The absence of chairmen, despite replacements, is disrupting services
Persistent water crisis in Rangamati hills demands interventions
Warnings from World Bank should be taken seriously
PRIME Minister Sheikh Hasina announced her government's plan to construct elevated and underground railways, flyovers, circular waterways and roads to ease the city's traffic woes. The announcement came while she was replying to queries in the Parliament on October 28. The prime minister also said that her government had begun a project to upgrade Zia International Airport, construct a bridge linking Arong at Tejgaon and the Gulshan shooting club, and coordinate a development project in Hatirjheel to solve the traffic tangles in the capital.
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IF so many male members of the Delhi establishment were not irredeemably bald, the loudest sound in the capital would be that of hair being torn in frustration. Those who have rescued their pates with American wigs (probably made with recycled hair from Tirupati) or artificial implants are not going to risk their camouflage by an injudicious display of temperament. So the prevailing noise in Delhi is the sound of gnashing teeth. The despair is over the upsurge of Naxalite violence.
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CONDITIONS in Pakistan have clearly been going from bad to worse in this past week. Just how horrific matters are in the embattled country is made obvious by the ceaseless activities of militants, especially in the northwest. The death toll from bombs and grenades detonated by elements like the Taliban has been rising, with the Pakistan authorities virtually unable to stem the tide of violence sweeping across large parts of it. Matters are certainly not being helped by the drone attacks carried out by the Americans in Pakistan, especially along the border with Afghanistan.
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IN a central bank report to the Executive Committee of National Economic Council (ECNEC) it is revealed that Tk 3,685 crore worth of interest had been waived on outstanding loans during last eight years. In the period under review, a Jammat-BNP four-party alliance government and a caretaker government were in power. As many as 693 borrowers including former MPs and influential businessmen got the massive waiver from nine state-owned banks and financial institutions.
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A parliamentary panel has recommended that to ensure strict adherence to traffic rules by all, even members of parliament (MPs) and ministers will not enjoy any immunity from the law. The Chairman of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Planning Commission, Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) Leader Oli Ahmed also echoed this view, suggesting further that, to ease congestion on the roads of Dhaka and Chittagong, and to stop haphazard parking of vehicles, the flouters of traffic rules should be made to pay |TK.1000 as fine, regardless if they are MPs or ministers.
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THE formalisation of the G-20, in place of G-8 with the US as chairman of the board of governors, is now expected to monitor and guide politico-economic affairs of the world. Yet, despite Thomas Friedman's claim the world is not flat enough, conflicting interests abound among G-20 and non-G-20 nations. At the recently held G-20 meeting at Pittsburgh, China and other developing countries got greater say in the IMF while the USA maintained its veto power, but the non-G-20 got nothing. They wanted more resources for development through a new concessional fund, a disproportionate share of the IMF gold sale, a more liberal interpretation of the debt sustainability framework, and funds for climate change devastation. All they got were promises. Still, the very fact that the G-20 was...
THE Tipaimukh controversy spurred a wave of protests that highlighted a kind of ineptness and indecision of the government for too long a period on a vital matter for our survival. It also focused the confusion that existed in our foreign policy objectives from the beginning, particularly after the SAARC was set up with a set of lofty ambitions much of which remained unfulfilled over the last decade and a half.
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THE Dhaka Metropolitan Police launched a three-day special drive on Wednesday to tackle criminality in the nation's capital. There are a couple of ways in which the drive can be looked at. In the first place, it is a welcome move for the important reason that when citizens are face to face with lawlessness, it is the social order which threatens to get frayed. In the second, the launch of the drive is an acknowledgement by the police that all is not well where security of life is concerned in this metropolis. It is now to be seen whether the drive yields any perceptible success or is merely one of those exercises that begin with a bang and end in a whimper. Besides, one is not quite sure that a three-day special drive will do what normal police activities have not done in the past....
SOME government ministries, departments and agencies have an inherent potential to be useful in the task of creating awareness among the people against militancy. They need to be self-activated given their contact with the people to be playing their due role here. For, in the ultimate analysis, it is at the community level that extremist agenda feeding on exploitation of religion are best countered, fought off. People's awareness of ways and threats of militancy, their vigilance over these and cooperation with law-enforcement agencies provide the most effective safeguards against attempted extremist inroads into a society.
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