in the world’s sec-ond-largest economy.

The o� cial Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) came in at 49.7 last month, the National Bureau of Statistics said in a statement.

The result, which tracks activity in China’s vast factory and workshop sector and consid-ered a key barometer of the nation’s economic health, was worse than July’s 50 reading and the � rst contraction since February.

A � gure above 50 signals expansion, while anything below indicates shrinkage.

The result, which was in line with the median estimate of economists by Bloomb-erg News, is lowest o� cial PMI since August 2012, but was still better than an independent survey sponsored by Chinese media group Caixin.

The Caixin reading for August plunged to a 77-month low of 47.3, down from July’s 47.8, Caixin said in a joint statement with Markit, a � nancial information services provider that compiled the survey.

The updated result, however, marked a slight improvement over the preliminary � g-ure of 47.1 announced earlier.

The outlook for China’s economy has

turned decidedly pessimistic even after gross domestic product (GDP) registered an expan-sion of 7% in the April-June quarter, surpris-ing economists on the upside.

Indicators in the current third quarter have worsened as have concerns over the health of China’s economy, leading to turmoil on over-

seas stock markets as a bubble also de� ates on domestic bourses.

“Recent volatilities in global � nancial markets could weigh down on the real econ-omy, and a pessimistic outlook may become self-ful� lling,” He Fan, chief economist at Caixin Insight Group, said in the release. l

Dollar weakens further in Asian AFP, Tokyo

The dollar lost ground for a second day yes-terday in line with a fall in Asian shares, as concerns about the global economy clouded the outlook for a long-awaited US Federal Re-serve rate hike.

In Tokyo trade, the dollar weakened to 120.62 yen from 121.24 yen late Monday in New York.

The euro was mixed at $1.1269 and 135.93 yen from $1.1213 and 135.95 yen in US trade.

Investors are looking for clues as to when the US Federal Reserve will raise its near zero interest rates for the � rst time in almost a decade, after o� cials gave no clear signal at a weekend conference.

China’s shock devaluation of its currency last month, combined with signs of slowing growth in the world’s number two economy, have raised more questions about whether the US economy is ready for higher rates.

“Currencies are still taking directional cues from the daily yuan � xing as well as the per-formance of Chinese equities - and what that means for risk appetite,” Sue Trinh, head of Asia foreign exchange strategy at Royal Bank of Canada in Hong Kong, told Bloomberg News.

“Dollar-yen’s price action is dragging the dollar down in general.”

Speaking at the weekend, Federal Reserve vice chairman Stanley Fischer acknowledged that the turmoil rooted in China had raised some questions about the health of the world economy, even if US data remain good. l

An employee works on an assembly line producing Mercedes-Benz cars at a factory of Beijing Benz Automotive Co (BBAC) in Beijing REUTERS

BUSINESS 17D

TWEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015

Why $40 oil is killing Iraq, Venezuela and others, but not Russian John Lloyd

It’s not the economy, stupid. At least it isn’t where hearts are warmed by the � ercer � ame of nationalism, rather than rising living stand-ards.

Oil prices as low as $40 a barrel are separat-ing the oil haves from the oil have-nots. The oil producers happily rode a wave of high oil prices for years, buying popularity with in-creased state spending while excusing them-selves from the hard pounding of legitimate economic reform. The oil-buyers — like India and Egypt — now enjoy prices as low as a third of those they paid as recently as two years ago and can cut fuel subsidies, saving spending or redirecting it to broader social uses.

As a result, most of the oil-producers are now in a troubling position. Venezuela’s Pres-ident Nicolas Maduro faces parliamentary elections in December with falling populari-ty and a poll showing Venezuelans will vote for the opposition rather than his Socialist Party by a factor of two to one. Maduro lacks the charismatic populism of his predecessor, Hugo Chavez — a popularity based on the for-mer president’s insistence that the high oil revenues were bene� tting the poor (they did) and making the nation great, while sticking it to the Americans.

In Canada, now a major oil producer from Alberta’s tar sands, polls are jumping about nervously, as Conservative Prime Minister Ste-phen Harper seemed up in April, then down in July. Harper has been in power since 2006, so “regime fatigue” is judged to be a large factor in the public’s ambivalence toward him. The fall in the price of the commodity that ac-counts for a quarter of the country’s export revenue and nearly 10 percent of its GDP is not his fault — but it’s happened on his watch. This will only aggravate the fatigue. Elections are in October; a credible critique of Harper’s economic policy at a time of falling revenues could tip it for the opposition.

Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari doesn’t have to face an election soon — he just won one. But like other leaders from oil-pro-ducing nations, he does have to cope with a

price slump in the commodity, which com-prises 80 percent of the government’s reve-nue. It has meant civil servants in most states are owed months of pay; capital projects have been frozen; and an already restive and divid-ed country shows more signs of revolt.

The turmoil is felt by countries throughout the Middle East — by those desperately reli-ant on oil revenue (Iraq, Syria and Libya) and those with vast riches (Saudi Arabia).

And yet the Russian Federation, and Scot-land buck this trend. Their leaders are the Tef-lon Kids of the oil slump: Hit by sliding prices but not public scorn.

The ruling party in the state’s’s regional parliament, the Scottish National Party, pre-sented an economic program to the Scottish people before last year’s independence ref-erendum (independence was voted down 55-45) promising higher social, infrastructural and education spending. And, perhaps most critically, better infrastructure based on an oil price above (as it had been) $100 a barrel. This should have doomed them in today’s court of public opinion, in a landscape dominated by cheap oil.

Yet the falling price hasn’t a� ected the re-sult of either the Scottish or the UK parliamen-tary elections one whit. An independent Scot-land would now be in an economic crisis. But the fall in the oil price has had less e� ect on the economy of the UK as a whole than the bene-� ts from cheap oil — a fact that should make Scots relieved they live in the larger state. Yet since the election, and as the price has gone down further, the popularity of the SNP and its leader Nicola Sturgeon has gone up.

A similar phenomenon has occurred in Russia. Rising prices, falling employment, stagnant or reduced wages have had one po-litical result above all others: an outpouring of support, amounting to veneration or even love, for President Vladimir Putin.

What unites Sturgeon and Putin? What makes them exempt from public scorn as oil prices slip and slide? They are ardent nation-alists. Neither loses an opportunity to glorify their country.

Putin, in a visit to the Baltic � eet in the port

of Baltiysk, depicted his country as again fac-ing hostility from the West, again drawing on its own human reserves to repel the foreign-ers. (It is worth noting that Sturgeon’s prede-cessor in the SNP, Alex Salmond, is an admirer of “certain aspects” of the Russian president)

Sturgeon is less emphatic than Putin. But her party’s celebration last year, through a reenactment of the 1314 victory of a Scots army over an English one in the Battle of Bannock-burn, shows that the SNP’s heart remains deep-ly anti-English. It keeps alive the popular myths and heroes of centuries’ old triumphs. During the referendum campaign, the then Labor lead-er Ed Miliband was forced to abandon speeches and walkabouts in Edinburgh, and the Scots La-bor leader Jim Murphy was abused into silence in Glasgow. The SNP deplored those actions; but once released and encouraged, nationalism takes increasingly aggressive forms.

Putin and Sturgeon’s popularity is pro-pelled by a force more powerful — at least to date — than the desire for better living stand-ards. Especially in Russia, there is a pride in displaying courage and patriotism in the face of deprivation and aggression, seen as coming largely from the United States. In Scotland, the propaganda is more muted and the Eng-lish enemy less clearly delineated, but nation-alism needs a foe, and the English are it.

There is no question of which nationalism is more dangerous. An independent Scotland would reduce the UK’s authority, further weaken the EU and greatly damage the state itself. Russian nationalism on the other hand is a danger, perhaps a disaster, on a global scale, not least because its political success spawns imitators. For example, China, head-ing into harder times and taking the world with it, has a leader keen on promoting the “Chinese dream” — a stronger, more national-istically inclined China.

Nationalism hasn’t gone out with the tide: it’s coming in waves. l

John Lloyd co-founded the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at the University of Oxford, where he is Senior Research Fellow. The article was initially published at Reuters.

Oil prices tumble in Asia on Chinese datan AFP, Singapore

Oil prices tumbled in Asia yesterday, surren-dering some of their big gains after fresh data showed manufacturing activity in top energy consumer China contracted in August, ana-lysts said.

The contraction in the Purchasing Man-agers’ Index (PMI) for China’s factory sector added to concerns about the health of the world’s second biggest economy.

US benchmark West Texas Intermediate (WTI) for October fell $1.50 to $47.70 and Brent crude for October dropped $1.46 to $52.69 a barrel in late-morning Asian trade.

WTI surged 8.8% and Brent advanced 8.2% on Monday as the US government lowered its domestic production estimate and the OPEC cartel said it was “ready to talk” to producers about prices which had fallen to their lowest levels in six and a half years last month.

The PMI for China’s key manufacturing sector slumped to a three-year low of 49.7 in August, an o� cial index showed, in the latest sign of slowing growth in the country, a major engine for global economic growth.

The reading, which tracks activity in Chi-na’s vast factory and workshop sector, was worse than the 50 reading in July, and the � rst time it showed contraction since February.

A � gure above 50 signals expansion in the sector, while anything below indicates shrink-age.

US � nancial giant Citigroup said in a mar-ket commentary that China was driving com-modity prices, including oil, “as never before, and it is driving them lower”. l

Plants are pictured near an oil pump, owned by oil company Rosneft, in the settlement of Akhtyrskaya in Krasnodar region, southern Russia REUTERS

Android smart watches get in time with iPhonen AFP, San Francisco

Google on Monday broke down the wall be-tween Android smart watches and iPhones, taking on Apple Watch on its home turf.

A version of Android Wear smart watch software tailored for Apple’s mobile operating system made its debut, paired for now only with LG Watch Urbane, according to a Google blog post.

“Today, Android Wear for iOS works with the LG Watch Urbane,” Google said.

“All future Android Wear watches, includ-ing those from Huawei, Asus, and Motorola will also support iOS, so stay tuned for more.”

Android Wear was modi� ed to work with iPhone 5 models or newer powered by the lat-est versions of Apple’s mobile device operat-ing system, according to Google.

The move puts Android-powered smart watches in position to compete with Apple Watch to be the computing device strapped to the wrists of iPhone owners.

Android Wear previously worked only with the Google-backed mobile operating system.

Apple news comingInternational Data Corporation last week said that Apple’s freshly launched smart watch was a hot commodity in the second quarter of this year. l

BUSINESS18DT

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015

SECTORAL TURNOVER SUMMARY

Sector DSE CSE TotalMillion Taka % change Million Taka % change Million Taka % change

Bank 335.42 7.96 18.16 4.14 353.58 7.60NBFI 111.69 2.65 7.13 1.63 118.83 2.55Investment 59.45 1.41 3.58 0.81 63.03 1.35Engineering 489.68 11.62 50.79 11.57 540.47 11.62Food & Allied 122.59 2.91 6.37 1.45 128.96 2.77Fuel & Power 468.60 11.12 39.75 9.05 508.35 10.93Jute 8.65 0.21 0.00 8.65 0.19Textile 367.65 8.73 15.73 3.58 383.38 8.24Pharma & Chemical 491.01 11.65 20.20 4.60 511.21 10.99Paper & Packaging 25.50 0.61 0.80 0.18 26.30 0.57Service 78.70 1.87 4.03 0.92 82.73 1.78Leather 137.11 3.25 6.57 1.50 143.68 3.09Ceramic 50.11 1.19 1.98 0.45 52.09 1.12Cement 140.47 3.33 8.61 1.96 149.08 3.20Information Technology 30.08 0.71 3.31 0.75 33.39 0.72General Insurance 18.25 0.43 0.33 0.08 18.59 0.40Life Insurance 25.14 0.60 3.00 0.68 28.14 0.60Telecom 75.33 1.79 8.07 1.84 83.40 1.79Travel & Leisure 54.75 1.30 11.26 2.56 66.00 1.42Miscellaneous 1123.10 26.66 229.30 52.24 1352.40 29.07Debenture 0.06 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.06 0.00

Prepared exclusively for Dhaka Tribune by Business Information Automation Service Line (BIASL), on the basis of information collected from daily stock quotations and audited reports of the listed companies. High level of caution has been taken to collect and present the above information and data. The publisher will not take any responsibility if any body uses this information and data for his/her investment decision. For any query please email to biasl@bol-online.com or call 01552153562 or go to www.biasl.net

News, analysis and recent disclosuresAMANFEED: (Repeat): (Q3): The Company has reported its pro� t after tax Tk. 58.10 million and basic EPS Tk. 0.97 for the 3 (three) months ended on 31 March 2015 (Jan 2015 ’March 2015) as against pro� t after tax of Tk. 62.38 million and basic EPS of Tk. 1.04 for the same period of the previous year. It is to be noted that basic EPS has been calculated based on weighted average Pre-IPO paid-up number of shares i.e. 60,000,000 shares for both the periods. However, consid-ering Post-IPO 80,000,000 number of shares the Compa-ny’s basic EPS for the 3 (three) months ended on 31 March 2015 would be Tk. 0.73. For the period of 9 (nine) months (July 2014 to March 2015) ended on 31 March 2015 pro� t after tax was Tk. 215.73 million and basic EPS was Tk. 3.60 as against pro� t after tax of Tk. 198.54 million and basic EPS of Tk. 3.31 for the same period of the previous year. It is to be noted that the said EPS has been calculated based on weighted average Pre-IPO paid-up num-ber of shares i.e. 60,000,000 shares for both the periods. However, considering Post-IPO 80,000,000 number of shares, Company’s basic EPS would be Tk. 2.70 for 9 (nine) months ended on 31 March 2015 (July 2014 to March 2015) and NAV per share would be Tk. 34.77 as on 31 March 2015.

SQUARETEXT: Credit Rating Information and Services Limited (CRISL) has rated the Company as “AA” in the long

term and “ST-1” in the short term along with a stable outlook in consideration of its audited � nancials up to December 31, 2014, unaudited � nancials up to June 30, 2015 and other relevant quantitative as well as qualitative information up to the date of rating declaration.

Dividend/AGMGPHISPAT: 17% cash, AGM: 08.11.2015, Record date: 20.09.2015.SAIHAMCOT: 5% cash and 10% stock, AGM: 28.10.2015, Record date: 17.09.2015. BBS: 20% stock, EGM & AGM: 15.10.2015, Record date for EGM & AGM: 20.09.2015.APEXFOODS: 20% cash, AGM: 30.09.2015, Record date: 13.09.2015. APEXTANRY: 45% cash, AGM: 04.10.2015, Record date: 09.09.2015. GRAMEENS2: 10% cash 15% Unit Dividend, Record date: 07.09.2015. GRAMEEN1: 82% Unit Divi-dend, Record date: 07.09.15.GREENDELMF: 4.50% Cash Dividend. Record date: 06.09.2015. ABB1STMF: 15% Unit Dividend. Record date: 07.09.2015. EBLNRBMF: 6% Unit Dividend. Record date: 07.09.2015. PHPMF1: 7.50% Unit Dividend Record date: 07.09.2015. POPULAR1MF: 12% Unit Dividend. Record date: 07.09.2015.FBFIF: 9% Unit dividend. Record date: 03.09.2015. TRUSTB1MF: 8% Unit divi-dend. Record date: 03.09.2015. EBL1STMF: 7% Unit Dividend Record date: 03.09.2015.

CSE GAINER

Company Closing (% Change)

Aver-age (%

Change)

Closin-gAvg. Closing DHIGH DLOW Turnover

in MillionLatest

EPSLatest

PE

Anwar Galvanizing-B 10.00 11.45 59.29 59.40 59.40 55.00 1.808 0.68 87.2AIBL 1st Is. M. F.-A 10.00 8.20 5.41 5.50 5.50 5.10 0.253 4.76 1.1Miracle Industries -B 9.04 4.35 17.75 18.10 18.20 16.80 0.851 0.36 49.3Sinobangla Indu.-A 8.20 3.93 26.73 27.70 28.10 25.00 2.655 0.62 43.1Tallu Spinning -Z 6.44 2.59 20.60 21.50 21.50 20.00 0.722 -0.21 -veStandard Ceramic -A 5.37 4.15 51.15 51.00 53.00 48.70 0.772 0.49 104.4National Housing Fin.-B 5.20 5.08 26.27 26.30 26.60 25.80 0.454 2.24 11.7DBH 1st MF-A 4.88 3.88 4.28 4.30 4.30 4.10 0.119 0.45 9.5Prime Islami Life -A 4.74 4.68 39.78 39.80 40.00 38.50 0.346 4.95 8.0Dacca Dyeing-A 4.58 1.49 15.66 16.00 16.00 15.40 0.120 0.84 18.6

DSE GAINER

Company Closing (% Change)

Aver-age (%

Change)

Closin-gAvg. Closing DHIGH DLOW Turnover

in MillionLatest

EPSLatest

PE

Anwar Galvanizing-B 9.83 8.48 57.85 59.20 59.20 53.20 31.619 0.68 85.1Standard Ceramic -A 9.70 3.45 49.84 52.00 52.10 47.00 11.231 0.49 101.7Tallu Spinning -Z 7.96 4.38 20.95 21.70 21.90 20.10 8.683 -0.21 -veMiracle Industries -B 7.74 3.42 17.53 18.10 18.30 16.50 21.232 0.36 48.7Jute SpinnersA 6.70 8.06 70.77 71.70 72.20 69.00 0.429 -31.68 -veMonno Ceramic -B 6.14 0.85 45.18 46.70 47.00 43.00 12.676 0.16 282.4Northern Jute -Z 5.94 8.12 341.85 342.50 351.30 330.00 4.618 1.75 195.3AIBL 1st Is. M. F.-A 5.77 3.65 5.39 5.50 5.60 5.20 5.176 4.76 1.1Savar Refractories-Z 5.65 7.07 50.55 50.50 52.00 48.00 0.023 -0.64 -veSinobangla Indu.-A 5.45 - 25.75 27.10 27.80 24.50 39.492 0.62 41.5

CSE LOSER

Company Closing (% Change)

Aver-age (%

Change)

Closin-gAvg. Closing DHIGH DLOW Turnover

in MillionLatest

EPSLatest

PE

S.B. 1st M. F.-A -9.89 -9.89 8.20 8.20 8.20 8.20 0.008 1.41 5.8Paramount Insur-A -8.33 -8.19 12.10 12.10 12.10 12.10 0.002 0.98 12.3Apex Foods -A -7.03 -5.22 155.19 152.20 159.90 150.60 0.521 12.60 12.3GQ Ball PenA -6.39 -3.18 77.31 74.70 79.80 73.50 0.303 -1.68 -veApex Footwear-A -6.23 -6.70 370.42 370.40 371.00 370.00 0.184 -24.62 -veApex SpinningA -6.07 -6.08 72.70 72.70 72.70 72.60 0.166 2.52 28.8ISN Ltd. -Z -5.50 -5.78 10.27 10.30 11.00 10.20 0.001 -0.20 -veSamorita Hospital -A -5.17 -4.83 87.59 86.20 90.20 85.50 0.861 2.11 41.5First Finance- A -5.17 -5.34 10.98 11.00 11.10 10.90 0.083 0.94 11.7Premier Cement-A -4.34 -4.43 72.67 72.70 76.00 71.00 0.022 1.55 46.9

DSE LOSER

Company Closing (% Change)

Aver-age (%

Change)

Closin-gAvg. Closing DHIGH DLOW Turnover

in MillionLatest

EPSLatest

PE

S.B. 1st M. F.-A -9.78 -8.39 8.30 8.30 8.30 8.30 0.390 1.41 5.9NLI 1st M F-A -9.38 -8.81 8.70 8.70 8.70 8.70 0.318 1.50 5.8Global Insurance -A -7.25 -7.01 12.87 12.80 13.80 12.70 0.797 1.64 7.82nd ICB M F -A -5.97 -5.91 270.78 270.70 280.00 268.00 0.772 55.89 4.8Apex Foods -A -5.55 -5.51 154.10 151.60 159.90 150.00 33.705 12.60 12.2Zeal Bangla Sugar -Z -4.88 -6.27 7.62 7.80 7.90 7.40 0.016 -45.17 -veBATBCL -A -4.72 2.64 2978.69 2922.40 3110.00 2913.90 3.354 92.10 32.3Samorita Hospital -A -4.62 -4.10 88.01 86.80 92.30 86.00 24.810 2.11 41.7Imam Button -Z -4.55 -4.98 10.50 10.50 10.70 10.30 0.088 -1.21 -veEastern Cables-A -4.47 -4.08 126.61 126.10 134.00 125.10 0.108 1.12 113.0

DSE key features September 1, 2015Turnover (Million Taka)

4,213.35

Turnover (Volume)

104,906,281

Number of Contract

143,023

Traded Issues 318

Issue Gain (Avg. Price Basis)

82

Issue Loss (Avg. Price Basis)

227

Unchanged Issue (Avg. Price Basis)

4

Market Capital Equity (Billion. Tk.)

2,663.87

Market Capital Equity (Billion US$)

32.29

CSE key features September 1, 2015Turnover (Million Taka)

438.97

Turnover (Volume)

10,360,027

Number of Contract

26,594

Traded Issues 237

Issue Gain (Avg. Price Basis)

59

Issue Loss (Avg. Price Basis)

171

Unchanged Issue (Avg. Price Basis)

7

Market Capital Equity (Billion. Tk.)

2,571.65

Market Capital Equity (Billion US$)

31.17

BUSINESS 19D

TWEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015

DSEX SLIPS TO SIX-WEEK LOW

Aman Feed makes unusual debutn Tribune Report

Stocks drop for the third consecutive session yesterday with benchmark index DSEX slipping to six-week low.

The Dhaka Stock Exchange benchmark index, DSEX, lost 44 points or almost 1% to 4,724—its lowest since July 14 this year.

The Shariah index, DSES, fell 11 points or 1% to 1,165. The blue chip comprising index DS30 settled at 1,806, shedding more than 20 points or 1%.

The Chittagong Stock Exchange Selective Category In-dex, CSCX, was down nearly 54 points to 8,827.

Aman Feed Limited in its � rst trading witnessed an unusual rise in share prices and was also the most trad-ed stocks, accounting for around 20% of the total DSE turnover.

Its stock prices climbed more than 172% to Tk98 on its o� er value of Tk36 a share, after rising as high as Tk103 and as low as Tk54 per share.

The DSE turnover stood at Tk420 crore, which was 20% higher over the previous session’s value.

Share prices of majority issues closed lower as out of 317 issues traded, 71 advanced, 191 declined and 55 remained unchanged.

Most sectors closed in red. Food and allied sector slumped almost 4% as investors booked pro� t on previous two-day gain.

Non-banking � nancial institutions, cement, banks, tel-ecommunications, power, pharmaceuticals and textile ex-tended their losses for the third consecutive day.

Lanka Bangla Securities said the market saw sharp slide in line with the sell-o� in the global stock market.

“Investors were prompted to churn their portfolio on the day of debut of new share Aman Feed,” it said.

It said all the major sectors got the hit of the huge sell-o� in the market where bank and textile stocks dragged down the market close to more than a one-month low. l

Investors were prompted to churn their portfolio on the day of debut of new share Aman Feed

ANALYST

Daily capital market highlightsDSE Broad Index : 12375.03110 (-) 0.93% ▼

DSE - 30 Index : 1806.29122 (-) 1.13% ▼

CSE All Share Index: 14498.74090 (-) 0.59% ▼

CSE - 30 Index : 12375.03110 (-) 0.48% ▼

CSE Selected Index : 8827.76730 (-) 0.61% ▼

CSE TURNOVER LEADERS

Company Volume-Shares

Value in Million

% of Total-Turnover ClosingP Change % ClosingY DHIGH DLOW AvgPrice

Aman Feed-N 2,750,941 202.23 46.07 96.00 0.00 0.00 99.90 100.00 73.51BSRM Ltd. -A 141,548 15.00 3.42 107.70 0.94 106.70 111.90 104.00 105.97United Power-N 90,060 13.57 3.09 150.50 -0.86 151.80 152.60 149.90 150.64National Feed-A 494,043 12.92 2.94 26.30 1.54 25.90 26.70 25.30 26.14UNITED AIR-A 872,111 8.49 1.93 9.70 -2.02 9.90 9.90 10.00 9.73Olympic Accessories -N 150,147 8.35 1.90 56.00 1.63 55.10 57.00 54.20 55.64Shahjibazar Power-N 41,484 7.82 1.78 188.10 -1.57 191.10 190.90 187.00 188.54LafargeS Cement-A 68,208 7.57 1.73 111.20 -0.89 112.20 113.00 110.60 111.05Khulna Power-A 87,745 6.22 1.42 70.80 -0.70 71.30 71.80 70.10 70.93BEXIMCO Ltd. -A 207,078 6.20 1.41 29.90 -1.32 30.30 30.30 29.80 29.95BD Submarine Cable-A 48,058 5.91 1.35 122.00 -3.79 126.80 130.50 121.50 122.96Square Pharma -A 20,382 5.14 1.17 253.30 0.52 252.00 253.90 250.10 252.05FAR Chemical-N 88,425 4.69 1.07 53.00 -0.38 53.20 54.00 52.80 53.09WesternMarine -N 94,694 3.98 0.91 41.70 -2.34 42.70 45.00 41.50 42.02Legacy Footwear -A 132,579 3.80 0.87 29.00 3.94 27.90 29.50 27.40 28.69

DSE TURNOVER LEADERS

Company Volume-Shares

Value in Million

% of Total-Turnover ClosingP Change

% ClosingY DHIGH DLOW Avg-Price

Aman Feed-N 11,037,188 822.67 19.53 98.20 0.00 0.00 103.00 54.90 74.54National Feed-A 5,577,237 145.69 3.46 26.20 0.77 26.00 26.80 25.40 26.12Square Pharma -A 545,467 137.50 3.26 253.10 0.08 252.90 254.00 250.10 252.08LafargeS Cement-A 1,124,402 124.73 2.96 111.00 -1.33 112.50 113.00 109.70 110.93Shahjibazar Power-N 601,378 113.38 2.69 188.20 -1.41 190.90 192.90 187.00 188.54Al-Haj Textile -A 644,121 81.35 1.93 123.40 -1.99 125.90 131.90 122.20 126.29United Power-N 505,654 76.22 1.81 150.10 -1.44 152.30 154.50 149.60 150.74BSRM Ltd. -A 654,371 69.33 1.65 107.90 0.84 107.00 113.00 104.00 105.95Bata Shoe Ltd. -A 51,001 68.30 1.62 1300.30 -0.33 1304.60 1340.00 1300.00 1339.23Islami Bank BD - A 2,129,237 61.48 1.46 28.70 -3.37 29.70 29.90 28.40 28.88FAR Chemical-N 1,002,775 53.36 1.27 53.10 0.00 53.10 53.90 52.90 53.21Brac Bank -A 1,326,571 51.60 1.22 38.50 -1.53 39.10 39.00 38.40 38.90UNITED AIR-A 4,626,595 45.40 1.08 9.70 -2.02 9.90 10.00 9.70 9.81Khan Brothers-N 1,637,746 45.04 1.07 27.80 3.73 26.80 28.10 26.70 27.50Olympic Accessories -N 806,761 44.94 1.07 56.10 1.63 55.20 57.00 54.60 55.70

The blue chip comprising index DS30 settled at 1,806, shedding more than 20 points or 1%

BUSINESS20DT

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015

Tarana: Take stern actions against illegal VoIP businessn Tribune Report

Tarana Halim, state minister for Post and Telecommuni-cation, yesterday asked the ministry o� cials to take stern actions against illegal VoIP (Voice-Over Internet Protocol) business.

“Any kind of slackening will not be tolerated in stopping il-legal VoIP business under any circumstances,” said Tarana at a meeting with the o� ce bear-ers of IGW Operators Forum (IOF) held at her secretariat o� ce in the city.

She said, “The government will be tougher for stopping this illegal business at any cost

and telecommunication o� -cials will have to take the re-sponsibility to terminate those VoIP calls.”

Recently, IGW Operators Forum increased the interna-tional incoming call termina-tion rate by 33.33% to 2 cents per minute without any ap-proval from the government.

Terming the IOF’s decision illegal the state minister said, “They won’t be allowed to in-crease the call rate without the

proper approval from the authority concern.” Tarana Halim joined the cabinet on 14 July

and since then she reiterated her � rm stance against any anomalies in her sector. l

Walton extends replacement guarantee of compressorsn Tribune Report

Walton, the local manufacturer of electronic products, has extended its replacement guar-antee of the compressors usedin its refrigera-tors and freezers up to 8 year s from existing 5 years.

The research and development of Walton has improved the quality of compressors, which paved the way to extend the consum-ers’ facility through augmenting the guaran-tee period of compressors by 3 more years, said a Waltonpress statement released yester-day.

The Walton compressors will provide ser-vices more than the guarantee period as it is always for the customers, said Golam Mur-shed, deputy director of the Walton Group.

Customers can use Walton brand’s refrig-erators and freezers for up to 20-30 years if they follow the user guidelines properly, said Murshed.

Walton has brought more perfection in the

cooling and accuracy system in its compres-sors and it will provide long time service, he added.

The compressors used in Walton brand re-frigerators and freezers are being produced in the combination of the world’s latest technol-ogy and high quality raw materials, said En-gineer Md Moeenul Hoque, head of research and development department of Walton.

Consequently, they have been able to give the assurance of durability of compres-sors used in Walton brand’s refrigerators and fridges, Hoque added.

Engineer Shahriar Reza, assistant director of Walton Service Management System, said customer will get long time service from com-pressors without facing problems if they carry or transport fridges carefully.

During transportation or placement, the fridges should not be careened more than 30-degree angles. In Addition, customers should start fridge minimum two (2) hours later after the transportation. l

Ecnec approves new water treatment plant at Sayedabadn Tribune Report

A new water treatment plant will be set up at Sayedabad Water Treatment Project (Phase-III) aiming to collect 70% water from surface sources by 2030.

The new plant with the daily supply ca-pacity of 450 million litre water will be estab-lished at a cost of Tk4,597 crore. Dhaka WASA will implement the project by June 2020.

The above project is one of the seven pro-jects worth Tk7,215 crore approved by the Exec-utive Committee of National Economic Council (Ecnec) yesterday at the NEC conference room with Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in the chair.

Of the total project cost, the government will provide Tk3,117 crore from the national ex-

chequer while Tk3,993 crore will come as pro-ject assistance and the organisation concerned will contribute Tk104 crore from its own fund.

After the meeting, Planning Minister AHM Mustafa Kamal briefed reporters about the project details.

On the new treatment plant, he said the pro-ject location is the right embankment of River Meghna at Haria under Sonargaon Upazila of Narayanganj district while the water trans-mission line would go through Haria-Sonar-gaon-Narayanganj-Sayedabad and then Dhaka.

Under the project, there will be construc-tion of intake raw water pumping station, sludge treatment plant, 52.8 kilometre trans-mission line, 54 kilometre distribution line and 33 kv electric line.

According to the Planning Ministry, cur-rently, the daily water supply demand for some 1.5 crore city dwellers is 2,200 million litre. The daily demand would reach 5,268 million litre water by 2035.

Dhaka WASA is now mainly dependent on groundwater for meeting up the demand and with such operations the layer of ground water is gradually decreasing by two to three meters every year which poses serious risk to the environment as well as to fresh drinking water in future.

The meeting also approved another project titled “BSCIC Industrial Park, Tangail” with Tk164 crore to be implemented by the BSCIC by June 2017.

Under the project, some 50 acres of land would be acquired to prepare some 280 in-

dustrial plots while necessary infrastructural facilities like roads, drains, culverts, power, water and gas connections would be ensured at the Industrial Park.

The other projects approved in the meeting are Strengthening Research Activities of Bang-ladesh Sugarcane Research Institute with (Tk 63.17 crore), Protection of right embankment of River Jamuna and constructing alternate embankment from Kurnibari of Sariakandi Upazila of Bogra to Chandanbaisha (Tk301.53 crore), Karnaphuli Water Supply Project (2nd revised, Tk1,848.53 crore), Scour protection of Meghna Bridge and maintenance of Meghna and Gomoti Bridges (Tk41.05 crore) and de-velopment of various roads under Chittagong City Corporation with (Tk199.99 crore). l

21D

TWEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015T

-JUN

CT

ION

22Trial roomA � nger on the pulse

24NewsBUFT signed MoU with Goethe-Institut

INSIDE

Sign of the times

Illustration: Priyo

Trial RoomWEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015

T-JUNCTION22DT

A � nger on the pulseBuzzDHK has been getting some serious recognition for their humorous content, all of which is well deserved, so we took them uuh...seriously. Join us for a conversation with co-founder Muhammed Asif Khan, about the evolution of the site.

n Rad Sharar Bin Kamal

Stumbling onto the ideaSo far, the Bangladeshi youth, has almost exclusively been dependent on foreign websites to cater to their infotainment needs. For example, to be entertained, we go for BuzzFeed, The Onion, CollegeHumur etc. For tech reviews, we depend on The Verge, CNET. To know about upcoming events in Dhaka, we look up AllEvents or Eventbrite. The question that came to our minds is that, why isn’t there a Bangladeshi platform that serves all those needs for our youth? “We figured since there isn’t one, we should go ahead and be the one to create such a service. One that entertains our youth with humour, news and updates from the Bangladeshi point of view. One that can we can all call our very own. That is how BuzzDHK came to be” says Asif.

Starting the buzzThey say the hardest part of a start-up is the actual execution. Too many ideas just remain in the conceptual stage and never see the light of day. Nishadul Haque Nihal isn’t one to make that mistake. Teaming up with Abdullah Atique, they were very quick in designing the website and launching the Facebook page in a flash, after they made up their mind that BuzzDHK should be more than just an “idea.” Just before the formal launch of our startup, they took in Rafi Nizamee and Muhammed Asif Khan, initially to help promote the startup, but once things began snowballing, it became an all-hands-on-deck affair, and the founding members became integral elements of the project. “What really

motivated us is how much people liked our concept, and how soon we started getting offers from people wanting to write for our platform. That helped us realise we were on to something that deserves some serious dedication.”

The special first“The first article that helped us create a dent in the community around us is a rather strange one. We all worked on it but really didn’t think it would make much of an impact amongst the readers. The title 8 Things Only A Bengali Medium Student Can Relate To should tell you why we thought of it that way. But then, the article went viral by our standards, bringing a lot of traction our way and eventually scoring 12,000 views, which is a lot for a website that was barely a month old. The eventual success of this article taught us three important lessons:1. One cannot necessarily predict what the

readers want to read. Rather, it is better to try different things and see what works and what doesn’t.

2. Entertainment is one topic that appeals to all segments of the youth population.

3. Topics from the Bangladeshi point of view are perfect to differentiate us from foreign websites, as they resonate quite well with our readers.Other humour articles, many written

in the context of the Bangladeshi life, by some awesome members of the BuzzDHK team had similar success stories to tell, leading us to adjust our core proposition. From then on, it was not just to fill in the youth on all the news and updates they would want to read. Sure, you can give

people precious information, but who’s to say we can’t make them laugh and have a good time along the way? Entertainment soon became a core part of our purpose with BuzzDHK. But it is not just any usual entertainment. Where else with you find entertaining articles from the Bangladeshi point of view?”

Celebrity mode onWhen things start going your way, it is always important to keep in mind that Murphy’s law never takes a break. One of the team members found this out the hard way when one of his articles went viral, resulting in him being inundated with friend requests and inbox praise. Right around this time, the site reached its limit with its international web host. “For one month, the entire site was down as we battled endlessly with the host to reinstate our site, to no avail. A month of absence after getting quite a bit of traction is not easy to jump back from. But given how much people put faith and appreciation into our idea, what we were doing and the hard work the entire BuzzDHK team had been putting through, it made little sense to us to pack our bags and give up. We had to start from scratch, so to speak. Having to cope with losing all the view counts, we re-made the site, and painstakingly re-uploaded all the articles. Our team members did not lose heart either, and together, we started afresh and now we are glad to say that we are stronger than ever!”

Pros and uh oh’s“Our main blessing and strength lies in our team, hands down. You can have a

great product, a great idea or service, but if you don’t have the right people pushing it ahead, it is going to be a failure. The current crop of Dhaka youth hides a rich pool of highly gifted writers, and the fact that they chose BuzzDHK to be the platform for their write-ups is our biggest inspiration. Because they are not short of options when it comes to writing for a website or publication, by choosing BuzzDHK they are putting faith in the idea, the concept and the vision. Some of our senior members in the team, such as Adiba Islam, Kash� a Ahmed, Na� sa Afsana Taskia, Tash� a Rawnak Anika, Ayman Rahman Arghyo, Fableeha Bushra Chowdhury and Anand Rahman have been absolutely brilliant. The whole team is responsible for our articles, our views, our reach, and the spread of our name. So as long as the team sticks together, with members from diverse universities and schools around the city, the platform will keep growing, both in numbers and in strength.”

Technical issues top the list of problems for the outfit. Sites like Buzzfeed or Mashable backed by multi-billion dollar conglomerates and have the luxury to employ dedicated technicians and web hosting services that BuzzDHK doesn’t have. Add that to slow Internet, and a big hassle for readers accessing the site through their mobile devices arise. In the face of these challenges, the team is leveraging all their resources to provide the best experience for their readers. “As long as we have our dedicated and talented team of writers with us, such issues will never keep us from growing and evolving!” Asif exclaims.

Trial Room T-JUNCTION 23D

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WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015

After-buzz“I have a strange habit” Asif confesses. “Whenever I want to know about any particular topic of any kind, I would type in the keywords and end it with “wiki.” For example, if I wanted to know more about Richard Branson, I would Google “Richard Branson wiki.” That way, the Wikipedia article of Branson would come up at the very top. It is because I have huge respect and trust in Wikipedia. Nishadul Haque Nihal envisions the same phenomenon for the youth of Dhaka in terms of BuzzDHK.

That is, whenever one needs to know about upcoming futsal events in Dhaka, he would google “futsal buzzdhk.” Whenever someone needs to know if any good part-time jobs for students are available, he would google “part-time jobs buzzdhk.” And whenever one wants a taste of all the different topics in life from the Bangladeshi perspective, which is not present in any of the fancy foreign websites out there, he would just search from his bookmarks and visit BuzzDHK.”That’s the vision! l

A basic overview of BuzzDHKBuzzDHK is a platform for the youth of Dhaka to be entertained and also stay updated on news and information that they would � nd relevant. Basically, if you are looking for some cool humour, give the site a visit. And if you want to stay updated on di� erent sorts of news (events, food reviews, part-time jobs, sales promotions, tech reviews etc) that is relevant for the youth, let this site be your guide.

Photo: The BuzzDHK team

NewsT-JUNCTION24DT

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015

BUFT signed MoU with Goethe-Institut

Independent University Bangladesh (IUB) launched a female dormitory

Grameenphone (GP) Recruitment Boot Camp 2015 held at Eastern University

BGMEA University of Fashion & Technology (BUFT) and Goethe-Institut in Bangladesh signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on August 30 at the BUFT campus. This Memorandum of Understanding is a framework for mutual interest in the � elds of educational and academic exchanges, joint fashion competition, research, internship, academic transfer agreements, encouraging international cultural exchange and relations between BUFT and Goethe-Institut. Under MoU, both BUFT and Goethe-Institut will host local- international sustainable fashion workshops and exhibitions for both German and Bangladeshi students.

On behalf of BUFT, vice chairman (Finance), Reaz-Bin-Mahmood along with the board of trustees, signed the MoU with the director of Goethe-Institut, Judith Mirschberger.

During the ceremony vice chancellor of BUFT, Prof Syed Masud Husain; pro-vice chancellor, Prof Ayub Nabi Khan; registrar A N M Ra� qul Alam; head of logistics Wg Cdr Shahidullah (Rtd); dean of School of Business Prof Md Saiful Islam; head of the Departments and Coordinators, and high o� cials of BUFT were all present at the event. The activities under the MoU will hopefully start from next month. l

IUB-Saima Hall, a female dormitory for meritorious students from outside Dhaka city, was recently launched in Baridhara, with generous support from the Shaheed Khalek and Major Salek Bir Uttam Trust.

Tahrunnesa Abdullah, a renowned social activist and Magsaysay award winner, inaugurated the ceremony as the chief guest. She commented: “I am really delighted to mention that IUB has done something signi� cant for the female students. There are many capable personalities and institutions in our country and should also come forward, initiate similar facilities and sustain these in our society.”

A Matin Chowdhury, chairman of IUB Founding Trust; Rashed Chowdhury, chairman of the Board of Trustees and M Omar Rahman, vice chancellor, and other o� cials also attended the launching ceremony.

The dormitory students will receive full tuition scholarship from IUB along with free dormitory facilities.

Dormitory supervisor, Tahsina Zaman said: “This is a unique initiative in Bangladesh where all sorts of facilities are provided for female students with extra care, safety and security. In fact, when we were students and stayed in hostels, we didn’t get these facilities in our time.”l

Career Services and International O� ce (CSIO) of Eastern University (EU) arranged a two-day recruitment campaign titled “Grameenphone Recruitment Boot Camp 2015” with the support of Grameenphone Ltd from August 25-26 in the EU Seminar Hall. More than 200 registered students

from di� erent departments of Eastern University attended the interview along with Grameenphone authority. It is expected that more than 40 successful freshers from EU will get the opportunity to work with the GP family to provide the widest network coverage of Bangladesh. On each day, a

delegation comprised of eight members from Grameenphone conducted the session on four di� erent booths. Professor Abdur Rab, vice chancellor; Professor Abdul Hannan Chowdhury, pro-vice chancellor; Maj Gen Kazi Ashfaq Ahmed, psc (retd), registrar; and other respective members of EU visited the boot camp to share their thoughts.

Having joined the session, EU students not only had the opportunity to work at GP but they also got acquainted with the interview process, which helped them develop their interview skills. l

25D

TWEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015

SERENA, DJOKOVIC, NADAL SAIL THROUGH

BEST OF 2015 WORLD ATHLETICS CHAMPIONSHIPS

27 2928

Everton mid� elder Darron Gibson was banned from driving for

20 months and sentenced to a 12-month community order on

Tuesday after he collided with three cyclists and drove o�

NO DRIVING

SportNARAYANGANJ LOOK TO UPSET FENI IN U-15 FINAL

First international T20 tournament for the disabled begins todayn Minhaz Uddin Khan

The International Committee of the Red Cross Twenty20 cricket tournament for the disabled is all set to raise its curtains at Mirpur’s Sher-e-Bangla National Stadium today. Alongside hosts Bangladesh, Afghanistan, England, India and Pakistan will battle it out for the title in the nine-day tournament.

The opening ceremony and the tournament’s inaugural match involving the home side and England will be held at SBNS today. Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina is scheduled to inaugurate the � ve-nation competition. The remaining matches of the tournament, including the � nal and the closing ceremony, will be held at BKSP, Savar. The grand � nale is scheduled for September 10.

On the eve of the tournament opener, Bangladesh Cricket Board CEO Nizamuddin Chowdhury informed the media that the competition is unique and the � rst of its kind.

“The BCB is honoured for being able to be a part of such a noble initiative. I hope more such tournaments will be held in the future, allowing the disabled ones to enjoy the beau-tiful sport called cricket,” said Nizamuddin yesterday in Mirpur.

Bangladesh ODI and T20 captain Mashrafe bin Mortaza, who is the brand ambassador of the tournament, thanked the organisers for arranging such an inimitable competition.

“I am very excited and honoured that I have

been made a part of this tournament. This tournament will help the society minimise the di� erences between the physically challenged and people with abilities. I thank the ICRC and other organisers for holding

such an event,” said Mashrafe.“We have a decent Bangladesh side par-

ticipating in the tournament. I will request everyone to support the side, like you guys do with the national team. I also want to encour-

age the visiting teams. I wish the tournament well,” he added.

ICRC, with the association of the BCB, Ministry of Youth and Sports and BKSP have arranged the tournament.l

Afghanistan captain Ashraf Khan (L), India captain Dinesh Kumar (2L), Pakistan skipper Hasnain Alam (C), Bangladesh captain Alam Khan (2R) and England captain Iain Nairn pose with the ICRC cricket tournament for people with physical disabilities trophy at SBNS yesterday BCB

‘Schweichler made me a better goalkeeper’n Tribune Report

Bangladesh are just a day away from facing their biggest opponents – Asian champions Australia - in a very long time and goalkeeper Shahidul Alam Sohel believes all the players should try to perform to the best of their abili-ties to achieve something from their 2018 Fifa World Cup second round quali� er, slated for tomorrow at NIB Stadium in Perth.

The Sheikh Jamal DC custodian put up a brave display against Malaysia in the just-concluded Fifa international friendly in Kuala Lumpur, making a number of brilliant saves to hold the hosts to a goalless draw.

And ahead of the all-important Austral-ia clash, Sohel admitted that the stalemate against the Malaysians will inspire them when they take the � eld tomorrow.

“We played well against Malaysia and I believe that it will give us more con� dence ahead of the game against Australia. Every-

body praised my performance and I want to continue my form in the next game as well,”

said Sohel.“Having said that, the Australia attacking

line is stronger than the one we faced against Malaysia. So to overcome this challenge, the defenders and all the players should perform, not only the keeper,” he added.

Sohel thanked Bangladesh’s German goal-keeping coach Christian Schweichler for the improvement in his form. “I trained under his supervision ever since I recovered from inju-ry. He taught me new things. I am now more con� dent than before. Whatever the result will be, I will try to give my very best.”

Ahead of tomorrow’s match, the Bengal Tigers enjoyed a two-hour training session at Dorrien Gardens, Lawley Street yesterday. It was learnt that the coaching sta� are now mainly working on the players’ psychological aspects. l

The Sheikh Jamal DC custodian put up a brave display against Malaysia in the just-concluded Fifa international friendly in Kuala Lumpur, making a number of brilliant saves to hold the hosts to a goalless draw

Sport26DT

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015

MAJOR EUROPEAN TRANSFERS LEADING UP TO THE DEADLINE DAY

BCB unlikely to respond to PCB’s proposaln Minhaz Uddin Khan

Bangladesh Cricket Board is still undecided on the bilateral series proposed to them by Paki-stan recently. Pakistan Cricket Board invited the Tigers in Dubai for two Tests and three one-day internationals this December but BCB cricket operations committee chairman Nai-mur Rahman said they are unsure as to how they can � t the invitation in their schedule.

“We (BCB) will hold the third edition of BPL at that point of time. So it is very unlikely that we will accept PCB’s proposal,” said Naimur.

It was understood that PCB made the ap-proach after their planned bilateral series with India, comprising two Tests, � ve ODIs and three international Twenty20 matches, got mired in limbo due to the political tension between the two nations.

However, the one thing BCB is considering is sending the women’s team to Pakistan but that move solely depends on the security clearance.

Headed by BCB’s security consultant, Major (Retd.) Hossain Imam, a four-member delega-tion team have already been formed and are awaiting the government’s clearance to visit the terror-stricken Pakistan in order to assess the security situation. If things go as planned, the Bangladesh women’s team are likely to leave for Pakistan on the 27th of this month.lBrazilian defender Dante (L) left Bayern Munich for VfL Wolfsburg while Javier Hernandez ‘Chicharito’ (R) poses alongside Bayer Leverkusen manager Roger

Schmidt after leaving previous employers Manchester United AP

Real blame United for De Gea deal collapsen AFP, Madrid

Real Madrid have blamed Manchester United for the collapse of goalkeeper David de Gea’s move to the Spanish giants, claiming the English side sent the documents needed to complete the deal after the Spanish transfer deadline had passed.

Madrid seemed set to conclude the long-running transfer saga with a deal that would see the Spanish giants pay a signi� cant transfer fee for De Gea and send Costa Rican international goalkeeper Keylor Navas to

United as part of the deal.However, Spanish league sources con-

� rmed that the player hadn’t been registered and Madrid admitted they had sent the re-quired documentation to the league after the window closed at midnight local time (2200GMT) on Monday.

“Manchester United introduced into the Transfer Matching System (TMS) the details for the transfer of David de Gea, not those for Keylor Navas, at 00:00 Spanish time, send-ing simultaneously to Real Madrid the signed transfer contracts. Real Madrid received

the complete documentation at 00:02 and tried to access the TMS but this was already closed,” Madrid said in a lengthy statement posted on their website on Tuesday.

“Madrid, facing the possibility of a conten-tious situation in the transfer of the player, decided to send the contracts to the Spanish Professional League, even knowing the dead-line had already passed.

“In conclusion, Real Madrid did everything necessary in every moment to try to � nalise these two transfers.”

Despite Madrid’s prolonged interest in De

Gea, they claim negotiations between the two clubs for the player didn’t begin until Mon-day morning. Real Madrid haven’t indicated whether they intend to appeal to football’s governing body FIFA in an attempt to force the transfer through.

FIFA refused to comment on the speci� c details of the case when contacted by AFP on Tuesday, but con� rmed that no appeal had been lodged by any of the parties involved.

“Up until now, we do not appear to have been contacted by either of the parties in this matter,” said a FIFA spokesperson.l

Song and Moses join West Ham on loanFormer Cameroon interna-tional Alex Song and Nigeria winger Victor Moses have joined West Ham United on season-long loan deals, the Premier League club announced on Tuesday.

United loan Januzaj to DortmundManchester United’s Belgium forward Adnan Januzaj has joined Borussia Dortmund on loan for a season, the German club con� rmed on Monday.

Leverkusen swoop for United’s HernandezBayer Leverkusen have bought Mexico striker Javier Hernandez from Manchester United as they look to plug the gap left by South Korean Son Heung-min who joined Tottenham Hotspur last week.

Juve boost midfield with Hernanes, LeminaJuventus have bolstered their depleted mid� eld following the departure of Andrea Pirlo and Arturo

Vidal by signing Hernanes from Inter Milan and upcoming Frenchman Mario Lemina from Marseille.

Djilobodji seals Chelsea moveFrench Ligue 1 club Nantes con� rmed on Tuesday that their Senegal international defender Papy Djilo-bodji has joined English Premier League champions Chelsea on a four-year deal.

Everton move for Argentine defender FunesArgentine centre-back Ramiro Funes Mori has joined Everton from River Plate for a fee of £9.5 million the Premier League club announced on Tuesday.

Inter capture Melo, Ljajic in late dealsInter Milan have bolstered their new-look mid� eld by capturing Brazilian veteran Felipe Melo and Bosnian Adem Ljajic from Galatasaray and Roma respectively, the Serie A club announced Monday.

West Brom sign Lindegaard from UnitedWest Bromwich Albion have signed goalkeeper Anders Lindegaard from Manchester United on a two-year contract.

City defender Denayer joins GalatasarayManchester City centre back Jason Denayer has joined Turkish club Galatasaray on a season-long loan, according to a statement on the Premier League club’s website.

Portugal defender Rolando joins MarseillePortugal defender Rolando has joined Olympique de Marseille from Porto, the French club said on Monday without disclosing any further details.

Socceroo Kruse joins Langerak at StuttgartAustralia winger Robbie Kruse will join Socceroos team-mate Mitchell Langerak at VfB Stuttgart this season after being loaned out for a year by Bayer Leverkusen on Monday.

Southampton’s Mayuka signs for MetzFrench club Metz have signed forward Emmanuel Mayuka from Southampton on a permanent deal, the Premier League club said on their website.

Adrian joins Villarreal on loan from PortoFormer Atletico Madrid forward Adrian Lopez has joined Villarreal on a season-long loan from Porto, the Spanish club con� rmed on Monday.

Layun leaves Watford to join Porto on loanFC Porto have signed defender Miguel Layun from Watford on a season-long loan, with an option to buy him for six million euros at the end of the cur-rent campaign, the Portuguese club said.

Norwich’s Wolfswinkel joins Betis on loanNorwich City striker Ricky van Wolfswinkel has joined La Liga side Real Betis on a season-long loan, the Premier League club said on its website. l

Sport 27D

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India captain Virat Kohli takes a stump as a memento from their 117-run win in the third Test against Sri Lanka in Colombo yesterday

AP

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015

INDvSLINDIA 1ST INNINGS312 (Pujara 145 not out, Mishra 59, Prasad 4-100, Herath 3-84)SRI LANKA 1ST INNINGS201 (Perera 55, Herath 49, Sharma 5-54, Binny 2-24, A. Mishra 2-25)INDIA 2ND INNINGS274 (Sharma 50, Binny 49, Ashwin 58, Prasad 4-69, Pradeep 4-62)SRI LANKA 2ND INNINGS R B(overnight 67-3)U Tharanga c Ojha b I. Sharma             0 7K Silva c Pujara b Yadav                 27 50D Karunaratne c Ojha b Yadav              0 7D Chandimal c Kohli b I. Sharma          18 17A Mathews lbw b I. Sharma               110 240L Thirimanne c Rahul b Ashwin            12  47K Perera c R. Sharma b Ashwin            70 106R Herath lbw b Ashwin                    11 23T. Kaushal not out                         1 14D. Prasad c Binny b Ashwin                 6 4N Pradeep lbw b Mishra                    0 2Extras: (b4, lb2, nb7)                    13  Total (all out, 85 overs)                268

Fall of wickets1-1, 2-2, 3-21, 4-74, 5-107, 6-242, 7-249, 8-257, 9-263, 10-268.       BowlingSharma 19-5-32-3, Yadav 15-3-65-2, Binny 13-3-49-0, Mishra 18-1-47-1, Ashwin 20-2-69-4   

India won by 117 runs;take series 2-1

Four charged for misconduct in SL TestThree Sri Lankan players and one Indian have been charged for misconduct during the ongoing third Test, with details to be revealed after the match, the International Cricket Council said on Tuesday. India’s  fast bowler Ishant Sharma and the Sri Lankan trio of Dhammika Prasad, Dinesh Chandimal and Lahiru Thirimanne were involved in a heated � are-up during the fourth day’s play on Monday in Colombo. Tempers rose in the � nal session as Sharma and the Sri Lankan � elders had a heated exchange after Prasad bowled three consecutive bouncers to the Indian tailender.

–AFP

Ozil nursing knee injury but should be � tGermany playmaker Mesut Ozil is nursing a knee injury but should be � t for their Euro 2016 quali� ers against Poland on Friday and Scotland next week, Germany assistant coach Thomas Schneider said on Tuesday. The Arsenal mid� elder will not be training with the team on Tuesday and will be treating “a minor knee in� ammation” but said he would be back in training on Wednesday.

–REUTERS

Dembele withdraws from Belgium squadMoussa Dembele has withdrawn from Bel-gium’s squad for their European Championship quali� ers against Bosnia and Cyprus and has been replaced by Steven Defour, the Belgian football association said on Tuesday. Dembele injured his ankle in Tottenham Hotspur’s match against Everton on Saturday and underwent a scan in Brussels on Monday. Defour from Anderlecht will join the squad for Thursday’s match in Brussels against Bosnia and Sunday’s encounter away against Cyprus.

–REUTERS

Loew backs Schweini after shaky United startGermany coach Joachim Loew is backing Bastian Schweinsteiger to brush o� his shaky start at Manchester United when he captains his country in Friday’s key Euro 2016 quali� er against Poland. The world champions host Poland in Frankfurt with Adam Nawalka’s visitors top of Group D by a point from Loew’s Germany, who then face third-placed Scotland in Glasgow on Monday, in two important quali� ers for Schweinsteiger’s side.

–AFP

Nigeria move Sierra Leone Africa tie after Ebola fearsA 2017 Africa Cup of Nations qualifying match between Sierra Leone and African champions the Ivory Coast will now be played in Port Harcourt after Lagos declined to stage the match because of concerns over the Ebola disease. The Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) agreed to stage the match after Sierra Leone were banned from hosting international matches because of the deadly Ebola scourge ravaging the country.

–AFP

QUICK BYTES

‘I was told it had never been done before’ India end 22-year series drought in Sri Lankan AFP, Colombo

India overcame a gallant century by Sri Lan-kan captain Angelo Mathews to win the � nal Test by 117 runs yesterday and end a 22-year wait for a series win on the island.

The hosts, set a victory target of 386, were bowled out for 268 after tea on the � fth day at the Sinhalese Sports Club in Colombo to hand the tourists a 2-1 series scoreline.

Sri Lanka were revived by a 135-run stand for the sixth wicket between Mathews and debu-tant Kusal Perera, but the dismissal of both batsmen on either side of tea sealed their fate.

O� -spinner Ravichandran Ashwin � nished with four for 69 and was named man of the series for taking 21 wickets in the three Tests.

Seamer Ishant Sharma took three wick-ets in the innings, including the vital scalp of Mathews after tea, to take his tally to 200 wickets in his 65th Test.

India had fought back after losing the opening Test in Galle by 63 runs to win the second at the P. Sara Oval in Colombo by 278 runs and then took the enthralling � nal Test in the last session of play.

India’s last series success in Sri Lanka came under Mohammad Azharuddin’s captaincy in 1993 when they won 1-0.

Virat Kohli, enjoying a series win for the � rst time as Indian Test captain, said he was delighted to see the team bounce back after losing the � rst match.

“Being 0-1 down was never easy,” he said. “I was told it had never been done before by us abroad, so we managed to create a bit of history.

“It feels nice, especially with such a young team early in our careers, to achieve a magnif-icent milestone and win a series here for the � rst time in 22 years.

“The attitude has been brilliant. That is why we are playing the kind of cricket we are play-ing. There are areas we want to improve on, but the number of bad sessions we had in the series were few. I am really proud of the boys.”

Sri Lanka had slipped to a shaky 107-5 before lunch when Mathews and Perera lift the hosts to 249-6 by tea. India grabbed the last � ve wickets for 26 runs after Sri Lanka were sailing at a comfortable 242-5 before Perera’s dismissal. l

Narayanganj look to upset Feni in U-15 � naln Tribune Report

Feni and Narayanganj districts will lock horns with each other today in the � nal of the Sailor-Bangladesh Football Federation National Under-15 Football Championship at Bangabandhu National Stadium. The grand � nale will kick o� at 5pm and BTV will telecast it live.

The age-level tournament got underway on June 29 this year with the participation of 12,200 young footballers from 61 districts across the country. And after two months of ac-tion featuring as many rounds, the lucky foot-ballers from Feni and Narayanganj will battle for the winner’s prize, worth Taka two lakh.

Both the � nalists sealed their berth after winning their respective semi-� nals 5-4 in the tie-breaker. While Narayanganj defeated Syl-het, Feni ousted hosts Dhaka. Feni are the only team that have been able to maintain their hun-dred percent winning record in the � nal round, which started on August 23 in the capital.

In spite of the opponents’ unbeaten run, Narayanganj coach Aslam Chowdhury and captain Antar Kumar are con� dent of upset-ting the record books in today’s � nal. Feni coach Ashraful Anwar Shimul and skipper If-tekhar Hossain Anik, on the other hand, are determined of continuing their unbeaten run and clinching the trophy. l

28DT Sport

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015

BEST OF WORLD ATHLETICS CHAMPIONSHIPS 2015 The Hollywood script

Usain Bolt v Justin Gatlin. Bolt entered Beijing encumbered by the challenge of “saving the sport” from the dastardly Gatlin, banned twice for doping violations. It appeared a burden too heavy for one man to carry, as the Jamaican ran a ragged 100 metres semi-� nal in 9.96sec, far adrift of the American’s 9.77. But in a moment of collective catharsis, he came good with a glorious perfor-mance in the � nal, squeezing out his nemesis on the line by one hundredth of a second. The encore was even better, as Bolt produced a stunning time of 19.55 in the 200m � nal for his 10th world championship gold.

The Chinese!Song Tao. The man from host broadcaster China Central Television had no rivals for this accolade, dramat-ically � ooring the all-conquering Bolt mere seconds after

his 200m triumph. Song had been tracking the sprinter on his lap of honour, only for his Segway scooter to strike a strut on the camera rail and ca-reer into the back of the double world champion, upending him by the ankles to cue gasps around the Bird’s Nest. Song was full of contrition after-wards, handing Bolt a good-luck charm to wear around his wrist.

Best celebrationHolder da Silva, of Guinea-Bissau, re-acted with hilarious over-exuberance to his modest feat of � nishing second in the 100m prelim-inaries. Cavorting in front of a sparse audience and making chest-thumping ges-

tures straight into the camera lenses, he behaved as if he had just won an Olympic title.

Most gasp-inducing featAmerica’s Christian Taylor was a strong contender in a crowded � eld, as he hopped, skipped and jumped to 18.21m in the triple jump. It was the second longest leap in history behind Jonathan Edwards’s 18.29m, set in 1995.

Most brain-dead momentOne of the most � ercely contested categories thanks to such a plethora of seemingly moronic incidents over the course of the past nine days. James Dasaolu’s decision to slow down to jogging pace 60m into his 100m heat seemed remarkably stupid at the time and then became worse in hindsight when he only missed quali� cation by 0.01sec.

Best Brit/Mum of the Year Part IIJessica Ennis-Hill. Last year the mantle of supermum was expertly taken on by Jo Pavey, who upset all odds to win European 10,000m gold just 11 months after the birth of her daughter Emily. This time round it fell

to Ennis-Hill to do the unthinkable by adding the world heptathlon title to her Olympic crown just over a year after the birth of her son Reggie. Three months earlier she did not even know if she would be able to return to top-level competition. Now she is back at the head of the pack.

Special award for persistenceTwo fully deserving winners in Rolanda Bell and Veronica Campbell-Brown. Bell, of Panama, provided one of the greatest athletics images of all time when she failed to navigate the water jump during the 3,000m steeplechase heats, performed a Superman-esque dive over the top and ended up with the entire top half of her body submerged. She managed to haul her soaking body out and � nished the race ... albeit 20sec behind the next

slowest runner. Campbell-Brown’s act of lunacy in-volved leaving her lane after turning into the home straight in her 200m heat and running the remain-der of the race in the adjacent lane belonging to Britain’s Margaret Adeoye. Bizarrely the Jamaican was not disquali� ed and went on to win bronze.

Most Herculean effortOn the one hand Aries Merritt is the reigning Olympic 110m hurdles champion and world record holder. On the other he is due to undergo a kidney transplant in two days’ time. The American was told his running days were over when he was diag-nosed with a rare genetic disorder two years ago and hooked up to a dialysis machine. Merritt spent months in hospital and has barely raced since, but decided to compete in Beijing for his “mental sanity” instead of moping around at home ahead of his impending operation. Despite his kidneys functioning at just 20 per cent, Merritt managed to win bronze in Beijing. If it turns out to be his last race it will be one that he will forever look upon with immense pride. l

IAAF men’s 3000 metres steeplechase gold medallist and Kenya’s team captain Ezekiel Kemboi addresses supporters upon their arrival at the Jomo Kenyatta airport in Nairobi, yesterday, after they topped the medals table at the recently concluded 15th International Association of Athletics Federations World Championships at the National Stadium in Beijing, China REUTERS

Sport 29D

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WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015

England182 for 5 (Morgan 74, Moeen 72) Australia177 for 8 (Smith 90)

England won by � ve runs

Ten Sports 9:00PM US Open 20152nd Round, Session 1

DAY’S WATCH

Serena, Djokovic, Nadal sail throughn AFP, New York

Three-time defending champion Serena Wil-liams  launched her quest for a historic title Monday by overwhelming 86th-ranked Rus-sian Vitalia Diatchenko and advancing to the second round of the US Open.

The world number one was a 6-0, 2-0 winner after only 30 minutes at Arthur Ashe Stadium when Diatchenko retired with a left foot injury, advancing Williams into a sec-ond-round match against Dutch quali� er Kiki Bertens.

“If I can just stay relaxed and stay in the points and stay calm and happy out there, I have to look at it as I have nothing to lose,” Williams said.

The 33-year-old American chases the � rst calendar Grand Slam since Ste� Graf in 1988 and a 22nd career major title to match Graf’s Open Era record, two shy of Australian Mar-garet Court’s all-time mark.

Williams praised the loud New York crowd, which has adored her since she captured her � rst major title at the 1999 US Open as a teen prodigy.

“I felt the support and love on this journey and milestone I’m trying to take one match at a time,” Williams said. 

“I feel so good. I’m so ready. I’m at home, where it all began for me in ‘99. It all feels great.”

Top-ranked Novak Djokovic and eighth seed Rafael Nadal also cruised into the sec-

ond round on the men’s side but Japanese fourth seed Kei Nishikori crashed out after his US Open runner-up e� ort last year.

Djokovic needed only one hour and 11 minutes to capture a 6-1, 6-1, 6-1 victory over Brazil’s Joao Souza.

“There’s something I love about number one for sure,” said Djokovic, who plays Aus-trian Andreas Haider-Maurer next.

“Hopefully I can keep it up. If I can, I feel I have a really good chance against anybody.”

Nadal, in his � rst US Open match since winning in 2013 after missing 2014 with an injury, avenged a loss last year at Basel to Cro-atian teen Borna Coric with a 6-3, 6-2, 4-6, 6-4 victory, booking a date with Argentina’s Die-go Schwartzman. l

Kompany expects Chelsea, Arsenal to bounce backn Reuters

Manchester City captain Vincent Kompany refuses to get carried away by his team’s strong start to their Premier League campaign and expects usual contenders like Chelsea to bounce back after stuttering early in the season.

City have won all their four games this season, scoring 10 goals and conceding none, while champions Chelsea have four points from as many games, including a 3-0 loss to the Sky Blues.

“I’m trying generally not to care (about Chelsea’s start). I’m focused on ourselves. Teams like Chelsea, Arsenal ... the big teams will always come back so it’s a matter of time,” the 29-year-old Belgian said at BX Brussels, the football club he set up in 2013.

City � nished eight points behind Chelsea last season, despite scoring 83 goals, the high-est in the league.

“For me, to have a season like last season wasn’t acceptable and I’ve done what I’ve always know when times were tough,” Kompany said.

“I just got back to basics, worked even harder and I’ve come back stronger. Right now, what I see in this team which I haven’t seen - probably ever - is just a level of focus.l

Cook in search of opening partnern AFP, London

It is Test cricket’s equivalent of a lonely hearts advert: experienced opener seeks partner for meaningful relationship.

Yet for England captain Alastair Cook it is no joke. Since former skipper and � rst-wick-et colleague Andrew Strauss retired in 2012, left-hander Cook has had six partners at the top of the order.

This season saw Adam Lyth join a list that includes Nick Compton, Joe Root, Michael Carberry, Sam Robson and Jonathan Trott, who has since retired from Test duty

Compton’s nine appearances and 17 in-nings are the most any of the sextet have so far managed alongside Cook, although Root has � ourished at four and � ve.

Yorkshire’s Lyth made a Test hundred against New Zealand at his Headingley home ground but struggled during the Ashes, aver-aging a mere 12.77 in England’s 3-2 series win over Australia.

Lyth’s place is now under threat ahead of England’s departure to the United Arab Emir-ates in October for three Tests against Pakistan.

Moeen Ali has been touted as a possible replacement for Lyth in the UAE, a move that would allow England to play two spinners on pitches known to aid turn. l

England’s Morgan glad to justify Fraser’s faithn AFP, Cardiff

England Twenty20 captain Eoin Morgan thanked his county boss Angus Fraser after marking his return to cricket with a � ne 74 in his side’s � ve-run win over Australia in Car-di� on Monday.

Morgan had been struggling for runs at domestic level in the season, averaging 26 in T20, 10.16 in � rst-class cricket and just 6.66 in the 50-over cup. He came into the county season having had a busy period where he led England in their woeful 50-over World Cup campaign in Australia and New Zealand be-fore heading to the Indian Premier League.

It led him to ask Fraser, his boss at Mid-

dlesex and also an England selector, if he could take some time o� from playing for the Lord’s-based county in a bid to get himself in the right frame of mind for England duty.

The result was Monday’s innings and a stand of 135 in just 75 balls with fellow left-hander Moeen Ali (72 not out) that was the centrepiece of England’s 182 for � ve. l

Rafael Nadal of Spain hits a return to Borna Coric of Croatia during their match at the US Open in New York on Monday REUTERS

DOWNTIME30DT

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015

CALVIN AND HOBBES

PEANUTS

DILBERT

How to solve: Fill in the blank spaces with the numbers 1 – 9. Every row, column and 3 x 3 box must contain all nine digits with no number repeating.

CODE-CRACKER

CROSSWORD

SUDOKU

YESTERDAY’S SOLUTIONS

CODE-CRACKER

How to solve: Each number in our CODE-CRACKER grid represents a di� erent letter of the alphabet. For example, today 8 represents I so � ll I every time the � gure 8 appears.You have two letters in the control grid to start you o� . Enter them in the appropriate squares in the main grid, then use your knowledge of words to work out which letters go in the missing squares.Some letters of the alphabet may not be used.As you get the letters, � ll in the other squares with the same number in the main grid, and the control grid. Check o� the list of alphabetical letters as you identify them.

ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ

CROSSWORD

ACROSS1 Makes believe (6)5 Short jerky motion (3)7 Bird (5)8 Atelier (6)10 Fresh (3)12 Chair (4)13 Finish (3)14 Nimble (4)16 Finest quality (4)17 Spoil (3)18 Wise man (4)20 Spinning toy (3)23 Drinks to (6)24 Interior decoration (5)25 Marsh (3)26 Airmen (6)

DOWN 1 Church recess (4)2 Entertains (6)3 Group of three (5)4 Black deposit (4)5 Container (3)6 United (3)9 Impression left by blow (4)11 Twisted (3)14 Long detailed story (4)15 Quickly (mus) 6)16 Sporting item (3)17 New Zealander (5)18 Halt (4)19 Enquires (4)21 Lyric poem (3)22 Female swan (3)

SUDOKU

SHOWTIME 31D

TWEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015

JATRA BIROTI BULLETIN

CELEBS ON SOCIALNargis @NargisFakhri U were in my dream last night @IISuperwomanII We were running away from zombies & then i broke ur phone U were not happy bout that. =O

Farhan Akhtar@FarOutAkhtar Big shout out and a big hug to all 6 million for their continued love and support.

Nicole Scherzinger @NicoleScherzy Look who’s in London !!! #screamface

Top features from MIFF 2015

n Showtime Desk

A retrospective � lm screening of independ-ent � lm-maker Abu Sayeed will take place at the Shawkat Osman Auditorium of National Public Library in Shahbagh from September 4-5.

Six of his feature � lms, each di� erent in style, story and theme, will be showcased at the exhibition. Kittonkhola, Shankhanad and Nirontor will be screened on the opening day at 3pm, 5pm and 7pm respectively. On the next day, Banshi, Rupantor and his latest � lm Opekkha will be screened at 3pm, 5pm and 7pm respectively.

One of the pioneers of independent � lm industry here, Abu Sayeed, started his career as a � lmmaker with his short � ction, Abor-ton, in the late 80s. All of his major works are exhibited in various international � lm festivals all around the world. Till date, Abu Sayeed earned six national and three interna-tional awards for his creative � lms. l

Screening of Abu Sayeed’s � lms

Thursday, September 3 “Bhaab” featuring Shoeb: Shoeb is Bangladesh based classical singer, pursuing a solo career, who is also the lead singer of fusion band Gaan Pagol.Ticket: 500BDT

Friday, September 4 Open Mic: Audience driven event. Ticket: 300BDT

Saturday, September 5 Electro/Acoustic featuring The Speakeasy Crew, Fahad Zaman, Don Donadoni and other guest musicians with their instruments, computers, and analog gear. Ticket: 500BDT

Tickets can be booked/purchased online at imdhaka.com. Tea and phuckha included in the ticket price.

Venue: Jatra Biroti. 60 Kemal Ataturk Ave, 1213 Dhaka, Bangladesh

Net� ix’s Beasts of No Nation attains its slot in the o� cial competition section of the BFI London Film Festival.

The festival will commence from October 7-18.

The festival will open and close with the European premieres of Sarah Gavron’s Su� ragette and Danny Boyle’s Steve Jobs, respectively. Festival director Clare Stewart revealed the full program for the 59th edition of the LFF, which will include the Europe-an premieres of Jay Roach’s Trumbo, John Crowley’s Brooklyn and Nicholas Hytner’s The Lady in the Van as sponsor gala screen-ings. Other receivers of sponsor galas are Ben Wheatley’s High-Rise and Scott Coop-er’s Black Mass, while special presentations include Guy Maddin and Evan Johnson’s The Forbidden Room and the European premiere of Davis Guggenheim’s documentary He Named Me Malala. As announced Blanchett will be receiving the BFI Fellowship during the festival’s awards ceremony on October 17.

The festival will screen 238 features, 16 world premieres, eight international premieres, 40 European premieres and 11 archive � lms.

The festival will be split into nine program strands, titled Love, Debate, Dare, Laugh, Thrill, Cult, Journey, Sonic and Family, each with their own gala.

Following bows in Venice and Toronto Beasts of No Nation will compete in the 12-� lm o� cial competition section line-up (which come from a range of nationalities) at the festival. l

“Beasts of No Nation,” from “True Detective” director Cary Fukunaga

n Showtime Desk

Melbourne International Film Festival (MIFF), one of the oldest � lm festivals in the world, curtained o� a few weeks back and is currently showcasing some of the year’s most anticipated movies in local, foreign, art-house, and experimental � avours. MIFF audiences vote for their favourite feature � lms to win the MIFF People’s Choice Awards. This year’s top feature � lm winners are listed below:

Song of the Sea

This visually stunning animation adroitly mixes the magical elements with reality. Watching it will make the viewer wholly immersed in an enchanted world.

Holding the Man

Timothy Conigrave’s best-selling memoir became an award-winning stage play; now, at last, it has been adapted for the big screen.

In the Crosswind

Based on the real life diaries and letters of Erna, this is a tale of a young woman separated from her husband due to brutal persecution and sent to a Gulag.

An

Earning her 24th directorial credit in 23 years, proli� c Japanese auteur Naomi Ka-wase tells a bittersweet tale of old wounds and new beginnings, set in a budding bakery and unravelling against a backdrop of blooming cherry blossoms.

Me and Earl and the Dying GirlDebuting to a standing ovation at Sundance, the � lm is a funny, pop culture-saturated delight based on Jesse Andrew’s novel of the same name. Embracing common com-ing-of-age cliches while joyously subverting them, the � lm is a sure-� re crowd pleaser.

The rest of the list follows Fernando Leon de Aranoa’s Spanish political satire A Perfect Day, Turkish origin Deniz Gamze Ergüven’s feminist � ick Mustang, Sebas-tian Schipper’s German crime drama Victoria, Paul Ireland’s Australian comedy drama Pawno, and Jafar Panahi’s political auteur Tehran Taxi.l

BACK PAGE32DT

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015

INT’L T20 FOR DISABLED BEGINS PAGE 25

TEHRAN READY TO TALK GAS PIPELINE WITH DHAKA PAGE 15

INDIAN LAW COMMISSION FOR ABOLISHING DEATH PENALTY PAGE 10

Top court questions legality of section 57n Tribune Report

The High Court yesterday issued a rule upon the government to explain why section 57 of the Information Communication and Tech-nology (ICT) Act should not be declared un-constitutional.

The bench of Justice Moyeenul Islam Chowdhury and Justice Md Ashraful Kamal asked the secretaries to the ministries of ICT, home and information to come up with their explanations by four weeks.

The order came in response to a writ peti-tion moved by 11 eminent citizens including university teachers challenging the legality of the much-talk-about provision.

During the hearing, petitioners’ lawyer Jyotirmoy Barua told the court that a similar provision in India’s ICT Act had been termed unconstitutional, and therefore, scrapped by their apex court in March. “Since the section 57 of our ICT Act was prepared based on the India’s one, it should be scraped too,” he said.

On the other hand, Deputy Attorney General Motahar Hossain Sazu said that a separate High Court bench was holding hearing on a similar

writ petition while another petition rejected. “So there is no need to move the third one.”

Meanwhile, the bench of Justice Farah Mahbub and Justice Kazi Md Ejarul Haque Akondo � xed today to pass order on the pe-tition � led by Zakir Hossain, an accused in a case � led under the section 57.

Attorney General Mahbubey Alam opposed the petition during the second day’s hearing yesterday. He said the section was consistent with relevant provisions of the constitution.

Zakir moved the petition on August 26 urg-ing the court to declare the section unconstitu-tional. His lawyer placed arguments on Sunday.

Another petition was � led by lawyer Yunus Ali Akanda last week. But the court rejected the petition after a hearing terming it premature.

Debate over the section 57 and demands for its cancellation began since the formula-tion of the Act in 2006. But the controversy intensi� ed recently when veteran journalist and war crimes trial campaigner Probir Sikdar was arrested and sent to jail in a case � led for defaming a minister.

Journalists, rights bodies and writers have been demanding cancellation of the controver-

sial provision claiming that it is being misused.The law minister, Anisul Huq, recently said

the government would consider revising the section as many raised questions about it.

The ICT Act was passed in 2006 and amended twice – in 2009 and 2013. In the latest amendment, o� ences under section 57 were made non-bailable and the maximum punishment extended to 14 years’ imprison-ment. O� enders can be punished by mini-mum seven years imprisonment and the � ne can be as high as Tk1 crore under the Act.

“If any person deliberately publishes or transmits or causes to be published or trans-mitted in the website or in any other elec-tronic form any material which is false and obscene and if anyone sees, hears or reads it having regard to all relevant circumstances, its e� ect is such as to in� uence the reader to become dishonest or corrupt, or causes to deteriorate or creates possibility to deterio-rate law and order, prejudice the image of the state or person or causes to hurt or may hurt religious belief or instigate against any person or organisation, then this activity will be re-garded as an o� ence,” the provision reads. l

3 to die in long-due Ammar murder casen Md Sanaul Islam Tipu

A Dhaka court has sentenced to death two brothers and another for the kidnapping and murder of O Level student Md Ammar Shamsi of Lalbagh in 2000.

Abdur Rahim Sader, judge of the Speedy Trial Tribunal 4, pronounced the judgement yesterday in presence of the convicts. The tri-bunal also � ned them Tk20,000 each.

The convicts are Alamgir, son of Md Idris from Shahidnagar; Md Ziaur Rahman, son of Firoj Uddin of the same area, and his brother Salahuddin. The tribunal sent them to jail af-ter the verdict.

Name of another charge-sheeted accused Mostafa Almas Bappy, a friend of Ammar, was dropped following an Appellate Division order. Convict Zia was also the victim’s close friend.

When contacted, Ammar’s father Md Tou-� que Shamsi said that he was not aware of the case proceedings. The Old Dhaka businessman welcomed the verdict, but expressed frustra-tion mentioning that the case had been stalled for a decade due to a High Court stay order.

A student of Dhanmondi Memorial Ideal School, Ammar Shamsi, 19, was kidnapped on October 16, 2000, while going to his friend’s house to attend a birthday party.

According to case statement, the kidnap-pers took him to Gazipur National Park and strangled him to death the same day. But they later demanded Tk10 lakh as ransom from his brother.

On October 25, the victim’s father agreed to pay the ransom, but one of the kidnappers - Salahuddin - was caught while trying to col-lect the money. Alamgir, Zia and Bappy were later arrested. The body was recovered from the national park the same day.

On April 13, 2004, the case proceedings were stayed by the High Court following a de-fence petition against the charge-framing or-der. The Appellate Division vacated the High Court order on January 20 this year. l

E nthusiastic bus owners hike fare in advancen Shohel Mamun

A number of CNG-run bus owners have al-ready started charging passengers extra fare, even though the government has yet to make a decision in this regard.

“We are buying fuel at the new price, our cost has already increased. I have to charge extra fare now; I can’t wait for the govern-ment’s decision,” said Asadullah, driver of a CNG-run bus on Motijheel-Mirpur route.

Road Transport and Bridges Minister Obaidul Quader said bus fare would not be increased before the public transport fare co-ordination panel placed its recommendations for evaluation.

During a brie� ng at the Secretariat yester-day, the minister said the recommendations

would be submitted between September 5 and 10, following which the ministry would make a decision.

He said a 12-member panel were eval-uating the public transport fare, while an eight-member body was reviewing CNG-au-torickshaw fares. The Bangladesh Road Transport Authority (BRTA) chief Md Nazrul Islam is heading both the committees.

Earlier, Dhaka Bus Owners’ Association is-sued a circular to the bus owners which said no bus service should increase the fare until the government � xes the rate in line with the fuel price hike.

They submitted the proposal to raise the fare of local CNG-run buses to the govern-ment on Sunday.

Dhaka Metropolitan CNG-run Autorickshaw

Owners’ Association also promised they would not increase fare without government nod.

However, some bus services in the capital were seen already charging their passengers extra fare.

This correspondent rode a Gazipur Pariba-han bus yesterday around 10am, where the conductor charged Tk10 for the commute between Moghbazar and Paltan – double the original amount of Tk5.

When asked about it, Solaiman, the con-ductor, said: “We are forced by the bus own-ers to increase the fare. They are demanding extra money for a single trip; if we don’t col-lect the extra money from the passengers, we have to pay from our own pocket.”

However, he did not agree to give the contact number of the transport owner when asked.

“Most passengers are getting involved in verbal altercation with the conductors over the extra fare,” said Mainul, a passenger com-ing from Uttara. “I don’t know if increasing the fare is the solution – it will only cause us more su� erings.”

Passengers from time to time have com-plained about having to pay more than what the BRTA � xed on its fare chart in 2011.

Mozammel Haque, secretary general of Jatri Kalyan Samity, said: “We have already been paying extra fare for long. If it increases again, it will become very di� cult to live in Dhaka.”

When his attention was drawn to the fact that autorickshaws do not follow rates set by the government when charging passengers, Obaidul Quader said he would instruct the BRTA to look into the matter. l

Work for Better Bangladesh forms a human chain in front of the National Press Club yesterday demanding walking and cycling be included under the Sustainable Development Goal RAJIB DHAR

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