Consumers may experience trouble in gas supply from Monday to Wednesday due to disruption in delivery of imported liquefied natural gas (LNG).   Read: Gas supply to stop in some city areas Tuesday Titas Gas Transmission and Distribution Company Ltd said consumers may experience disruption or low pressure in gas supply from June 14-16 as unloading of LNG from  ships is being disrupted due to inclement weather. Read: Areas in Dhaka where gas supply to be suspended Sunday “This creates disturbance in supply of 400 million cubic feet of gas per day (mmcfd) to the transmission system”, it said, adding that consumers of different groups including households, industries, power plants and commercial users may suffer. Read: Summit Power installs heavy-duty gas turbine at Meghnaghat plant The Titas Gas regrets the inconveniences of its consumers, it added.   

The Iodised Salt Bill, 2021 was passed in Parliament on Monday, aiming to ensure proportionate use of iodine in salt and regulate the salt market in the country. The Bill was passed by voice vote when Industries Minister Nurul Majid Humayun Mahmud placed  it. Read: BHBFC to have extended areas of services; Bill lands in JSThe proposed Bill will be enacted through annulling previous ‘Iodine Deficiency Disease Prevention Act-1989’.Under the proposed law, a 14-member national salt committee, headed by the Industries Secretary as its chairman, will be formed to oversee production, processing, refining, storage, transportation and marketing of salt, ensuring iodine use in salt, supply of iodine to the salt factories, regulating salt import, as well as to place recommendations over salt management policy.There will be a separate cell under the Industries Ministry to ensure the proportionate mixing of iodine in salt.If anyone wants to produce, process, store, import, supply salt or set up a salt factory, the concerned person will have to get registered under the proposed law. Read:Updated Bankers’ Book Evidence coming, Bill placedIt would be considered an offense if anyone to tries to import, produce, market or stock salt without registering beforehand.If anyone produces, processes and imports salt and runs iodised salt factory without registration, or doesn’t maintain the standard, the person will be sentenced to one to three years of jail and fined Tk 50,000- Tk 15 lakh or both.The law violators can be punished through mobile courts. Read: Bill placed in JS with provision of archiving all recordsAccording to the bill, During the past decades, Bangladesh has done a remarkable job bringing down the numbers of goitre and thyroid disease.In the mid-1990s, around 47 percent of population suffered from goitre. Today, that number has fallen well below 6 percent.

The House Building Finance Corporation Bill (Amendment) 2021 was placed in Parliament on Monday to increase the authorised and paid-up capitals, and expand its areas of providing services. Finance Minister AHM Mustafa Kamal placed the Bill in the House and it was sent to the respective Parliamentary Standing Committee for further scrutiny. The Committee was asked to submit its report within a month. Read:Updated Bankers’ Book Evidence coming, Bill placed The original law was promulgated in 1973, during Bangabandhu’s rule, through issuing an order. With the amendment, the authorised capital of the Bangladesh House Building Finance Corporation (BHBFC) will be Tk 1,000 crore while the paid-up capital Tk 500 crore. The BHBFC, with the enhancement of these, will be able to provide more services, according to the objective of the Bill. The proposed Bill is making punishment for providing false statements harsher while taking loans from the corporation. Read:Bill placed in JS with provision of archiving all records The punishment for providing false statements deliberately to take loan from the corporation has been proposed for a five-year jail term or Tk 500,000 fine or both raising that from a two-year jail term or Tk 2,000 fine or both. If anyone uses the name of the corporation in any advertisement or prospectus without any written permission, he or she will be sentenced to six months' jail or be fined with Tk 50,000 or both. The punishment was six months' jail or only Tk 1,000 fine in the existing Bangladesh House Building Finance Corporation Order 1973. In the proposed Bill, some words, including 'loan default', 'chairman of the corporation', and 'director' have been incorporated. Read: Cabinet approves draft Finance Company Bill A superseding clause has been inserted in the bill to give it priority over other laws. There will be a seven-member Board of Directors for three years while the Chairman and the Managing Director will be appointed by the government.  

The Bankers’ Book Evidence Bill 2021, defining the digitally recorded documents as such evidence under the proposed law, was placed in Parliament on Monday. Though there is already a law to deal with it, the draft of the new law was brought to incorporate digitally-recorded evidence in it. Read:Bill placed in JS with provision of archiving all records Finance Minister AHM Mustafa Kamal placed the Bill in the House and it was sent to the respective Parliamentary Standing Committee for further scrutiny. The Committee was asked to submit its report within one month. The proposed law is going to replace the old Bankers’ Book Evidence Act 1891 as many things in the current law are not consistent with the present-day situation. Besides, the banks are now working digitally which was not mentioned in the previous law and the draft law has stated it clearly. Read: Cabinet approves draft Finance Company Bill The proposed law has suggested making information public except those of private one after taking permission from the court and fixing the authorities who can do that. The new law also states some offences, punishments and trial to prevent unauthorised and the behind-scene leak of any information. The proposed law defines the jurisdiction of the court for any bank-related information, which is totally prohibited in the old one. Read:40 collect AL nomination papers for JS by-elections Some of the information have been opened up in the new law, axing the privileged and personal information, which will be authorised to publish the information.

A village head was shot dead by some miscreants at Lulongchhari in Jurachhari of Rangamati district on Sunday night. The deceased was identified as Pathar Moni Chakma, 63 of the area. Read: 2 shot dead in separate incidents in Cox’s Bazar Police said two miscreants called Moni out of his home and opened fire on him around 9 pm, leaving him dead.  Shafiul Azam, officer-in-charge of Jurachhari Police Station, said, “Police recovered the body but no one was arrested in this connection. The motive behind the killing could not be known immediately.” Read: Jubo League leader shot dead in Teknaf Mir Moddasser, superintendent of Rangamati Police said legal action will be taken in this regard. The body was sent to the Rangamati Hospital for autopsy. Read:PCJSS man shot dead in Rangamati Moni Chakma raised his voice against criminal activities in the area and played an important role in the development of the area, said local people.

Despite a drop in the number of new cases in several countries, the  global Covid-19 caseload is fast approaching the 176-million mark. The total caseload reached 175,878,310 while the death toll climbed to 3,799,883 as of Monday morning, according to John Hopkins University (JHU). So far, 2,342, 590,769 doses of vaccine have been administered across the globe. Read:As COVID-19 cases wane, vaccine-lagging areas still see risk The US, which has been the world worst hit country in number of cases and deaths, has logged 33,461,575 cases with 599,768 deaths. Brazil on Sunday registered 1,129 more deaths, bringing the nationwide tally to 487,401, the health ministry said. A total of 37,948 new infections were detected, raising the caseload to 17,412,766, the ministry said. Brazil has the world's second highest Covid-19 death toll, after the United States, and the third largest caseload, following the United States and India. Besides, India's Covid-19 tally rose to 29,439,989 on Sunday, with as many as 80,834 new cases recorded in the past 24 hours, said the health ministry. Read: Covid pandemic: Situation in Bangladesh worsening, 47 more die Besides, 3,303 Covid-19 patients died in 24 hours until Saturday morning taking the death toll to 370,384. Situation in Bangladesh Amid the growing concern over the rapidly increasing cases and the higher transmissibility of Delta variant, Bangladesh registered 2,436 new Covid cases in 24 hours till Sunday morning. The deadly virus also claimed 47 more lives during the period, pushing up the fatalities to 13,118, said a handout released by the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS). The caseload reached 8,26,922 with the logging of the new cases. Vaccination drive Bangladesh, the prime recipient of Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccines, has suspended the registration for Covid-19 jabs due to vaccine shortage amid a delay in the arrival of shipments from India. Read: India reports 80,834 new COVID-19 cases Some 42,05,167 people got the second dose of this vaccine while the number is 58,20,015 for the first one. Besides, the total number of people receiving their first jab of Chinese Sinopharm vaccine is 2,162. So far, four vaccines – Oxford-AstraZeneca (Covishield), Sputnik-V, Sinopharm, and Pfizer-BioNTech – have got the approval for emergency use in Bangladesh.  

Criminal Investigation Department (CID) of police arrested five alleged members of a gang, including a foreign national, for smuggling hundreds of crores using livestreaming apps Bigo and Likee. Mobile phones, laptops, private cars, credit cards and cheque books of various banks, along with undisclosed amounts of cash, were recovered from their possession. The arrested Bangladeshi nationals were identified as Mostafa Saif Reza (26), Md Arif Hossain (27), SM Nazmul Haque (27), and Asma ul Husna Sejuti (28). The CID did not reveal the identity of the foreign national, for 'purpose of investigation'. Read Tecno launches 1st shopping cart campaign on Likee Briefing reporters at the CID's head office in the capital's Malibagh on Sunday, head of Cyber police DIG Jamil Ahmed said the people in ultimate control of organised criminal rings using apps like Bigo and Likee, are still out of reach. "But we are collecting all important information about them," he added. The arrested foreign national is "directly involved" with Bigo and Likee apps, while Mostafa Saif Reza is Bigo and Likee's Bangladeshi admin, he added. Bigo Live and Likee are live video streaming apps owned by JOYY Inc, a Chinese company that is listed on New York's NASDAQ, the capital market for tech companies. Read Top 5 Mobile Apps for Farmers in Bangladesh DIG Jamil Ahmed said that the arrested Arif Hossain used to associate different girls with Bigo Live by giving jobs on a monthly salary. SM Nazmul Haque is one of the leading Bangladeshi agents for selling virtual currency diamonds, while Asma ul Husna Sejuti  is the chief admin of Bigo Live. Admins get a salary of Tk 1 lakh per month. Jamil said that information about criminal activity through these apps was recently published through various newspapers and magazines and social media. In this context, the issue of smuggling huge amounts of money abroad through live streaming apps Bigo Live and Likee came to the notice of CID's cyber unit. After that, they started investigating. The Cyber police chief said during the investigation, it was revealed that many of the country's youngsters and expatriate Bangladeshis stream videos on Bigo Live and Likee. The Bigo Live app has two types of ID: one is Broadcaster ID and the other is Supporter ID or Sender ID. Adolescents use Broadcaster ID to stream live video. This is used to spread various obscenities behind the veil of so-called entertainment. Read Top Job Searching apps in Bangladesh Those who streamed videos with a supporter ID or sender ID were gifted a 'digital coin-like diamond'. Later, the diamond was used to make huge amounts of money illegally. He also said that during interrogation, the arrestees have disclosed  the names of several more people associated with them and more than Tk 100 crore worth of transactions have been found in the accounts of their various banks and mobile banking services in the last one year. Meanwhile, BIGO Technology (BIGO) in a statement Sunday evening said that the company has a zero-tolerance policy against any criminal activity by any person or individual, regardless of whether or not the person is involved with any of the company’s local agency partners. Read Top health apps for online doctor consultation services in Bangladesh “We have developed rigorous policies and processes, combined with our industry-leading technology to combat any criminal behavior. At the same time, we do not take a side with or endorse any isolated action of any person or organization who may or would have an intention of involving BIGO’s name in any criminal activity,“ it said. The Singapore-based company said they are conducting a thorough review of the case and will work with relevant law enforcement agencies in whatever way they can. BIGO has operations in more than 20 countries around the world, one of which is Bangladesh. Its total user base is upwards of 400 million, spread across 150 countries.  Read Tribunal orders CID to probe DSA case filed by Samia Rahman

Tapan Biswas of Dainik Janakantha has been elected as president, while Masudul Haque of UNB as general secretary of the Bangladesh Secretariat Reporters Forum (BSRF). The executive committee election for the 2021-22 term was held on Sunday at the National Press Club from 10 am to 3 pm, and the results were declared in the evening. Motahar Hossain was elected vice-chairman of the committee for the 2021-22 term. Of the 17 posts of the executive committee, voting was held for all except the training and research secretary post, for which Tauhidul Islam was elected unopposed. Besides Tapan and Masud, Mehedi Azad Masum was elected assistant general secretary, Akhtar Hossain organising secretary, Md Shafiullah Sumon finance secretary, Moskayet Mashreq office secretary and Bahram Khan publicity and publication secretary. The elected executive members of the committee are:  Ismail Hossain Russell, MA Jalil Munna (Munna Raihan), Mainul Hossain Pinnu, Shahjahan Mollah, Hanif Mahmud Shah, Shahadat Hossain (Rakib), Md Belal Hossain and Rubayet Hasan. Information Minister Hasan Mahmud congratulated all the newly elected members of the committee.

A female worker died after hitting her head on an electric pole Sunday, while running away after police intervened at a laid off workers' protest with tear gas in the Ashulia area of Savar. The deceased was identified as Jasmine, a sewing operator of Gold Tex Factory in Savar EPZ. Around 7am, workers of Lenny Fashion Factory in Dhaka EPZ blocked the road near New EPZ area on Nabinagar-Chandra highway, demanding payment of their arrears since January. Five of the workers got injured after police intervened to quell the protest, and Jasmine succumbed to her injuries on the way to hospital, said the protestors. The incident happened as workers started running helter-skelter following the police's intervention with rubber bullets and tear gas, they said. Superintendent of Industrial Police-1 Md Asaduzzaman said they had to use water cannons to scatter hundreds of workers who were demonstrating and blocking the road for hours, paying no heed to any request to relent. The protesting workers said the Indian owner of their factory has not visited amid the Covid-19 pandemic, and on February 8 the two factories owned by him were closed, without payment of two months' wages and provident funds for some 600 workers. Having not received their dues in over four months, the workers were left with no option but to take to the streets in protest.

Director General of Special Security Forces ( SSF)  Maj. Gen. Mojibur Rahman on Sunday paid a courtesy call on President Md. Abdul Hamid at Bangabhaban on the occasion of the founding anniversary of the force. Maj. Gen. Mojibur briefed the president about the activities of SSF. President Hamid congratulated all the members of SSF on its founding anniversary. The president said the SSF is playing an important role in providing national security, including providing security to VVIPs. The president urged the SSF to ensure that the public participation of the VVIPS is not disrupted while giving them protection.