bangladesh
BALTWF urges govt to find out actual reasons for frequent road accidents
Bangladesh Auto-rickshaw Light Transport Workers Federation (BALTWF) in a statement urged the government to find out the actual reasons behind the frequent road accidents in recent days.
BALTWF present Abul Hossin and its founder general secretary Golam Faruk in a statement on Sunday said that some unauthorised vehicles like battery-operated Easybike, battery rickshaw, Nasimon/Karimon/Bhutbhuti are mainly identified by transport experts as main reasons for the road accidents.
All these vehicles are not allowed by the Bangladesh Road Transport Authority (BRTA). But some media outlets publish news of the accidents in a way that creates a perception in the public mind authorised three wheelers and light vehicles are responsible for the accidents.
"Actual reasons should be identified through proper investigation without blaming the drivers for any accident," the leaders said.
They also expressed deep sorrow for the loss of life and property in the road accidents, specially, during the recent Eid journey.
They said transport sector experts have been giving different opinions for a long time about the road accidents in Bangladesh which should be taken into account in identifying the reasons.
Hospitals instructed to be ready to deal with possible outcomes amid heat wave: Health Minister
The authorities concerned of the hospitals across the country have been instructed to be prepared to deal with adverse conditions amid a severe heat wave, said Health and Family Welfare Minister Dr Samanta Lal Sen on Sunday.
“Due to the severe heat wave, the hospital authorities have been asked not to admit patients under cold cases (those who are not emergency to provide medical treatment) and keep the hospital prepared,” he said while talking to reporters after talking with the directors and civil surgeons of the hospitals across the country.
Elderly persons and children are vulnerable due to the heat wave and we have to face the situation, he added.
Health Ministry to tackle medicine price hike: Minister Samanta Lal Sen
Referring to the oral saline, the minister said it is fully under control now and directions were given to inform me in case of an oral saline crisis.
Replying to a question about the condition of Shishu Hospital, the minister said “I have visited the Sishu Hospital and asked the authorities concerned to keep adequate arrangements at hospitals.”
Asking whether there is a possibility to extend the holiday of educational institutions, Samanta said “Observing the overall situation, if we think, we will definitely extend the holiday. Children should not be put at risk.”
Expanding healthcare access to marginalized communities: A pledge by Health Minister Samanta Lal Sen
Failure to communicate rationale behind consolidation in banking sector driving panic among customers, employees
Depositors are gathering at different banks to withdraw their hard earned money, as a kind of panic has spread in the entire banking sector centring the process of mergers taking place between strong and weak banks, or the private and public sectors.
The mergers are necessary to fill the central bank's objective of initiating a process of consolidation in Bangladesh's highly-fragmented banking industry, aimed at reducing the number of banks in the country, which for a number of years now has been far too high.
In a sense, the government is trying to rectify its past mistakes - in particular the overly laissez-faire approach to handing out banking licenses.
For example, just based on the five merger proposals so far received by the central bank, if all of them were to succeed, or at least be approved, the number of banks in Bangladesh would come down by 6 - almost 10% of the number of bank currently in operation.
But there has been no effort to explain this to the public in these terms. Rather they are seeing a string of random (to them) mergers being announced, where the decisions to merge often don't make sense on the surface, in a landscape where such mergers are unprecedented.
The sense of knowing something is happening, but not knowing what it is, has driven the sense of panic among the public, who feel some decisions of Bangladesh Bank are being forcefully imposed on the sector, while Shapla Chattor's decision to impose a ban on beat reporters entering the central bank, alongside whatever purpose it served the decisionmakers, has also raised people's doubts about the authorities' intentions to remain transparent.
BASIC Bank to merge with City Bank in strategic consolidation move
That in turn could only exacerbate the sense of panic, which hsn gotten to the point of people withdrawing their deposits from certain banks, said sources at some respected banks.
They said most of the depositors are suffering from the dilemma of whether or not to keep money in the bank. Some are withdrawing money from the bank due to fear.
This list also includes some institutional depositors. A Shariah-based private bank has received 12 deposit refund applications in the last week. Each is a capital FDR. Already, Basic Bank has lost more than Tk2000 crore of deposits recently at the news of merging this bank with private sector City bank.
About Tk100 crores have been withdrawn from BDBL. The situation is almost the same for other banks in the list of mergers.
When asked to know, the Acting Managing Director (MD) of BASIC Bank, Abu Md. Mofazzal told UNB, "Since 2015, BASIC Bank is also a state-owned bank like Sonali and Janata."
Top execs of merging bank cannot hold posts at acquiring entity: Bangladesh Bank
He explained that various government institutions and organizations have deposited money in BASIC Bank. With the news of merger with private sector players, these institutes have started withdrawing the money.
“Various institutions have already withdrawn more than Tk2000 crore of deposits. Because they think that BASIC Bank is going to become a private bank,” BASIC acting MD pointed out.
He said for this reason, the board of directors decided BASIC Bank would send a letter to the government to merge with a government bank.
A senior official of National Bank told UNB on condition of anonymity that it is becoming difficult to retain deposits, ever since the old board was dissolved and a new board was formed.
The new board should be given at least six months’ time. A decision to merge now will not be good for the bank, the official said.
The top management of UCBL is saying the same thing, which bank is scheduled to merge the National Bank.
A senior official of the bank said, like other banks, there is panic in UCB. Because, the depositors are seeking money back.
BDBL to merge with Sonali Bank while BKB with RKUB
Meanwhile, Basic Bank does not want to merge with the private sector City Bank. They want to merge with a government bank. The board of directors of the bank has given an official letter to the government stating this.
However, the BB spokesperson and other officials working on bank mergers have not agreed to comment in this regard.
The panic among employees of these banks (that are in line for merger) is driven by a sense of uncertainty over their futures. Many apprehend being made redundant once the merger process is completed. It means many of the mid-to-lower ranked employees are already fishing for new opportunities, although these are relatively scarce to come by. Nevertheless their search is on.
Amid the sweltering heat, first working day starts with 966 MW of load shedding
Amid the summer's sweltering heat, the week's first working day started with 966 MW of load shedding.
Very severe heat wave has gripped parts of Bangladesh, with maximum temperatures ranging from 40 degrees Celsius to over 42 degrees Celsius in some areas.
National Load Dispatch Centre (NLDC) at the Power Grid Company of Bangladesh (PGCB) data shows, a total of 966 MW of load shedding was recorded at 1 am on Sunday.
Officials said rural areas have been experiencing the power outages mostly as the government has been pursuing a policy to avert the power cut in urban areas, mainly the capital Dhaka and large cities.
Both the Bangladesh Power Development Board (BPDB) and PGCB forecast shows that the country's highest electricity demand will be 15,000 MW in the day peak hours while it will go up to 16,200 MW in the evening peak hours.
State Minister for Power, Energy and Mineral Resources Nasrul Hamid recently said that the electricity demand may cross 17,000 MW this summer.
Highest evening peak hours' power generation was 15,358 MW on Saturday, as this was a weekly holiday, while the day's peak period generation was 13,325 MW.
The NLDC data also shows that the extent of load shedding was decreasing to 387 MW at 12 noon and again took a U-turn with increasing the power shortage.
The load shedding was recorded at 418 MW while the filing of this report at 3 pm.
Interestingly, in regard to the load shedding, a big difference was found in the official data of the BPDB and the PGCB.
The BPDB data shows that the country experienced highest 374 MW of load shedding on Saturday while the evening peak demand was recorded at 15,053 MW.
Of the total load shedding, Dhaka region experienced only 40 MW load shedding, Cumilla 84 MW, Mymensingh 200 MW and Rangpur only 50 MW while Sylhet, Barisal, Chattagram, Khulna and Rajshahi experienced no load shedding.
But the PGCB record shows that the entire country experienced 644 MW which is about double of the figure shown by the BPDB.
No official from BPDB was willing to comment on the matter when attention was drawn to it.
Meanwhile, state-owned Petrobangla official data shows that the gas production increased to 3006.7 million cubic feet per day (MMCFD) which is the highest in recent days.
Recently, recently the gas production witnessed a big fall in gas production and the highest supply was recorded at 2,300 MMCFD last week.
Petrobangla officials said both the LNG terminals are now operating in the full swing with supply over 1000 MMCFD while Chevron-operated Bibiyana gas field is also back to the production which also supplied over 1000 MMCFD against its capacity of 1200 MMCFD.
As a result, gas supply witnessed a good improvement across the country, said an official of the Petrobangla.
BASIS election: Sohel’s ‘Team Smart’ comprises bunch of young entrepreneurs
A panel titled “Team Smart” – comprising a diverse group of young entrepreneurs led by Mostafizur Rahman Sohel – has been formed to contest the election to the executive committee (2024-26) of Bangladesh Association of Software and Information Services (BASIS), the national trade body for software and IT-enabled service industry.
The panel is now running its campaign in full swing with an aim to build a “Smart BASIS”, said a press release.
Under the leadership of Mostafizur Rahman Sohel, managing director of Advanced ERP BD Limited, this panel features a diverse array of young candidates.
Malaysia’s Silverlake Group to form partnership with Nagad
Competing for the director (general) positions are Nagad Ltd.’s Executive Director Niaz Morshed Elite, Content Matters Limited’s CEO ASM Rafiq Ullah, Babylon Resources Limited’s CEO Liakat Hossain, Inument Solutions Limited’s Co-founder and CEO Monjurul AL Mamun, Loosely Coupled Technologies’ (LCT Solution Centre) Chief Operating Officer Syeda Nawshad Jahan Promee, Analyzen Bangladesh Ltd.’s The Man of Steel (Chairman) Muhammad Risalat Siddique, and Bondstein Technologies Limited’s Managing Director and CEO Mir Shahrukh Islam.
Candidates for the associate director positions include Arman Ahmed Khan, CEO of Magnus Software Works, Lutfi Chowdhury, co-founder and CEO of Adfinix Limited, and Hasinul Quddus (Rusho), chief corporate affairs officer of Daraz Bangladesh.
Team Smart’s panel leader Mostafizur Rahman Sohel said, “We have formed a youth-centric panel. We need a smart team to build Smart Bangladesh and Smart BASIS. So, we have endeavored to come up with such a panel. If the entire Team Smart is elected with votes from BASIS members, we will transform BASIS into a more dynamic and ICT-dependent modern organisation.”
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Earlier, Mostafizur Rahman Sohel served thrice on the BASIS Executive Committee.
Indian FS’s visit postponed due to their internal reasons: Hasan Mahmud
Foreign Minister Hasan Mahmud on Sunday said the planned official visit of Indian Foreign Secretary Vinay Mohan Kwatra to Bangladesh was postponed due to their various internal reasons.
“Look, elections are underway there (in India). It (visit) was postponed because of various internal (India's) reasons,” he told reporters when asked about the reasons behind the postponement of the visit.
Hasan Mahmud raises 1971 genocide issue with Pak envoy
The foreign minister said it has not been conveyed to Dhaka yet when the visit will take place.
The visit, which will take place on a mutually convenient new date, is part of high-level exchanges between Bangladesh and India and to review progress in two countries' bilateral cooperation agenda, said a diplomatic source.
Though there was no official announcement from Dhaka and New Delhi regarding the visit, the Indian FS was scheduled to be in Dhaka on a brief visit on April 20.
Diplomatic sources indicate that Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's visit to India is planned early July after the conclusion of the neighbouring country’s national election, which is the world's largest democratic exercise, spanning seven phases from April 19 to June 1, with the vote count set for June 4.
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Pre-election surveys suggest a strong showing for the coalition led by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who is widely anticipated to secure re-election.
"Prime Minister's (Sheikh Hasina) India visit will definitely take place. However, it will take place after the election in India," FM Hasan said recently.
He said it is not yet discussed at the official level when the visit will exactly take place.
In January, Modi extended warm congratulations to PM Hasina on her electoral victory, expressing hopes for the continued strengthening of the historically close ties between India and Bangladesh.
The last bilateral engagement between the two prime ministers occurred during the G-20 Leaders Summit in September 2023, where Bangladesh was the guest country.
PM taking nation forward by removing all obstacles: Hasan Mahmud
PM Modi is expected to extend invitations to South Asian and BIMSTEC country leaders for his swearing-in ceremony, fostering regional cooperation.
The government of India in March extended Foreign Secretary Vinay Kwatra's tenure by six months.
Kwatra assumed charge as India’s foreign secretary on 1 May, 2022 and joined the Indian Foreign Service in 1988.
Hasan Mahmud raises 1971 genocide issue with Pak envoy
Foreign Minister Hasan Mahmud on Sunday raised the issue of genocide committed by Pakistan military during the War of Liberation in 1971 during his courtesy meeting with High Commissioner of Pakistan to Bangladesh Syed Ahmed Maroof.
“Naturally, there was a discussion about the genocide that took place here in 1971. I also shared my personal sufferings,” Minister Hasan told reporters at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs while responding to a question.
Bangladesh seeks an official apology from Pakistan for the genocide committed during the 1971 Liberation War in Bangladesh.
During the meeting, both sides emphasized that cooperation can be expanded in trade and commerce, agricultural cooperation, and people-to-people contact, according to the MoFA.
They also agreed to work together at the United Nations and other International Organizations for promoting common interest.
Gas supply to remain off in parts of Savar Monday
Gas supply to different areas in Savar will remain suspended for two hours from 2 pm to 4 pm on Monday for all categories of customers for emergency works in gas pipelines.
Gas supply to remain suspended for 12 hours in Narayanganj Sunday
According to Titas Gas Transmission and Distribution Company Ltd, the areas where gas supply will remain off include Tongabari, Ashulia, Khejur Bagan, Gouripur, Khagan, Kumkumari, and Akran.
Gas supply to remain suspended for 2 hours Saturday in Narayanganj, adjoining areas
The consumers in the adjoining areas may experience low pressure in gas supply during the period, said Titas Gas regretting the temporary inconveniences of consumers.
Bangladesh reports 22 COVID-19 cases in 24hrs
Bangladesh reported 22 more COVID-19 cases in 24 hours till Sunday morning.
With the new numbers, the country's total COVID-19 caseload rose to 2,049,850, according to the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS).
The official death toll from the disease remained unchanged at 29,494 as no new fatalities were reported during this period.
Bangladesh reports one more Covid-19 death, 16 cases in 24hrs
The daily case test positivity rate was 4.19 percent as 525 samples were tested, said the DGHS.
The recovery and death rates stood at 98.41 percent and 1.44 per cent, respectively.
Diarrhoea breaks out in Joypurhat, over 550 hospitalised over past one week
Statistics Alumni of CU held Eid-reunion, AGM
Statistics Alumni of CU, an organization representing the former students of Statistics Department, Chittagong University (CU) has hosted an Eid-reunion programme at Bangladesh Academy for Rural Development (BARD).
They also held its annual general meeting at the same venue which was presided over by organization’s President Dr Obaidur Rab.
Over 400 alumni and their family members from various parts of the country joined the daylong function, said the organizers on Sunday.