March 26, 2016

SECOND EDITION

SATURDAY, MARCH 26, 2016 | Chaitra 13, 1422, Jamadius Sani 17, 1437 | Regd No DA 6238, Vol 3, No 340 | www.dhakatribune.com | 36 pages plus 8-page special supplement | Price: Tk10

Nazmul blasts ICC, cites sheer injustice Uddin Khan n Minhaz from Kolkata

People lit candles at Manik Mia Avenue on the eve of the Independence Day in memory of the martyrs of the Liberation War of 1971

Independence Day today n Tribune Report The country will observe its 46th Independence Day today with due solemnity and festivities. The day is a public holiday.

On March 26, 1971, Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman declared Bangladesh’s independence following the crackdown on unarmed Bangalis by the Pakistan occupation forces.

The call for independence was first raised on March 7, 1971, when  PAGE 2 COLUMN 5

Bangladesh Cricket Board President Nazmul Hasan has slammed the International Cricket Council over the suspension of Bangladesh fast bowler Taskin Ahmed.

The BCB chief yesterday said the ICC has done injustice by banning Taskin in the middle of an important tournament like the 2016 World Twenty20.

Nazmul believes Bangladesh cricket will have to go through difficult times in future too and is of the opinion that the ICC would have never taken such a harsh

State religion issue back in frame n

Tribune Report

The High Court is set to resume tomorrow the hearing on a petition that challenges the constitutional provision of state religion – after nearly five years of its adjournment.

The petition was filed in 1988 by 15 eminent citizens, including

former judges and academicians, many of whom are now dead.

The matter was absent from discussion tables until August 1 last year when Supreme Court lawyer Somendra Nath Goswami filed another petition with the High Court challenging the state religion provision as it was against the basic secular structure of the state.

 PAGE 2 COLUMN 1

SYED ZAKIR HOSSAIN

He also sought justification of retaining the clause even though the government had restored secularism through the 15th Amendment to the Constitution in 2011.

The petition was heard on August 30 and rejected by the court on September 7 last year.

On February 29, Chief Justice  PAGE 2 COLUMN 3

2nd Round

Sport Page-28

NOTICE Today, March 26, is Independence Day and a newspaper holiday.

However, the Dhaka Tribune will be published tomorrow under special arrangements.

On the occasion, the Dhaka Tribune is bringing out an 8-page special supplement and a 4-page broadsheet along with its regular publication.

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Nazmul blasts ICC decision if the bowlers were from any other team.

“All my life I knew that a bowler gets suspended if he bowls an illegal delivery in a particular game. But Taskin got suspended despite not having bowled any illegal delivery in that game [against the Netherlands].

This has happened for the first time in history. The match referee [Andy Pycroft] had said all of his deliveries in that game were suspicious but during the test, none of the deliveries were found illegal. So, this is a new learning curve for us in that a bowler can get suspended in this way. This is something new to us,” said Nazmul yesterday.

“I think the ICC should rethink its decision against Taskin. This is sheer injustice.

If there is any setback in Bangladesh cricket, this is it. Bangladesh cricket has been finished. Taskin was a major bowler for the team. He is not only the fastest among the Bangladesh bowlers but also one of the fastest in the whole World T20. He has been playing regularly for Bangladesh for the last

two years now. It is hard to accept his suspension,” the BCB supremo added.

Nazmul said anyone who thinks his claims about Taskin are incorrect should come forward and challenge him. The BCB boss, who is also a member of the Bangladesh parliament, hinted that there are propagandas against the progress of Bangladesh cricket.

“If anyone thinks that I am wrong, they should come and prove me wrong. The ICC still has the opportunity to prove me wrong.

The World Cup is still ongoing, lets see if they can suspect two bowlers of any team and suspend them. Let them set an example, then I will have nothing to say on Taskin issue. I cannot accept a suspension that has come for no reason and against a key bowler of a team,” said Nazmul before adding, “Everyone knows about it [propagandas against Bangladesh]. Let them do all these things to Bangladesh if it makes them happy. We will have to keep on playing under these difficult situations. We have nothing much to say.” l

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

State religion issue back in frame Surendra Kumar Sinha formed a new three-member bench to hear the 1988 petition following a prayer submitted on behalf of the petitioners. The new bench led by Justice Naima Haider also withdrew a previous order to hear opinions from over a dozen amici curiae.

Irked over the announcement of a fresh hearing, radical Islamist groups and leaders have warned that they would paralyse the country if the provision was dropped. They have been staging demonstrations in Dhaka and elsewhere, and are campaigning on social media and blogs to drum up support against the move.

The groups include Jamaat-e-Islami, Qawmi madrasa-based radical platform Hefazat-e-Islam, which emerged in 2013 by placing 13-point demands including formulation of anti-blasphemy law and a ban on free mixing of men and women, and other like-minded Islamist groups including its key component Islami Oikyo Jote.

Hefazat yesterday held protest processions in Dhaka, Chittagong and some other places. Leaders and activists of Jamaat and Islami Chhatra Shibir participated in the demonstrations too.

The Islamist leaders claim that the non-Muslims of the country are conspiring to scrap the state religion provision. They have also criticised the BNP and former president HM Ershad, who introduced the state religion provision, for keeping mum on the matter.

On the other hand, secularists have welcomed the court’s announcement as they think the existence of secularism and state religion in the constitution is contradictory. They have also urged the government to impose again the ban on religion-based politics as was in the first constitution of 1972.

They think that the rec-

ognition of Islam as state religion and the lifting of a ban on religion-based politics had given rise to radicalism and militant activities in the country.

Since 2013, Islamist militants carried out dozens of fatal attacks on secularists, religious minorities and Christian foreigners, shrines and mosques, prompting the government to declare zero-tolerance against all forms of religious extremism.

The Awami League-led government on June 30, 2011 reinstated secularism as one of the four pillars of the constitution but retained the state religion provision, and took no step to ban religion-based politics.

The current government maintains that the co-existence of state religion and secularism is not contradictory as the constitution ensures equal rights for adherents of other religions too.

Before Ershad, former president and BNP founder Ziaur Rahman lifted the ban on religion-based politics, paving the way for Jamaat and other Islamist parties to resume politics.

Ershad, now the premier’s special envoy, while introducing the provision claimed that since Muslims had overwhelming majority, they would not be able to establish its identity of nationhood, independence and sovereignty without Islam as the state religion.

The government highups had also said that the move was initiated with a view to curbing the alarming growth of fundamentalism, with particular reference to the politics of Jamaat-e-Islami, known for its religious fanaticism.

But the move has apparently failed to achieve the goal.

Subrata Chowdhury, a lawyer representing the petitioners, said: “By making Islam the state religion, the then military government

destroyed the basic character of our secular constitution.

“The minorities were relegated to second class citizens of the republic,” he told the AFP news agency recently.

The legal battle

After the passage of the Eighth Amendment Bill on June 7, 1988, 15 noted personalities filed a public interest litigation challenging the state religion provision.

They are Begum Sufia Kamal, former chief justice Kemal Uddin Hossain, Khan Sarwar Murshid, Prof Kabir Chowdhury, Prof Mosharraf Hossain, Maj Gen (retd) Chitta Ranjan Datta (Bir Uttam), Prof Serajul Islam Choudhury, Badruddin Umar, journalist Foyez Ahmed, Borhan Uddin Khan Jahangir, Prof Anisuzzaman, Justice Devesh Chandra Bhattacharjee, Justice KM Sobhan, Syed Istiaq Ahmed and Kalim Sharafi.

Many of them are now dead.

The first hearing on the petition began on June 8, 2011 in response to a supplementary petition. A High Court bench issued a ruling upon the government as to why the provision should not be declared to have been made without lawful authority. The government has not responded yet.

The court also appointed 12 amici curiae on that day to give their opinions on the matter. On June 9, the court appointed two other lawyers as amici curiae.

On June 16, three of the amici curiae told the court that the issue should be left to parliament, which was then in session and a special committee was working to amend the constitution in light of the Supreme Court judgements.

The hearing continued for two days and adjourned until July 14. But it did not take place on that day. l

Independence

Bangabandhu – during his historic speech at the Race Course Maidan, now known as Suhrawardy Udyan – urged citizens to join the struggle for independence.

“The struggle this time is for our emancipation, the struggle this time is for our independence,” Sheikh Mujib said in his 19-minute speech.

President Abdul Hamid and Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina have issued separate messages greeting citizens on the occasion of Independence Day. The national flag will be hoisted since sunrise atop all government, semi-government, autonomous and non-government buildings and different important buildings and establishments.

Different political parties including the BNP and main opposition Jatiya Party will observe the day with different programmes.

The president and the prime minister will place wreaths at the National Mausoleum in Savar at 6am.l

Monument planned for martyred Indian soldiers Showkat Kallol n Asif and Shohel Mamun The government is going to build a war memorial monument named “Pajorer Bandhan” in Ashuganj, Brahmanbaria to the memories of the 1,600 martyred Indian armed force members during the Liberation War. The place chosen is the site of the battle of Bhairab-Ashuganj in November 1971 in which around 100 Indian soldiers were killed, official sources said.

An official of the Liberation War Ministry said the monument will be built soon as there is pressure from the government high-up.

The implementation of the project was delayed recently when the Liberation War Affairs Minister asked to include a rest house in the monument’s design, the official said.

“Around 100 of the 1,600 martyred Mitro Bahini (Allied forces) officials and soldiers were killed during a battle in Ashuganj in the last week of November 1971. That’s why

the ministry has decided to build the war monument there,” Liberation War Affairs Secretary MA Hannan told the Dhaka Tribune.

The Department of Architecture at a recent inter-ministerial meeting presented the design, structure and beautification plans of the monument to the ministry, he said.

'In the battle of Ashuganj the three Indian PT76 tanks were hit point blank by Pakistani armed forces’ 106 mm anti-tank armour– piercing shells' “The department’s presentation did not include open space, car parking, sitting place for visitors, food court and amusement park for children which are essential for the project,” MA Hannan said.

The secretary said the size of the project was still

undecided but funds would be made available when required.

Liberation War Minister A KM Muzzamul Haque, the secretary and senior officials from several government agencies recently visited the site of “Pajorer Bandhan” in Ashuganj.

Freedom fighter Bir Protik Shahzaman Majumdar in his memoir of the 1971 Liberation War The Battle of Ashuganj describes how Indian army officers and soldiers fell in the battle.

“In the battle of Ashuganj the three Indian PT-76 tanks were hit point blank by Pakistani armed forces’ 106 mm anti-tank armour–piercing shells. At the same time, the entire battle field erupted in all sorts of small arms fire and the 18 Rajput Regiment suffered severe injuries of about a whole company (120 people), out of which 39 were dead. Almost everybody of 18 Rajput and 10 Bihar Regiment were flat on the ground, dead, injured,or trying to shield themselves from the murderous fire,” the book reads. l

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No preservation yet for graves of freedom fighters Showkat Kallol, Shohel n Asif Mamun and Syed Samiul Basher Anik Six years have passed since the Liberation War Affairs Ministry took an exemplary initiative to honour the fallen heroes of the country by identifying and preserving the burial sites of martyred freedom fighters.

But like many other government projects, bureaucratic tangles continue to stagnate the project as officials try to pass blame on each other.

According to a government gazette published in 2013, there are 2,938 sites where freedom fighters had been laid to rest. Under the preservation project, it was one of the primary tasks of authorities concerned to verify the authenticity of the burial grounds before preservation work could begin.

But after six years of efforts, only around half – 1,478 sites – have been verified so far.

Since 2010, the Liberation War Affairs Ministry has been working to develop and preserve the burial sites of martyred freedom fighters.

The initiative came following a 2009 High Court verdict asking the government to preserve all iden-

tified killing fields or mass burial grounds of freedom fighters.

The ministry blames the deputy commissioners of 64 districts for not cooperating in identifying the graves.

“Some of the district executives have not yet completed the identification of graves,” said Liberation War Affairs Secretary MA Hannan.

“We will not prepare the development pro forma for the martyred freedom fighter project without verifying each of the grave across the country in accordance with the gazette,” Hannan said, pointing out that more time would be needed as the project was of a sensitive nature.

But freedom fighters say the bureaucratic triangle of the minister, secretary and DCs concerned should all share the blame for delaying the initiative.

Ministry and district officials were not interested in preserving the graves of martyrs as those bureaucrats were neither freedom fighters themselves nor sons of martyrs, said SM Mujibul Rahman, the assistant administrative secretary of Bangladesh Muktijoddha Sangsad.

It would only take little funding to preserve the burial grounds as designs for all the sites would be identical, said Mujibul, who fought in Gopalganj during the war. l

Guests stand to pay respect during the national anthem at the Independence Festival 2016 held at National Museum auditorium in the capital yesterday SYED ZAKIR HOSSAIN

Muhith considers calling it quits n Nure Alam Durjoy Finance Minister Abul Maal Abdul Muhith yesterday said he was thinking about retirement considering his age.

“At this age, it has become very necessary to call it quits. I feel very lucky that I am still in service even at the age of 83 but still it is important that I retire,” he said while speaking at the Independence Festival 2016, organised by Muktijuddho Academy at the National Museum auditorium in the capital.

The festival was organised to express gratitude towards the first 45 countries that recognised Bangladesh’s independence from Pakistan in 1971.

“It is our birthday today. We

Hefazat, Jamaat protest state religion hearing n Tribune Report Leaders and activists of radical Islamist platform Hefazat-e-Islam and Jamaat-e-Islami staged demonstrations in Dhaka, Chittagong and some other areas of the country yesterday.

The Hefazat leaders vowed to wage a tougher movement if state religion was abolished from the constitution after the High Court hearing that resumes tomorrow, after five years of its adjournment.

Then the controversial parliament of HM Ershad-led Jatiya Party introduced the provision in 1988.

In 2013, Qawmi madrasa-based Hefazat observed countrywide demonstrations and held two rallies at Motijheel to press home their 13-point demands that include formulation of an-

ti-blasphemy law and ban on free mixing of men and women. The government refused to fulfil the demands terming those contrary to the constitution and other existing laws. Most of the Hefazat leaders are linked to the Islamist parties of BNP-led 20-party alliance.

From a pre-scheduled rally at Andorkilla Mosque in Chittagong after Jumma prayers, Hefazat Secretary General Junaid Babunagari said: “We will lay down our lives, if necessary, to protect Islam as the state religion. None will remain Muslim constitutionally if Islam is left out of the constitution.”

Babunagari claimed that they were not out to implement the agenda of any political party. “We are not supposed to help anyone grab state power or topple the gov-

ernment. Our aim is to protect Islam in this country,” he said.

“We sacrificed our lives at Shapla Chattar. We are ready to lay down our lives again to protect Islam. We will declare Jihad from Chittagong if Islam is dropped as the state religion. Lovers of Islam will not bow down to such an evil bid,” said Mainuddin Ruhi, joint secretary of Hefazat.

In Dhaka, leaders and activists of Shibir also joined the procession and rally organised by Hefazat’s city unit in front of Baitul Mukarram National Mosque. They warned the government of dire consequences if Islam was dropped from the constitution as state religion. From the rally attended by around 4,000 demonstrators, the speakers also chanted slogans demanding tough punishment of the atheists. l

were born at midnight. Lots of memories of what happened on that night come to my mind. We fought for democracy against oppressors,” Muhith said. “Like many other nations, we got help from different countries, including India, during our war of liberation.”

The finance minister described 1971 as one of the most glorious times of his life.

“There was a counter-revolution in the country in 1975 that lasted for 16 years until 1991. It was in 1991 when we actually became free because of the counter-revolution. It was the time when changes began to occur in our national life.

“I am glad that I got an opportunity to play a role in making changes happen. Serving the country is a

matter of great joy and happiness, and this feeling is what enables me to walk at this old age. This is the best that I have achieved,” added Muhith.

Yesterday’s event started with the playing of the national anthem.

Later, national anthems of 43 nations that recognised Bangladesh during and immediately after the war were played as a mark of gratitude.

Indian High Commissioner to Bangladesh Harsh Vardhan Shringla and some other representatives from Bhutan, Nepal and Russia addressed the event.

Dr Sharif Ashrafuzzaman, adviser of Muktijuddho Academy, read out the letter of gratitude on the occasion. l

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Smuggler points to lax border security Jamil Khan n Mohammad and Syed Samiul Basher Anik “What do you need?” asked Indian truck driver Sonaton.

“It is possible to bring anything from India, even without legal documents. You just need to know some techniques.”

The stout middle-aged driver said he brought everything his Bangladeshi customers wanted. A Dhaka Tribune correspondent approached him posing a trader.

“I charge Tk50,000 for a single trip and will bring anything you want to your preferred Bangladeshi port from any Indian state,” he said.

Sonatan explained that if someone wanted to bring goods from India, they first needed to contact brokers who manage shipments of the illegal products. Without brokers, it is not possible to procure good quality products at low prices, he added.

He said the brokers manage border guards. “If you can contact influential brokers on the other side, then the Indian authorities including the BSF will never touch our trucks. You need to manage authorities on this side and contact porters who

will unload products from our trucks and load them on Bangladeshi trucks inside the customs house.”

About smuggling contraband products, Sonaton said: “We usually hide them in rice sacks. We have seen some port brokers on your side unload our trucks and complete paper works swiftly.”

Sometimes they bribe customs porters and manage local Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB) officials and the work goes without a hitch, he said.

A senior BGB official posted in Dinajpur zone rejected claims about lax security. “It is impossible. We check each and every truck,” the official, declining to be named, said.

Asked if some Indian trucks go unchecked, BGB-12 battalion Commanding Officer Lt Col Nazrul Islam who supervises Akhaura land port, replied in the negative.

“But we cannot say for sure that all our officials are honest,” he quickly added.

The recently reconstituted central anti-smuggling task force is working to prevent entry of illegal goods into Bangladesh. Regarding the drug issue, Customs Intelligence DG Moinul Khan said they had spoken with Indian Directorate of Revenue Intelligence. l

Extreme heat and cyclone likely in April n Abu Bakar Siddique

The country is likely to see extreme weather events in April, with the met office projecting a temperature of over 40 degrees Celsius and at least one cyclone during the month.

At least one extreme heat wave is likely to blow over the northern, northeastern and central regions of the country in April, said Bangladesh Meteorological Department in its long-range forecast.

In addition, other parts of the country may see a couple of

mild or moderate heat waves.

According to the met office, temperature between 36-38 degrees Celsius is considered as mild heat wave, 3840 degrees Celsius as moderate heat wave and above 40 degrees Celsius is considered as extreme heat wave.

The long-range forecast, issued on March 6, also projected that one or two depressions might form in the Bay in April, and at least one depression may turn into a cyclone.

There may be also more than average rainfall in April. l

TEMPERATURE FOREC AST FOR TODAY

DRY WEATHER LIKELY SATURDAY, MARCH 26

Dhaka

38

23

Chittagong

33

24

Rajshahi

DHAKA TODAY SUN SETS 6:12PM

38

25

Rangpur

36

25

Khulna

37

23

Barisal

YESTERDAY’S HIGH AND LOW

TOMORROW SUN RISES 5:56AM

36.5ºC Faridpur

17.0ºC Rangpur & Ishwardi

Source: Accuweather/UNB

36

24

PRAYER TIMES

Sylhet

36

19

Cox’s Bazar

32

24

Fajr: 4:38am | Zohr: 12:04am Asr: 3:31pm | Magrib: 6:15pm Esha: 7:42pm Source: IslamicFinder.org

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NID helps solve Gulshan murder n Tribune Report Police have solved the murder of a young woman within 20 days of recovering her dead body on Road 12 in Gulshan 1.

Investigators are saying having her fingerprint records in the National ID database contributed significantly to the successful conclusion.

On Thursday night police arrested one Sujon Biswas, 26, from Gulshan in connection with the murder, Additional Deputy Commissioner Abdul Ahad of Gulshan division told the Dhaka Tribune.

In primary interrogation Sujon confessed to the murder, he said.

On March 5, Gulshan police recovered the decomposed body of an unidentified woman beside a furniture shop at House 11, Road 12 in Gulshan 1. There were several stab wounds on the body. That day the deceased was mistakenly identified in the news as belonging to the Garo ethnicity.

ADC Ahad said police carried out drives to identify the woman

but could not make any headway.

“Later, we collected her fingerprint from Dhaka Medical College Hospital Morgue, matched it with the NID database and finally got an ID,” he said.

The victim was identified as Kajli Begum, 22, from Badarganj, Rangpur. Upon further investigation police found that she used to work as a beautician at a beauty parlour in the city.

“Later when we informed the girl’s family, they told us about this youth named Sujon Biswas,” Ahad said.

Sujon is from Kashimpur, Gopalganj and used to work as a help at various shops in the same area.

The ADC said Sujon had told the police that he was in a relationship with Kajli. He began planning to kill her a couple of months back when a conflict arose between them.

“As per his plan, he took Kajli for a ride to the National Parliament area on March 4 evening and while going back home he took her under the Tejgaon flyover and committed the murder,” Ahad said. l

RAB’s 12th Rising Day today One killed in n Kamrul Hasan Rapid Action Battalion is going to observe its 12th founding anniversary today.

On this day in 2004, the elite force officially began its journey by participating in the Independence Day parade.

At the time, the force consisted of officials of police, army, navy, air force, then Bangladesh Rifles (now Border Guard Bangladesh), coast guard, Ansar and the civil service.

President Abdul Hamid and Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina issued separate messages marking the day.

The programme of the founding day, which RAB calls the Rising Day, will start with the hoisting of the national flag by Benazir Ahmed, director general of the force, at the force’s headquarters in the capital’s Uttara.

On the occasion, family members of the deceased RAB members would be accorded reception.

RAB started operation with 5,521 members in seven battalions and the number increased over time. At present, there are some 8,500 members in 14 battalions.

Over the last 12 years, RAB has been hailed for its role to arrest criminals, recover illegal arms and to carry out anti-corruption operations.

But it was lambasted for the 2014

seven murders in Narayanganj and the extrajudicial killings.

According to official statistics, RAB has so far made a total of 166,670 arrests – including terrorists and militants. Of them, 1,771 were members of Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) and Harkat-ul Jihad-al Islami (Huji).

The force has detained 8,706 armed criminals and recovered 334 anti-tank explosives, 12,460 arms of different categories, 181,225 rounds, 18,389 crude bombs and grenades, and 5,460kg explosive materials.

RAB’s very first incident of crossfire led to the death of Pichchi Hannan, a top criminal in the capital, on June 1, 2004. Since then, for similar incidents, it had been slammed by human rights groups.

According to RAB, 54 criminals were killed during shootouts in 2004. The number was 106 in 2005, 109 in 2006, 81 in 2007, 63 in 2008, 38 in 2009, 42 in 2010, 23 in 2011, 45 in 2012, 35 in 2013, 22 in 2014, 28 in 2015 and 14 since the beginning of 2016.

RAB claimed that those killed in gunfights were members of militant groups or were associated with top criminals.

Commander Mufti Mahmud Khan, media wing director of RAB, said the force would always be alert to fight terrorism in the country. l

RAB ‘gunfight’

n Our Correspondent, Gazipur A man was killed in a shootout with a gang of drug peddlers and extortionists, claimed Rapid Action Battalion in Gazipur.

The incident took place in Nau-bandar area under Tongi early yesterday.

The dead, Delwar Hossain alias Delu, 36, is from Arichpur area of Tongi. Nayek Nasir Uddin and Constable Hafizur Rahman were injured in the gunfight and treated at Tongi Hospital.

Acting Operation Officer of RAB 1 Md Nazmul Hasan Rajib said they were informed that some drug peddlers and extortionists were distributing extortion money among themselves near a kiln, and a RAB team raided the site around 3am.

Sensing RAB presence, the miscreants started shooting, forcing them to retaliate in a shootout in which Delwar was shot, Rajib added.

Later, Delwar was taken to Tongi hospital where he was declared dead.

A foreign-made pistol, a magazine, four bullets, a lighter gun, 196 yaba tablets, three knives, and Tk10,000 were foundat the spot.

Tongi OC Md Aminul Islam said Delwar was accused in several cases with the station. l

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TALE OF A BIRANGANA

Halima yet to get recognition from state Hossain, n Moazzem Lalmonirhat It has been 45 years since the country achieved independence, for which thousands of people lost their lives and women were raped by the Pakistani Army and their collaborators in 1971.

Halima Begum is one of them. On April 22, during the Liberation War, her husband AKM Nurul Islam and sons AKM Aminul Islam and Ehsanul Haque were killed by Pakistani soldiers.

Halima, who is now 80 years old, said: “The Pakistani Army shot dead my two sons, husband, and two brothers-inlaw right in front of me. But the state did not recognise them as martyred freedom fighters in the last 45 years.”

She said Pakistani forces had killed her family, as they were helping freedom fighters who fought for the country under Sector 7.

“One of the Pakistani soldiers raped me after killing them. Afterwards, I along with my four daughters fled my native home and took shelter at a relative’s home in Pabna. After the incident, I lost my memory for several days. I also went for treatment at Pabna Mental Hospital and returned to normal. Then we went to my parental home at Birampur in

Dinajpur where I lived till independence,” she added.

Halima said, when the war ended, she and her daughters returned home.

“Then, with the help of local freedom fighters, I was appointed (reg no DDHR/E-24/72/2457/1 (5)) lady home visitor at Thakurgaon tuberculosis clinic on June 29, 1972,” she added.

Halima said, due to lack of awareness, she could not apply for her family’s recognition by the state as contributors to the nation’s independence.

“At last, on October 27, 2014, I applied for recognition by the state for my family members’ contribution to the country’s independence,” she said.

She added that Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina is well aware of the pain of losing loved ones. Halima expects nothing from the premier but recognition, she said.

President of District Muktijoddha Sangsad Mesbah Uddin Ahmed told the Dhaka Tribune he is aware of the issue.

“I had suggested she apply to the National Freedom Fighters’ Council for the recognition, and she has already applied,” he said.

“She should have applied earlier, as locals in the area knew about the matter, and the government of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman had given her a job as

Scarce water causes abundant suffering in Bandarban Basu Das, Bandarban n SCorrespondent Residents of Bandarban municipality have been without clean water for 10 days after the Department of Public Health Engineering (DPHE) cut off water supply citing technical glitch.

Water scarcity has affected the area’s businesses, particularly residential hotels where tourists stay. Many tourists are leaving the town.

Locals said an estimated 65,000 people were left without drinking water.

There is usually a shortage of about 500,000 gallons of water in the municipality as the DPHE supplies only

956,000 gallons against a daily demand of nearly 1.45 million gallons, DPHE sources said.

“We do not have water for meeting even the basic daily needs,” said one Md Sohel, resident of the town’s Banrupa area.

Most of the tube and ring wells set up by the government in recent years are out of order. People are being forced to use contaminated water from ponds. Many are buying bottled water from other places.

Bandarban DPHE Assistant Engineer Manjel Hossain said the water supply was cut as several motors had gone out of order. “We hope water supply will resume within a day or two,” he added. l

lady home visitor in recognition of their contribution,” he added.

Chairman of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Primary and Mass Education Ministry Motahar

Hossain MP, also chairman of the Freedom Fighters Scrutiny Committee, told the Dhaka Tribune they had received a good number of applications from across the country.

He said: “After examining all the applications, we will give recognition to the genuine freedom fighters and martyred freedom fighters, as well as Biranganas.” l

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Controversy still on over Cox’s Bazar monument n Abdul Aziz, Cox’s Bazar

The Cox’s Bazar monument

DHAKA TRIBUNE

TORTURE ON WOMAN

Accused still at large, threatening victim Correspondent, n Our Lakshmipur Police yet to arrest two people who allegedly tortured a woman and shaved off head of her on charge of extramarital affairs at Ramganj upazila, Lakshmipur on Tuesday.

Although police arrested a person in connection with the incident, but the victim is still living with insecurity as the offenders are influential people in the locality and threatening the victim to withdraw the case.

Medical Officer of Ramganj Upzila Health Complex Dr Mahmud said the victim needed a psychotherapy as she has remained traumatised since the torture incident took place.

One Hasina Begum, wife of Mona Miah, called upon her at her (Hasina) residence on Tuesday afternoon and accused her of making extra marital affair with her husband.

As the victim denied the allegation, five people, including Hasina’s brother Aziz and son Faruk, tied her with a tree and tortured her

indescriminately.

At one stage, they perpetrators shove off her hair with a blade and put a shoe garland around her neck.

Later, local people took her to Ramganj Upzila Health Complex in critical state. Later, the victim filed a case against the trio with Ramganj police station accusing five people.

Meanwhile, locals staged demonstrations yesterday demanding the arrest and exemplary punishment of the perpetrators.

Officer-in-charge of the police station Solaiman Hossain said they had already arrested Hasina Begum in connection with incident while a drive was going on to arrest others.

He said they said would take action against the people who were threatening the victim.

General Secretary of NGO Forum Asaduzzam told the Dhaka Tribune that the influential quarters had tortured the innocent women who was left by her husband. He threatened that they would wage movement. l

A monument was constructed in Cox’s Bazar nine years ago to remember local brave-hearts who made the supreme sacrifice for Bangladesh in 1971.

But issues like alleged negligence in the monument’s construction and maintenance, excluding names of martyrs and not inaugurating it, have given rise to many questions and disputes.

It was constructed at a cost of Tk11 lakh in 2006 beside the central Shaheed Minar. Although it includes names of 10 martyrs, the first martyr from the district and many more have been reportedly left out.

Those named are Abdul Hamid, Golam Kader, Golam Sattar, Capt Maqbool Ahmed, Siddik Ahmed, Habilder Abul Kalam, Izahar Mia, Sepoy Lal Mohammad, Shamsul Alam and SM Jahangir.

Those left out include Cox’s Bazar’s first martyr Mohammad Sharif Chairman, martyred intellectual Shaheed Saber, Dhaka University’s Iqbal Hall martyr ATM Jafar Alam Chowdhury, Sepoy Aktar Hossain who protested against unloading weapons for Pakistanis at Chittagong Port.

Others include Enamul Haq, Amir Hamza, Subhash, Forhad, Ilias

2 killed as gas cylinder goes off in Comilla n Tribune Report A truck driver and a helper were killed as the gas cylinder of their vehicle went off at Kutumbapur on Dhaka-Chittagong Highway in Chandina upazila yesterday.

The deceased was identified as Shohel, 65, a resident of Sayedpur village, and Polash, 28, of Dharmapur village in Adarsha Sadar upazila of the district.

In-charge of Iliotganj Highway Police Camp sub-inspector (SI) Quazi Maniruzzaman said the truck, loaded with sand, was going to Comilla.

When the vehicle reached Kutumbapur, one of its front wheels went out of order and the driver lost his control over the steering.

As a result, the truck hit a covered van and suddenly the gas cylinder of the vehicle blasted on the aftermath, leaving the driver and the helper dead on the spot around 3pm. l

Master, Habilder Rahim Baksh, Meser Ahmed, Jonab Ali, Bhotto Mohajon, Sepoy Abul Hossain, Master Shah Alam, Master Ahmed Bashir, Kabir Ahmed, Ajit Pal, Nirmal Dhar, Mohammad Ali, Piyari Mohajon, Swapan Bhattacharya, Manindra Nath Dey, Nurussafa Chowdhury, Janendra Lal Chowdhury, Satish Mohajon Dey, Mohammad Shamsul Islam, Abdus Sattar, Anil Kanti Das, and Shashanka Barua.

Cox’s Bazar Nazrul Academy General Secretary Amirul Islam Md Rashed said the monument had been neglected since the beginning and that many organisations had been demanding inclusion of names of all martyrs from the district.

“Although several names were included hastily, many more were left out. We have been demanding their inclusion but for some unexplained reason, our demand is not being met,” he added.

Member of Udichi’s Cox’s Bazar unit Foysal Mahmud Sakib said the monument was to introduce the new generation with martyred freedom fighters. “If names are excluded, the new generation will be confused. That is why we demand including names of all martyrs within the shortest possible time and inaugurating it,” he said.

Joy Bangla Bahini 71 chief and

the district’s first armed resistance organiser Kamal Hossain Chowdhury said there was a fair bit of controversy. “What is the need for such a monument where the district’s first martyr has been ignored? The Zilla Parishad and municipality only looted money,” he alleged.

About dropping names of martyrs, he said a nine-member committee, led by him was formed two years ago. Local MP, deputy commissioner and police superintendent were its members. “But nothing happened, nobody assisted,” he claimed.

Nazrul Islam Chowdhury, one of the Liberation War organisers, said: “History will never forgive us if names of martyrs are left out.

Many are not named in the monument. A pro-liberation government is in office and we hope it will look into the matter cordially.”

Deputy commander of 1971 Liberation War in Cox’s Bazar and Bandarban, Capt (retd) Abdus Sobhan brushed off the allegations, saying, “There is no question of controversy over the monument.”

Sobhan said they had included names of 10 martyrs they got from the beginning. “I do not know if there are any other martyred freedom fighters in Cox’s Bazar. We can amend the list in that case.” l

9

DT

Learn English

SATURDAY, MARCH 26, 2016

Pre-reading task 1. Are you looking forward to retiring?

2. At what age should people retire?

Now, read the article and compare your experiences with those outlined in the article.

The redefinition of ‘old’ n Graham Bradford Magazine: Changing Times People in developed countries are living longer. In 2005 in the USA the average lifespan was 77.6 years. This compares with 54 years in 1920 and just 34 years in 1780.

By 2050 it is estimated that the average lifespan will be in the mid 80s. By 2025 in developed countries the share of the population over 60 will be 26 per cent.

This increasing longevity is starting to have an impact on public finances, economic growth and general living standards. This impact is greater in countries with low employment rates, such as those in the European Union – Italy would be a good example. As baby boomers (those born from 1946 to 1960) reach retirement age there is an increasing pressure on social security systems and

public funds for retirement and health care expenses. Economists are increasingly questioning the sustainability of the European social model with its current high welfare standards.

“Active aging” is now being advanced by policy experts. The current division of life into three cycles: education, employment and retirement should be changed.

According to these experts governments need to remove barriers that prevent older people from continuing to work and should extend the average working life. Schemes for lifelong learning need to be established to keep the ageing workforce equipped with up-to-date job skills.

The US agricultural firm Monsanto is encouraging the government to allow it to introduce “phased retirement” for its workforce. Back in 1991 the company set up the Resource Re-entry Centre (RRC).

BIGSTOCK

Monsanto found it difficult to hire qualified temporary administrative assistants.

Through the RRC, it began to offer this work to retired administrative workers.

The Centre now sources human resources among its retired workforce for a diverse range of projects. In doing so the company retains the skills, knowledge and social networks of its workers. Much of the work is project based and highly flexible. Over 60 per cent of the projects are given to workers over 60. A principal feature of the scheme is workers’ access to cost-effective computerbased training to maintain and update job skills. The Centre strives to educate company managers regarding the cost efficiency and high quality of the work achieved by the service. l

Word search

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7. a. b. c. d.

7d

3a

6f

2g

5c

1e

2T 1F

6T 5F 4T

Exercise 2

Answers

The ideas factory

e. f. g.

Exercise 1

3F

Avera_e Pop_lation Employm_nt Retir_ Lif_span Secur_ty Longevi_y S_ills managers Worke_s

4b

See if you can find these words in the grid.

They can be horizontal, vertical, diagonal and backwards.

Want to find more learning activities?

Visit www.britishcouncil.org/learnenglish

Exercise 1 Vocabulary: Matching. Match each word in the first column (1 to 7) with its definition in the second column (a to g):

6

lifespan longevity public finances employment rates retirement age lifelong learning computer-based training money spent by a government the number of people in work the age at which you stop working courses that deliver their content via computers, often via the internet the length of time a person lives always acquiring new knowledge living for a longer period of time

Exercise 2 Comprehension: True/False. Read the article and decide if the following statements are true or false: 1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

The average lifespan in 1780 was 54 years.

By 2050 the average lifespan will be more than 80.

In Italy the increasing longevity will have no impact on public finances.

“Active ageing” allows people to extend their working lives.

Monsanto employs only people who are over 60 years old.

The Resource Re-entry Centre offers workers computer-based training.

© British Council 2016

DT

10

Feature

SATURDAY, MARCH 26, 2016

In conversation with Ania Loomba n Raisa Rahim

In a world where words are shouted rather than spoken, Ania Loomba voices her ideologies in her books through literature.

Her writings include – Gender, Race, Renaissance Drama (1989); Colonialism/ Post-colonialism (1998); and Shakespeare, Race, and Colonialism (2002). She has co-edited Post-colonial Shakespeares (1998), Post-colonial Studies and Beyond (2005), Race in Early Modern England: A Documentary Companion (2007) and South Asian Feminisms (2012). Her latest publication is a co-edited collection of essays – Rethinking Feminism in Early Modern Studies: Gender, Race and Sexuality (2016). She is currently working on left-wing Indian women from the 1930s to 1950s.

Professor Ania Loomba, currently Catherine Bryson chair of English at the University of Pennsylvania, recently visited Bangladesh for a public lecture entitled “Remembering Commune-ism” under the Distinguished Scholar Series held at BRAC Centre Inn on March 3. She shared her views on the significant Jawaharlal Nehru University movement saying: “It’s been a very important movement in not only Jawaharlal Nehru university but all universities in India and more generally for democracy in India.” On February 9, police entered the campus, arrested a student, charged him with sedition, and circulated videos of the event, which turned out to be doctored. They also were

hunting for other students who allegedly raised “anti-national” slogans at the event. Loomba said: “This is a conspiracy by the supporters of the current right wing Hindu government to shut down student debate. So they planted the whole thing, doctored the videos and put them in prison for saying these things.” One of the students charged with sedition argued that “if you do not have debates in a university. Then that university is a prison.”

Loomba agrees, adding that it is vital to encourage freedom of expression in universities all over the world. Around two hundred universities in the world have expressed their support for these students and teachers who took

part in the movement. Loomba further said: “Basically it is a water shed moment in Indian democracy where students are defending their rights to hold meetings and discussions about any issue even if the views expressed in the meeting are not to the liking of the government of India.”

Professor Ania Loomba taught at Jawaharlal Nehru University for 10 years during the 1990s.

“Jawaharlal Nehru University’s wonderful tradition is to encourage lively discussions by students on every issue under the sun,” she says with pride.

The history of the communist movement in India is a new area of research for her. Ania Loomba completed her PhD from the

A sweet story of success n Nadeem Qadir Nadiya Hussain has made news home and abroad by winning the 2015 Great British Bake Off. She gives credit to her husband for being her greatest support in winning the contest in the most watched television programme.

Nadiya is a British Bangali, who was raised in Luton where she attended Challney High School and Luton Sixth Form College.

Nadiya learned basic cooking skills at school. Her mother never baked and used the oven for storage instead. Mother of three herself, Nadiya brushed her cooking and baking skills from reading recipe books and watching videos on YouTube. Her favourite book of all time is a book on baking

by Irish novelist Marian Keyes.

One of television’s greatest cooks, Nadiya took time to share her experience with Dhaka

Tribune. Below is a glimpse of the conversation.

Were you into cooking since childhood?

I learned to cook from my parents, but only started baking after I got married and moved out at the age of 21.

When did you take up baking seriously?

I took baking seriously about five years ago.

How much do you think, your love for cooking and baking has to do with you being a Bangladeshi, since Bangladeshi women are known to be more into cooking?

Cooking and baking have come from my love of learning. Being in the kitchen feels like I’m experimenting with science and that’s what intrigues me the most.

What made you decide to compete at the 2015 Great British Bake Off ?

I competed in the bake off to give myself a challenge and to help give me confidence.

Who inspires you the most?

My biggest inspiration has been by grandmother, who is an amazing cook and ever so resilient throughout her life. Apart from her, my husband and my children are my constant source of inspiration, since they are the ones who taste everything I prepare at home.

What is the secret to a great cake?

Measure all your ingredients and be scrupulous!

What do you plan to do when you go to Bangladesh?

I want to enjoy my trip to Bangladesh and discover parts of the beautiful country that I haven’t seen yet. l

University of Sussex, UK, where she worked on literature and culture of the English Renaissance.

She has written on the histories of gender and women in this period, as well as of contact between Europe and the rest of the world at that time. She has also written on post-colonial studies, which was a field that only started during the 1980s, as well as on feminism, and Indian literature.

“I am interested in communism now because I think that there has been wonderful scholarship on the history of feminism in India but we have heard very little about the contribution of left-wing women in that history.”

Ania Loomba further elaborated: “We get a history of feminism that

includes women who were part of nationalist movement, but leaves out left-wing women, except perhaps a few of the progressive writers like Rashid Jahan. There is very little about the other women who were part of the left movement. But I don’t want to talk only about their contribution to communism. What I am also interested in is their thinking on gender relations, on marriage and love, and how they negotiated their place within the family as well as the world of public action.”

Ania Loomba started collecting the voices of women that she had known as a child. She interviewed them to ask what they felt about gender relations in their families and in the party, and what they now felt about women’s issues and the feminist movement.

“Often times we tend to miss out on people’s emotional and private life so easily as if they don’t have anything to do with politics,” she commented.

Regarding her visit to Bangladesh, Professor Ania Loomba ends by noting: “We have shared histories, but we tend to look at these histories from different vantage points and different perspectives. I think it is crucial to have more productive exchange of ideas between India, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. We talk about living in a global world, but this ends up meaning only our interaction with the West. We neglect conversations with those who live right next door. It shouldn’t be so difficult for us to cross these immediate borders.” l

DT

Editorial 11

SATURDAY, MARCH 26, 2016

INSIDE

So sweet, yet so bitter PAGE 12

An accidental diplomat’s war of liberation PAGE 13

Climate change

DHAKA TRIBUNE PAGE 14

O

All paint and polish PAGE 19

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To never forget and move forward

n this day, the history of our independence as a nation began.

As we move forward into the 45th year of independence, we must strive to remember what exactly this day meant in the course of our history.

We cannot, as we take new steps towards the future, steps of innovation and progress, forget what this day stands for. Thousands of lives were sacrificed and the blood of countless Bangladeshis was spilt.

We must remember this day.

But we must also move forward. Bangladesh has come a long way since 1971. Our RMG sector has made its presence known on the world stage, technology has boomed, and the government has taken great strides in improving healthcare, individual rights, and the economy.

This is a clear testament to the resilience of the Bangladeshi people.

We have, as a nation and as a people, come through a war, political and economic turmoil, famines, and natural disasters. And there will be more hurdles to come.

But we have also, despite all odds, continued to succeed. And we cannot stop now. This day is another reminder of what we can achieve when we come together.

Our burgeoning young population has vast potential. It is every Bangladeshis duty to ensure that they too are aware of the meaning of this historic day and take that with them as they carry the country into the future.

Bangladesh’s people can work together to ensure that the country continues to grow and prosper.

Independence Day is a reminder of what we can achieve when we come together

12

DT

Opinion

SATURDAY, MARCH 26, 2016

So sweet, yet so bitter How have the lives of the struggling majority changed since our independence?

Some patriotic dreams have faded over time

n SM Shahrukh

W

e are celebrating the 45th Independence Day since the one in 1971, when the nation plunged into a war that would, in nine months, trigger the cessation of East Bengal from the faux dream of Pakistan, and Bangladesh would be born.

Pakistan was a dead horse since the days of upheaval in 1969, when its military rulers defied the actual condition that there were two economies and not one in the united Pakistan.

The beginning of the rift maybe traced to the language movement of 1952 but an earnest movement for autonomy and/ or independence, if not of all out violence, started in the early 1960s when it became obvious that the West wing was never going to give the East its due and primarily leftleaning students galvanised in a gradual mass upsurge that took a defiant shape in the late 60s.

The world as a whole was in a flux with Russian tanks rolling into Czechoslovakia, the Paris protests, the anti-Vietnam war protests etc taking place. There were unrests of the deprived in both wings of Pakistan.

Sheikh Mujibur Rahman with very strong rural roots succeeded in spreading the need for autonomy, if not independence yet, to far flung corners of East Bengal.

This paid rich dividends, as one can see from the Awami League’s landslide victory in 1970 elections.

It was the rural poor who suffered the most from the discriminatory policies of the West wing armybacked power holders.

DHAKA TRIBUNE

If the movement were left to the middle class politicians, it might have taken decades more to achieve our independence. It is not difficult to come to this conclusion since the Bengali middle class was in far better shape than the one in West Bengal of India.

It was the dispossessed rural poor who gave impetus to the drive towards independence, and they also constituted the majority of the freedom fighters that took up arms against the marauding Pakistani army who engaged in

The first constitution of the country was formulated along those lines, but as time went by, the new nation and its new rulers decided to put self-serving interests above the common good and it did not take long for a new ruling elite to emerge -- socialism was out, secularism was mollified to such an extent that the military rulers installed a state religion, the religion of the overwhelming majority and once the democracy was re-installed two and a half decades ago, the two main bourgeois

impact analysis on the lot of the common man or the environment, as long as the elite get their hefty cut. The poor have improved their lot somewhat by the dint of their hard labour but considering the overall wealth of the nation, their lives are often found to be in doldrums. The traditional student politics have had a miserable death, replaced by a club of hoodlums who are the “student leaders” of today.

The left revolted within a few months of independence but the

At the dawn of Bangladesh as an independent state, maybe even before that momentous occasion, the new state (or soon to be one) promised equity, socialism, justice, and secularism to the people of the landmass

a genocide of millions and rape of hundreds of thousands of women ever since the beginning of Operation Searchlight.

West Pakistan was always an imperial force for the East Bengalis, it was what one can term as “internal imperialism.”

All the capital of production was in the hands of the so-called “22 families” and with the military and the bureaucracy, the three formed a ruling elite that dictated all policy-making.

At the dawn of Bangladesh as an independent state, maybe even before that momentous occasion, the new state (or soon to be one) promised equity, socialism, justice, and secularism to the people of the landmass.

parties who have come to power never had the courage to go back to the secular roots or the tone and tenor of the original constitution.

Rather they are both guilty, in various degrees, in taking help from the religion-based parties to go to power or cling to it at all costs.

Gradually in the four and a half decades since independence, we have ended up with another ruling elite, a conglomeration of greedy politicians, business people, the bureaucracy, and goons who serve the people in power. Politics have lost all sense of public service and stuffing pockets seems to be the order of the day.

Various projects are taken into consideration without proper

clash of various factions following different ideologies and the repression by the state machinery spread them threadbare. The left has also failed to galvanise the rural masses who continued to remain dispossessed into their movement. As a result it splintered along ego lines and have gradually become of little significance in the last two decades.

The decline of the leftist movements worldwide with capitalism getting a clear victory, the subsequent fall of the Soviet Union and the capitalistic ambitions of communist China have all contributed to the inefficacy of the left.

Besides in Bangladesh, the left seemed always to be more full of

bombastic language filled theoretical pamphlets than the agents of change to try and merge with the cultural bends of the rural poor.

Needless to say, the leaders mostly had middle class roots.

The “spirit of independence” has become a show-piece in the various programs that take place during commemoration of anniversary of landmark dates.

These occasions often resemble the cheap sentimentalities of the middle class: Repetitive use of the same songs and “cultural programs” and certain rites. The whole thing reeks of a Bengali movie that can best be described as a sodden tear-jerker.

And then there is the “politics of memory” -- a deliberate fiddling with history. The two main parties have always presented events as per their political agendas. So, how are the people, the struggling majority, have had their lots changed from pre-independence?

It seems we have gone back to be ruled by an elite who hold all wealth and all power and who dictate policy that would best serve their own selves.

The disparity between the rich and the poor is still a startling yawn. And we have gone back to having an “internal imperialism” -masters rule, subjugated obey.

In order to have a share of the cream of the wealth of the nation, many are in a rat race to elevate themselves into that elite class.

These attempts are devoid of any principles or morality and are quite often rapacious in nature. Mendacity has become the principal trait of the national character. l SM Shahrukh is a freelance contributor.

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DT

Book Review

SATURDAY, MARCH 26, 2016

An accidental diplomat’s war of liberation Rehman Sobhan’s memoirs provide a window into the War of Independence

A life unequalled

n Habibul Haque Khondker

O

n March 27, 1971, Rehman Sobhan, an economics professor of Dhaka University, with close association with the leadership of the Awami League, busy negotiating with the Pakistani officials about the rightful share of the then East Pakistan as Bangabandhu was negotiating with President Yahya Khan, left home for India.

On a small boat, his own fate was as uncertain as that of Bangladesh -- as he recollected many years later in his autobiography, Untranquil Recollections: The Years of Fulfilment (Sage, 2016). A reviewer of his wonderfully written memoirs, Lincoln Chen, an American professor and a friend of Bangladesh, wondered: Why fulfilment?

The fulfillment for Sobhan was seeing Bangladesh’s liberation, a dream that finally materialised on December 16, 1971, which he saw from his temporary house at Oxford on TV with a broken ligament sustained at the UN building in New York. Though he saw the surrender ceremony on TV, he was fortunate to see the buildup leading to the war of liberation from the ringside.

Until December 15, 1971, Sobhan, an officially anointed “envoy extraordinaire” by the Mujibnagar government, lobbied hard at the United Nations. He moved from lawmakers’ offices in Washington, DC to persuade them to support the cause of Bangladesh.

He was on a personal mission to win the hearts and minds of politicians, intellectuals, and

public figures in the West for whom Bangladesh was a remote news bite, far removed from their day to day preoccupations.

Rehman Sobhan’s journey began in 1957 when a 21-yearold Cambridge graduate landed in Dhaka. He called Bangladesh home, even though his facility with the Bangla language was almost non-existent. His power of articulation in English is exceptional. I remember distinctly the day in December 1996 when Rehman Sobhan was recollecting his days of diplomacy at a conference held at Columbia University, New York to celebrate 25 years of Bangladesh. He mentioned the unforgettable Aretha Farnklin’s hit song of 1971, “Spanish Harlem.”

His eloquence charmed the audience so much that a woman seated next to me whispered into my ears: “I wish I had his power of articulation.” The lady in question was Shelly Feldman, a Cornell Professor. Sobhan’s power of articulation on a live television show of PBS in Boston in 1971 impressed a young Benazir Bhutto, then at Radcliff college, a sister institution of Harvard, so much so that after many years as prime minister of Pakistan, she once referred to him as “the Rehman Sobhan.”

Such a gift of gab that Sobhan cultivated in his school days at St Paul’s, Darjeeling, Aitchison College, Lahore, or Cambridge, where he was the president of Majlish, came handy in his role as an envoy for a country yet to be born. It is his boarding school experience of living in the Spartan way that helped him, squatting in his host’s living room in Washington, DC or in Kolkata.

He embarked on a diplomatic

role and headed for America in a borrowed, oversized overcoat of a friend in Delhi. Sobhan as an envoy for Bangladesh was on a mission to lobby hard to persuade the Aid consortium for Pakistan, joint meetings of the IMF and World Bank not to give aid to Pakistan unless it stops genocide in Bangladesh.

It was his Cambridge connections that helped him establish linkages to an international, old boy network, some of whom were economists and others prominent journalists.

As an essayist of distinction, Sobhan wrote for The Guardian, New Statesman, The Nation, and several other print media in the West to publicise the cause of Bangladesh. He gave speeches and participated in debates at Cambridge, The Chatham House, Sorbonne, Paris, Yale, MIT, the University of Pennsylvania, Syracuse University, and Williams College to drum up support for Bangladesh.

A scion of high nobility of Murshidabad from his father’s side and the Nawab family of Dhaka from his mother’s side, he was known for his simplicity.

His lifestyle was unassuming; the furniture of his modest Gulshan house was Spartan. He dedicated his life to public service.

But it is his elite background that gave him a ringside view of history. He met Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy, the president of the All Pakistan Awami League, at the residence of Kamal Hossain, whose father was Suhrawardy’s physician.

He met Bangabandhu along with Chief Minister Ataur Rahman at the residence of his nana, his maternal grandfather, Khwaja

Nazimuddin in 1957.

He also met Bangabandhu at the hospital room of Mian Iftikharuddin, president of a small opposition party of Pakistan.

But it was not until 1964 that he developed a close relationship with the founder of future Bangladesh.

It was in 1964 when Bangabandhu invited Kamal Hossain and Rehman Sobhan to help draft the manifesto for the 1964 elections. When Ayub Khan declared his candidacy for the 1964 elections and issued a list of his achievements, Bangabandhu asked the duo to contribute to the drafting of his response.

Sobhan fondly recollects Bangabandhu’s greatest quality to reach out to people and draw upon their perceived qualities at the service of the nation.

His masterly narratives vividly record the story of sacrifice and commitment of so many who cast their lots with the cause of Bangladesh.

Americans, Indians, the British, French academics, philosophers, and ordinary men and women who were able to make the right choice, in favour of justice.

Some made the right choice on their own, others needed a little persuasion

Rehman Sobhan, along with a group of brilliant Bengali economists at the Pakistan Institute of Development Economics, developed the germs of the two-economy theory in the early 1960s for which many give Sobhan singular credit. Sobhan shares this glory with his colleagues.

Inclusivity is one of Sobhan’s virtues. It is quite likely that through his sportsmanship -- from boxing to hockey, he developed a team spirit. A considerable part of his 444–page memoir is devoted to the stories of his friends from the tennis pitch of South Club, Kolkata, St Paul’s school and Cambridge.

Sobhan is endowed with an amazing memory with names.

In a recent interview, I pressed him, whether he kept a diary or Googled the spelling of some of his old friends. He assured me that he remembers the names and places very well.

A truly public intellectual, Sobhan wrote penetrating analyses of economic disparity between the two wings of Pakistan. His book on basic democracy was an expose on Pakistan’s authoritarian rule under the garb of democracy. As a teacher at Dhaka University, he fired the imagination of a future generation of economists, civil servants, and political leaders.

Later as head of BIDS and the founder of the Centre for Policy Dialogue, he was able to mobilise a fine group of economists dedicated to public service.

Rehman Sobhan’s memories take the readers to so many untold stories of the challenges of the liberation war, the intrigue in Kolkata between the Mujibnagar, 8 Theatre Road, and the Bangladesh Foreign Ministry at Park Circus where Mushtaq and his gang were conspiring with the US officials.

His masterly narratives vividly record the story of sacrifice and commitment of so many who cast their lots with the cause of Bangladesh. Americans, Indians, the British, French academics, philosophers, and ordinary men and women who were able to make the right choice, in favour of justice. Some made the right choice on their own, others needed a little persuasion.

The memoirs of Rehman Sobhan, a freedom fighter extraordinaire, ends on the last day of December 1971 when he returns to Dhaka after accomplishing his mission.

His memoirs provide a window into the complicated political and diplomatic processes of the background of the War of Independence and the historical antecedents that led to the birth of a nation. The process, surely, was untranquil. l Habibul Haque Khondker is a Professor of Sociology at Zayed University, Abu Dhabi.

DT

14 Climate Change Bangladesh will experience rise of temperature beyond the Paris agreement SATURDAY, MARCH 26, 2016

n AKM Saiful Islam

O

n December 12, 2015, a historic agreement to combat climate change to achieve a low carbon, resilient, and sustainable world was signed by representatives of 195 nations in Paris. The purpose of this historic agreement is to reduce greenhouse emissions to limit increase in global average temperature within 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, aspiring even to limit global warming within 1.5C above the pre-industrial level. However, it is important to know how realistic it is to achieve this goal as per IPCC, as global mean temperate has already been raised by 0.78C over the last century, compared to the pre-industrial level.

A mean global rise in temperature by 2C is not guaranteed to be the same for Bangladesh. Recent studies have shown that extreme weather events such as floods, cyclones, severe drought, and sea level the rise are already intensifying in South Asia due to the impact of rise of temperature. The rise of temperature will eventually increase the frequency of cyclones and storm surges, affect crop yields, and increase health hazards and the probability of drought. Thus, for a country like Bangladesh, changes of mean temperature due to climate

change will play an adverse role.

Quantifying future changes of mean temperature is often found essential to assess these adverse impacts.

Projecting climate variability is essential for a densely populated developing country like Bangladesh. However, projections should be made over a domain large enough to capture the circulation patterns, having a spatial resolution fine enough to provide essential details for the impact models and capturing a wide range of uncertainties of predictions which are often found absent in many of the recent studies.

In this context, a study is conducted with 11 high resolution (~50km) Regional Climate Model (RCM) dynamically downscaled Global Circulation Model (GCM) data over the whole Indian sub-continent known as CORDEX-South Asia domain.

Model results are validated using available observed datasets from the Bangladesh Meteorological Department. Changes of temperature are determined for three future time slices, viz short (2020s, ie 2011-2040), medium (2050s, ie 2041-2070), and long (2080s, ie 2071-2100) with respect to the baseline period (1971-2000).

In this context, a four-year long research project called “High End Climate Impact and Extremes (HELIX)” is ongoing at BUET funded by the European

Union to carry out this study.

An attempt has been made to assess the expected future changes of temperature across Bangladesh under an extreme global warming scenario termed as RCP 8.5. It has been found that high-resolution regional climate models (RCM) perform well in representing the seasonal mean as well as some small-scale features of monsoon temperature patterns over Bangladesh. The average temperature anomaly (difference between observed and model prediction) relative to pre-industrial period for the 11 RCM models exhibits an increasing trend. Towards the end of the 21st century (2071–2100), all RCM models indicate a significant rise in the mean annual temperature ranging between 3.7C and 5.7C over Bangladesh.

On the other hand, considering extreme emission scenarios, Bangladesh will experience a mean rise of 2C by 2040. Based on the median of these 11 regional climate model predictions, Bangladesh will experience a mean rise of temperature by 4C relative to pre-industrial period by the end of 2080.

From these multi-model ensemble results, the highest rise of temperature will be in February during the 2080s ranging between 3.6C and 9.8C. All regional climate models project increase in average temperature over Bangladesh for

the three future time slices. During the winter months (January and February) mean monthly temperature will rise to the highest during the 2050s and 2080s, which indicates a warmer winter season for Bangladesh. Though warmer winter will reduce cost of heating, it will adversely affect the production of cold loving crops. On the other hand, both summer and monsoon temperature will have an anomaly ranging between 0.7C and 4C relative to the pre-industrial period.

The scenarios presented in this article are indicative of the expected range of changes in the climate over Bangladesh. The detection of possible changes in extreme temperature, in terms of the seasonal, spatial as

well as duration, is of profound importance to the local, regional, and national scales, due to the associated socio-economic consequences. Nonetheless, the majority of models predict that temperatures will rise throughout the century and reach its maximum at the end of the century. l AKM Saiful Islam is a Professor of the Institute of Water and Flood Management (IWFM) at the Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET), Bangladesh.

Email: akmsaifulislam@iwfm.buet. ac.bd, saiful3@gmail.com. Mr Alfi Hasan and Mr Abdur Rahman Tazkia worked as a Research Assistant at BUET to simulate and extract regional climate model data.

Engaging the next generation towards a low carbon development pathway n Alex Trowell

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ast year was recorded as the hottest year in history.

Climate change is now the most urgent threat to mankind’s existence and it is time to stop procrastinating. The severity of issues we now collectively face from climate change go beyond changing daily habits such as resisting the temptation to switch on the air-con as the hot season looms. It is time to encourage and support planners and policymakers to take immediate large scale action on climate change before it is too late.

In climate change adaptation, Bangladesh is scribing the blueprint for the rest of the world to follow. However, in mitigation, there is room for improvement.

Bangladesh’s respective global emissions contribution (0.35%) is minuscule in many developing

nations, but Bangladesh as a nation must also show the willingness to develop in a sustainable manner.

The International Centre for Climate Change and Development (ICCCAD), together with Cardiff University, UK, are holding a series of student outreach workshops funded by the UK Department for Energy and Climate Change (DECC) to generate awareness of “The Bangladesh Energy, Emissions and Food Security Modelling Tool” (BD2050). BD2050 is an integrated model to explore low carbon development pathways for Bangladesh between now and 2050. The comprehensive model explores three main themes for long-term planning (with various additional sub-themes). The three main themes are: Energy (demand and supply), food production and land use, and overall emissions in Bangladesh.

Modelling calculators such as BD2050 will soon serve as a vital tool in Bangladesh’s climate change mitigation armoury. The objective of the student outreach workshops is to engage interested participants, generate discussion, and gain important feedback.

The BD2050 project has been developed by a team of researchers at Cardiff University under the supervision of project leader Dr Monjur Mourshed, senior lecturer in sustainable engineering. The project now seeks to engage a small group of students based in Bangladesh who can help develop the project further. The next generation will have to live with the energy choices the country makes today, so their participation in the energy mix is key.

How to get involved

ICCCAD seeks to engage a small group of interested young

professionals based in Bangladesh looking to gain experience in the field of climate change mitigation.

Roles to choose from include getting involved with emission scenario modelling, web tool development, or presenting the project through workshops to the public, academics, and researchers and policy makers. Stay updated on future events, project development and past work by “liking” “The Bangladesh Energy, Emissions and Food Security Modelling Tool” (BD2050) Facebook page -- https:// www.facebook.com/bd2050c. If interested, please do not hesitate to contact: v Yousuf Mahid, Coordinator: Climate Change Governance (CCG) at International Centre for Climate Change and Development (ICCCAD) mahid.buet06@gmail.com v Saqib Huq, Visiting Researcher at International Centre

for Climate Change and Development (ICCCAD) saqibhuq@hotmail.com v Alex Trowell, Visiting Researcher at International Centre for Climate Change and Development (ICCCAD) alexander@trowell.com Alex Trowell is Visiting Researcher at International Centre for Climate Change and Development (ICCCAD).

This page has been developed in collaboration with the International Centre for Climate Change and Development (ICCCAD) at Independent University, Bangladesh (IUB) and its partners, Bangladesh Centre for Advanced Studies (BCAS) and International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED). This page represents the views and experiences of the authors and does not necessarily reflect the views of Dhaka Tribune or ICCCAD or its partners.

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PAINTING: ZAINUL ABEDIN

SATURDAY, MARCH 26, 2016

On this day in 1971 n Arts & Letters Desk

O

n this day in 1971, people of Dhaka woke up to the horror of one of the most brutal genocide campaigns in history. The Pakistan army, well equipped with ammunition and tanks, engaged in an orgy of killing totally unarmed, unprepared teachers, students and officials of Dhaka University along with ordinary people living around. The DU dorms, especially Jagannath Hall and Iqbal Hall (now Zahurul Haq Hall), and the teachers’ quarters were the centre of anti-Pakistan political activities.

It explains why the crackdown, which later extended even to the remote village, began with the DU and the areas adjacent to it. The time from the night of March 25 to the lifting of curfew next day has found a central place in our historiography.

On the 45th anniversary of our Independence Day, Arts & Letters takes a look at this bit of history through the eyes of those who had survived this attack. Accounts of what had actually happened have been compiled in many books. But

INSIDE

Sahitya Prakash’s 1971: Bhoyaboho Obhiggata (1971: Dreadful Experience) and UPL’s Historicising 1971 Genocide stand out among others.

The former was edited by Rashid Haider and the latter written and edited by Imtiaz Ahmed.

Chhilam” (I was at Jagannath Hall that Night), Sheel gives a vivid picture of that night. Having completely surrounded the Jagannath Hall, the Pakistani army first launched a deadly shell and arson attack on the hall. The crushing nature of the

I found Iqbal Hall demolished in many places, with the staircases covered with dark stains of blood... There was dried blood on the floor of a room Rashid’s book anthologises articles, among others, by Kaliranjan Sheel, a veteran activist of Communist Party of Bangladesh, and Selina Hossain, one of our most respected fiction writers. While Sheel shares how he had survived the killing mission, Selina writes about what she had seen on the morning of March 26 upon visiting Iqbal Hall, one of the bastions of pro-independence student leaders.

In his article “Jagannath Hall-ei

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World Poetry Day

attack made it clear that the mission was to enact a holocaust, gunning down every living soul staying there. Yet, miraculously, Sheel had survived although how this was possible would continue to baffle him all his life. While the mortar shell attacks were going on, the army gutted most parts of the dormitory. Then they barged into the rooms and indiscriminately fired bullets into the hapless students.

However, some students, includ-

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Arts & Letters

ing Sheel, were spared because of the darkness. But as the day broke, they hunted down all of them and asked them to carry the corpses all over the compound, and to heap them in a corner of the field.

Finally, they ordered the remaining students to line up beside the stacks of corpses to complete their mission. But Sheel was too overworked to stand on his feet, so he fell on the ground right before the bullets could hit him. This was the breathtaking tale of how Sheel had cheated death. Yet, disturbing memories of that horrifying night might have taken their toll accordingly, precipitating an early death of one of the few survivors of the Jagannath Hall carnage.

In her article “Those Suffocating Days”, Selina Hossain writes, “We came to Iqbal Hall by rickshaw ...

On our way we saw the Babutala slums burned to the ground, nothing left except charcoals and ashes.

I found Iqbal Hall demolished in many places, with the staircases covered with dark stains of blood...

There was dried blood on the floor of a room and its door read, “Zafar, Chittagong.” There was dried blood on the floor and the dead body was

Spoken word poetry

18

not there. One realised that the dead body was dragged out and down the corridor, the stairs. A lot of the rooms were like that.”

Imtiaz Ahmed’s book not only provides a theoretical framework for better understanding the genocide, but also gives us interviews of those who had seen their loved ones get brutally killed in front of their eyes.

Through interviews with family members of Statistics Department’s ANM Maniruzzaman and English’s Jyotirmoy Guhathakurta, among others, Imtiaz’s book provides accounts of how teachers were dragged out and shot. It also includes interviews of Rajkumari Roy, wife of a martyred office assistant at Jagannath Hall; and Uma Rani, a sweeper whose martyred father was a gardener at the VC’s office.

At a time when perpetrators of this attack still deny their crimes against humanity, books like these, along with Bangla Academy’s voluminous Ekattorer Smrity series and UPL’s Road to Freedom series, serve as our witness to the darkest night in our history that had seen men turn into demons and the demons shoot indiscriminately at our people. l

Book Review & Exhibition

Send your submissions to: anl@dhakatribune.com

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Arts & Letters

16

SATURDAY, MARCH 26, 2016

W O R L D P O E T R Y D AY Demilitarized zones

Relevance

You: Impenetrable with your barracks of uniformed, armoured, marching armies-Ready to shoot an unsuspecting trespasser A dreamer’s, not a schemer’s, attempt at...

Territorial would be an understatement.

I’m trying to make you just a little less relevant.

Scribble your name on the main page Instead of outside the margins because the main page is where the ordinary belongs.

Ahsan Akbar

Syeda Samira Sadeque

Dismiss your platoon for an evening No court-martial, no show-cause; Easier - send them to the movies They may revel in the modern day antics of 21st century Marilyn or Marlon: Exchange their pre-washed hearts for a slice of violent delicacy.

I’m trying to smudge you out of my routine, Desperately adding meaningless conversations so you soon fall way below on that chat list - so that I have to scroll down For so long to find your name that I might as well forget you; For so long that That the bitterness might as well become tasteless the unnecessary bitterness, Of why do I know the time of your flight?

A detail as irrelevant As my existence in your life.

And I will swap my summer solstice, scramble the two hemispheres, For a night aflame: candle or bonfire...

The call is yours.

Not everything is negotiable, she declares, Even in completely demilitarized zones. [from The Devil’s Thumbprint, Bengal Lights Books, 2013]

Dead rose

Rashna Munawar A rose lay on my table: crinkled, dry and dead, Hard to believe my eyes Which had once seen it so red.

With petals wet in dewdrops, It had enchanting charms, And once saw you lay

careless, Spellbound in my arms.

At the blossom of love, In blooming red it shone, And fading towards the Fall, Was lifeless like a stone.

A token of immortal despair From the seed of red it grows, Till love dies a brutal death And leaves back a dead rose.

Untitled poems

Dew-flowerdrops

Abdullah Al Muktadir

PAINTING BY SM SULTAN

Urmi Masud

“Will rust”, is what sings the eastern winds; Yuki means to sail the seas The stone is breaking, Zarathustra’s wings.

1.

Zarathustra and Yuki looked at each other None looked down queer as it may sound.

Zarathustra made of stone, Yuki shaped in a daisy patterned frock, Their corneas, two pairs of engravings, Zarathustra’s purple patched pigeon plucked, Yuki’s were for dreaming.

I wondered at their friendship,

2.

There is a sea, shallow, breathless and I have seen its empty heart and barren depths and it has given rise to tsunami of sands, falling on its knees at sandy shores, tourists laughing at its retreating dust...A sea, I have seen, inside my empty fist...

There are broken nails, jagged lines,

A fresh coat of paint Shehzar Doja

By the sound of crashing waves, its subtle brushstrokes painting the sole canvas under the feet of my soul’s eye, I walked slowly, savouring each footstep of this ancient city alone.

There, on the corner of the Bosporus,

along the brittle horizon, of the seabed, I witnessed two forgotten prayers emerge either side from a single lotus tile and reminisce, forgetful in ignorant mirth, of the stuttering incantations of a lonely child from

claw like marks from benign finger tips, and pieces of hair on this wall, a bedroom, not a cage bright sunlight tsunami falls and retreats particle dust dances and hovers in freedom and I have seen this pretty bedroom and I hv seen the caged animal whimpering, my palm, empty, the sunlight flickers through my fingers

so far ago.

I wish I could tell myself then, what I truly felt but words simply slipped out of rhetoric and back into the crashing waves of that painted sea.

2.

The simple fragrance of this timeless bazaar was all I had to awaken me.

At quarter to dusk, the orchestrated heartbeats of composed peers found themselves rushing off seeming hell bent on ablutions.

They left me alone in the almost tangible stillness of my abstinence.

What now?

Questions,

Once he brought the most glorious autumn into our world.

Clouds into clouds. White over white.

He carried something we had never had around this city.

Kaashphul drenched with the shiuli’s red.

But when he left, two of our twelve sweet months followed him towards his no-land.

Clouds over clouds. White into white.

His blood washed everything of our autumn days, and Threw us into a calendar of ten lamenting months.

Our tears and years no more have any Bhadra and Ashwin.

Aamader brishti gulo aaj komol shishir-phul.

Our rains have now evolved into some dew-flower-drops.

Simple elegant meanderings.

Questions, Simple elegant musings.

The muezzin’s call spreads out thin in the backdrop of this ancient city. the smell of fresh paint is always alluring.

Nation

Each with our purpose Form convoluted reasons to twist each share My thoughts hang on each droplet Yours cut the monsoon air.

Each with our different theories Shall we emulse, shall we be torn?

Will this land see sparks of sunrise To nurture a future just born?

Shall we merge at last with our conscience?

Shall we shadow as the masks we wear?

Shall we fight as prodigal heroes To follow convictions we swear?

Or let them scatter ashes to ashes Crushed down dust to dust To flow with flirting breezes Or burn deep with no dignity or trust.

SATURDAY, MARCH 26, 2016

an obscure poem

Sadaf Saaz Siddiqi In a crowd with a blur of faces A heightened purpose in time suspends A mingling of emotions To question the beginning and end.

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Arts & Letters Rifat Islam Esha

Shall rigid principle paralyse And compromise betray?

Till wrong is right And is believed.

And given words Are imbibed and received.

Shall freedom be worn like a noose around my neck?

Eroded driftwood From a dying shipwreck. from Sari Reams, UPL, 2013

we want to find a place instill a slow forgetfulness to move on, take a step ahead from what lies in the culvert of our dismay— a to-be forgotten sinew, the smears of laughter; unwritten desires and all that. this has happened before, this happens. we have walked past this this we say; rage out the foamy words as we sift through blank pages: the story could have been otherwise— not so faint you know, there’s only noise in this one like the one before we throw punctuated lines— the more wordy ones become the pallbearer

Spoken word poetry

of justice— a body that has already died. our protests are merely situation-based, but, where is this place? our mouths dry in its search; the voyeurism and the slight-y irritation revolt in our eyes; and one step ahead, there is forgetfulness, for sure: a place out of us out of this mess we hum in deep breath— tongues licking off ideas as if we are wounded, as if the wound is ours.

we rave, sit our thoughts till they settle to make a nest of more noise in a distance— inked in grieving metaphors: cleverly spaced with silence glaring back at us as nothing happens. then, when we look back at our dug-out safe space we say we are: trying over and over to numb this unrest in us as days number up the pages.

WORKSHOP

A performance-based literature group has already made its mark on the literary scene. Now it’s time for some spoken word pieces. growth,” said Wilcock. n Syeda Samira Sadeque Omar, a Malaysian-Australian Poetry is one of our strongest cultural expressions. Whether in the form of small rhymes or recitations or rhythmic beats of Nazrul’s chol re chol re chol, poetry is instilled in us as a form of emotive expression from a very early stage in our life.

But that picture applies to Bangla poetry and the English poetry scene in the country is not as vibrant.

English poetry in Dhaka, however, has seen a rise recently what with increased activities of various poetry groups and international literary festivals in the city.

Last month, Ampersand, an English spoken word platform in Dhaka, organised various workshops and spoken word events for budding poets.

One of them included a performance as well as a workshop with Australian spoken word artist Omar Musa.

“The visit to Bangladesh by Omar Musa was an opportunity not just to share his talent with a friendly audience in Bangladesh, but a chance to encourage similar

talent in Bangladesh,” says Greg Wilcock, Australian High Commissioner in Dhaka.

The Australian High Commission sponsored and supported the show and workshop.

“We heard of a young group of poets coming together in Dhaka, and wanted to contribute to its

spoken word artist and rapper, was the winner of Australian Poetry Slam (2008), and Indian Ocean Poetry Slam (2009).

His novel Here Come the Dogs, written in a blend of poetry and prose, literary narrative and hiphop verse, was published by Penguin Books in 2014.

“Bangladesh has a rich and proud artistic heritage, not least in music and literature,” say Wilcock.

“Omar Musa and Ampersand Spoken Word Group expertly demonstrated that spoken word, poetry and hip-hop are universal and powerful ways of expressing our thoughts and feelings, whether we come from Australia, Bangladesh or anywhere else.”

The show, which was held at the High Commissioner’s residence, drew a large number of people from the literary crowd of Dhaka, and also featured spoken word pieces by Ampersand members.

The show was followed by a public workshop the next day wherein participants engaged in writing and performing activities. l

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SATURDAY, MARCH 26, 2016

BOOK REVIEW

Between science fiction and fantasy n Ikhtisad Ahmed A discussion on science fiction was hosted by Bangla Academy last November, as part of the Dhaka Literary Festival. Despite being in the morning, all the seats were occupied. The writers participating in it were not household names in Bangladesh, yet the hour-long session saw people queue by the semi-closed door of the auditorium to listen to them. As I talked with a few of the enthusiastic audience afterwards, it came out that the reason for such intense interest is that there is a hunger for the genre.

Many of the ever-growing number of writers in Bangladesh are turning to English. Genre-writing in the language, however, is dwindling, with science fiction almost absent. Saad Z. Hossain, one of the four writers at the panel discussion, seems to be the lone Bangladeshi writer writing in English in this genre. He writes in the no man’s land between science fiction and fantasy.

He writes from a place of absurdity and acerbic wit, which makes defining what he writes even more difficult. That it is difficult to put him in a clearly defined box is his allure.

His debut novel, Escape From Baghdad, was first published in Bangladesh in 2012 as Baghdad Immortals by Bengal Publications.

However, the Unnamed Press version, selected by Financial Times

as one of the best books of 2015 in the science fiction category (although they too referred to it as being unclassifiable), is equally imaginative, wild and quirky, and more refined and precise. It is ambitious in its flirting with and skirting of genres, forever on the verge of becoming a creative nightmare, yet somehow remaining on the edge to be delightfully creative.

ate and barter specialty items in the new economy that has been created by the war. Captain Hamid, the star torturer of the fallen Ba’athist regime, makes his appearance in the story. He promises Dagr and Kinza a share of the untold riches hidden in Mosul, and becomes a partner of convenience as they embark on a treasure quest.

No sooner do they leave their

He writes from a place of absurdity and acerbic wit, which makes defining what he writes even more difficult. That it is difficult to put him in a clearly defined box is his allure Set in the aftermath of the ill-conceived US invasion of Iraq, Dagr, a professor before the war, and Kinza are forced into opportunism for survival. A US Marine, Private Hoffman, is their business partner and friend. They appropri-

safe refuge than they are asked for help. Those who, much like them, are condemned to living in Baghdad enlist their help to hunt the Lion of Akkad. Their vigilantism lands them in the middle of a centuries-old war, involving the Druze

sect and the secrets they preserve and guard. The Lion is an ancient warrior pitted against the avaricious, manipulative Avicenna (a fictional version of Persian polymath Ibn Sina), a fellow immortal.

Constantly under attack from the US military, special elements of the former Iraqi secret service, alchemists, witches, and fundamentalist thugs, Dagr, Kinza, Hoffman and Hamid are transformed into survivalist truth-seekers embroiled in this other war taking place in the hellish warzone. Their primary objective of escaping from Baghdad descends into an absurdity reminiscent of Blackadder Goes Forth. But readers can constantly feel the city of Baghdad breathing in the background.

Escape From Baghdad is an eclectic war novel without peer. The gluttonous Hoffman, who admits to being “just a cog” and “dream[s] only in American”, personifies the US. He manufactures a baseless search for weapons of mass destruction (his superior says he will “personally make sure there is a Nobel Peace Prize in it” for him) as a means to his own end.

He escapes punishment for dealing in contraband, helps Dagr and Kinza, and indulges in debauchery.

His exchanges with fellow military officers exemplify Saad’s sharp wit.

He has a keen eye for humour and he is capable of writing lucid prose.

It is dialogue-heavy, which naturally lends itself to Saad’s wit and ensures

the novel maintains a brisk pace.

The wartime satire has shades of Catch-22, but the story is not about the Americans and their misdeeds.

Interactions between the characters stay true to the particular blend of styles, structures and diction employed in the book, while setting and driving the action. He writes about the horrors of a war blamed on the Iraqis by using fantasy and science fiction. In doing so, he achieves the extraordinary feat of making the reader root for the pair of misfits, Dagr and Kinza.

We want them to succeed so that we can discover the truth and feel satiated instead of short-changed at the end. Saad shatters the erroneous preconceptions about the war without indulging in didacticism.

He makes us see Iraqis as people – some good, some bad but all flawed like us – rather than as terrorists.

When fantasy and science are peeled away, what we are left with is a human story framed within a classic quest plot. It is an adventure tale, where good battles evil in a wasteland where everyone is both. Escape From Baghdad is bizarre, humorous and entertaining.

It cannot be classified, yet it is a bold example of genre-writing. l Ikhtisad Ahmed is a writer. His latest books are the poetry collection, Requiem, and the short story collection, Yours, Etcetera. Twitter: @ikhtisad

EXHIBITION

To see or not to see

n Arts & Letters Desk The paintings and artworks featured in Shawon Akand’s second solo art exhibition roamed between two worlds: a world we are

unfamiliar with and a very familiar world that we are living.

The unfamiliar world, however, takes us amid nature where people seem to be living comfortably, dressed as they are in traditional

and blend of perspectives that does stand out.

The artist himself nicely captures his position vis-a-vis differing and conflicting points of view existing in a society or across societies: “People dwell in their respective worlds of ‘concepts’. That world is being built upon their knowledge or conceptual framework – which they subscribe to and live by.

That’s why people differ in their thoughts. This in turn creates the difference in perception and read-

ing of the same subject/object at the same spatial-temporal reality.

Everything we ‘see’ and ‘do not see’ actually depends on the canon we come to dwelling with and on our concepts perceived. As a result, when we look at/read different works, we often ‘see’ certain things and sometimes ‘do not see’ certain other things at the same time. Due to diverse ‘conceptual’ framework, the same work discarded as insignificant by one person can be by regarded as important by other viewer. l

CORPORATE COUPLE

A GREAT SOUL VISITING SHAHBAGH

attires. A pale yellow colour pervades the forest-like place. But the focus is obviously on the centre where a giant tortoise is walking by with three or four people sitting on its shell. That’s where it defamiliarizes our experience but at the same time leaves us thinking about this construction.

The other world is very familiar to us: it’s the current world we are living and his representation of it involves a sharp critique of our current society that is becoming more and more mechanical and corporate and moving further away from nature.

The exhibition, titled ‘To see or not to see’ ended on March 19 at national art gallery of Shilpakala Academy. It showcased works from various mediums including painting, video art, mixed medium, digital print and Sara painting.

A lot of our painters and artists were and still are intellectually oriented. So is Shawon and there is nothing new in it. But his intellectually works exude an openness

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Heritage

SATURDAY, MARCH 26, 2016

All paint and polish Lacquer and beeswax have a rich history in international trade wooden coffin, finely decorated with birds and dragons, originating from Chu province, amongst the finest examples of early use.

However, its earliest known use, in China, is on a red wooden bowl of the Hemudu period of about six or seven thousand years ago.

Such artefacts, of course, not unnaturally, raise questions about the archaeology of Bangladesh.

Those great, abandoned Buddhist sites of ages up to at least two thousand years, no doubt because of the humidity and damp, have revealed, during excavation, little, if any such material.

n Tim Steel

I

t was tempting to title this reflection on a couple of indigenous commodities, and their processing, with origins in Bangladesh and the lands around, “spit and polish.”

Nor would this time-honoured description of the process, especially the military process, of hardening and shining leather, have been inappropriate.

After all, the military foundations of the forces of Britain that built, and with which it protected, the world’s greatest ever empire, all had significant evolution in the lands that are now, for the most part, Bangladesh.

This may be regarded as especially true, not only in the development and financing of British military and naval might, but also in growing its skills and expertise in the process of securing wider realms of the subcontinent. And, also, of course, as a source of the gunpowder that enforced the power of those forces.

However, it is, perhaps, in the social and civilian uses of fluids amongst the commodities of

indigenous origin, of the Lac bug, and the product of the Bee, that some of that financial foundation of trade developed millennia ago.

Both, for so long, have been used as an essential in shining so many surfaces such as wood, paper, and leather.

The name “Laquer” is amongst the world’s earliest of wood finishes, derives from a Sanskrit word, “laksha.” Produced from the scarlet, resinous secretion of the Lac bug that infested, and, presumably, continues to infest, trees in ancient Bangladesh, as well as neighbouring areas of the North Eastern parts of South Asia, for its use in wood treatment across the world -- dating from early times, laquer has a great history in craftsmanship, across the world, especially the eastern world.

Amongst their experimentations in uses for plentiful natural products, of course, was also their discovery of the properties of saltpetre, which was to lay the foundation for gunpowder, which was the most famous and most enduring.

The uniqueness to south Asia of the Lac bug leaves little doubt of the location of the origins

of laquer. Beeswax, however, surely has a more ubiquitous international origin, but perhaps it was the luxuriance of the fertile plains of the Ganges and its delta that created an especially beefriendly environment.

And we do know that the export of the wax has long played a part in the export trade from the lands around the Ganges.

The evident particularity of the beeswax merits, it seems, the mention in the mid-17th century journal of Sir Streynsham Master, head of East India Company operations, “(we) sailed up the river Ganges, on the east side of which most part of the great quantity of beeswax is made, which is the King’s commodity and none suffered to deal therein but for his account, and swarms of Bees flew over our vessel.”

Whilst the reason for the emperor’s monopoly or that, presumably of his viceroy of the time, Shaista Khan -- should be applied to the beeswax is not clear, but its existence clearly points to its perceived value.

We know lacquer to have been of use for decoration from as early as the fourth century BCE, in China, with a splendidly decorated

The uniqueness to south Asia of the Lac bug leaves little doubt of the location of the origins of laquer. Beeswax, however, surely has a more ubiquitous international origin, but perhaps it was the luxuriance of the fertile plains of the Ganges and its delta that created an especially beefriendly environment

However, we can have no reason not to suppose both laquer and wax were, in fact, in common decorative use in materials that, sadly, were never likely to survive such climatic difficulties.

Nearly two thousand years later, Japanese lacquered papier mache and wooden artefacts were probably at their finest -but we also know from the cargo manifests of European trading vessels, that, at the same period, cargoes of the substances were much valued.

The first literary reference to laquer is in the three thousand year old literary masterpiece, the famous Mahabharata, with origins in, or around, the lands of Bangladesh and the Ganges basin.

The plot of the famous “The House of Laquer” story depends upon the inflammability of the wood coating as a means of contriving an “accident” for the ubiquitous, “wicked” uncle to murder a heroic nephew.

No doubt that inflammability caused more than few, actual, historic house fires!

Beeswax, unsurprisingly, also has some archaeology in the history of its use.

By the mid-18th century, in the form of a substitute for “Gutta-percha,” as a form of latex, it was extensively used in the development of electric artefacts.

It was, in fact, one of the earliest, natural, “plastic” materials widely used, along with horn, tortoiseshell, and, of course, laquer, itself, also known as shellac.

It has been found in the tombs of ancient Egypt and Rome, as well as wrecked Viking ships. Whether or not this beeswax comprised part of the cargo for Roman, Greek, and Arab traders through the Ganges delta from, at latest, the middle of the last millennium BCE, is not clear. Certainly we know the Romans, at least, were themselves great bee keepers.

Over the centuries, its many uses, including in the ancient, four thousand year old “lost-wax” casting process that originated around the Ganges delta, and continues, today, in Bangladesh, through wax tablets for writing, ancient tooth fillings, musical instruments, and even sealing for bullets and shells, have certainly required industrial quantities of production, and it seems reasonable to suppose that the very fertile lands of the Ganges delta may well have been, for millennia, a traditional source of supply.

Beeswax is, of course, an indispensable component of the building of a honeycomb by bees. Secreted in tiny flakes on the underside of the abdomen of worker bees -- it is moulded by them, into the familiar cellular structure of the comb. As bee keepers are happy to say, “a lot of honey comes with a great deal of wax.”

Laquer and beeswax are two byproducts of nature, abundant in the hugely fertile lands that are now Bangladesh, and with a rich history as desirable objects of international trade, from very ancient times, even until today. l Tim Steel is a communications, marketing and tourism consultant.

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SATURDAY, MARCH 26, 2016

CROSSWORD ACROSS 1 Blood vessels (5) 6 Limb (3) 7 Tribal symbol (5) 10 Skip like a goat (5) 12 Soon (4) 13 Of birds (5) 15 Yield (4) 16 Beverage (3) 18 Small drink (3) 20 Celtic language (4) 22 Devotional song (5) 23 Facts given (4) 25 Kinds (5) 27 Deposit (5) 28 Strong alkaline solution (3) 29 Spirited mount (5)

DOWN 1 Empty (6) 2 Period of time (3) 3 Strong effect (6) 4 Long paces (7) 5 Marsh (3) 8 Make brown (3) 9 Fashion (4) 11 First woman (3) 14 Charges with gas (7) 16 Place of worship (6) 17 Humbled (6) 19 Gem (4) 21 Arch (3) 22 Cushion (3) 24 Summit (3) 26 Optic (3)

Downtime CODE-CRACKER How to solve: Each number in our CODECRACKER grid represents a different letter of the alphabet. For example, today 1 represents B so fill B every time the figure 1 appears.

You have two letters in the control grid to start you off. 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, fill in the other squares with the same number in the main grid, and the control grid. Check off the list of alphabetical letters as you identify them.

A B C DE FG H I J K L MN O P Q RST UVWXYZ

CALVIN AND HOBBES

SUDOKU 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.

PEANUTS

YESTERDAY’S SOLUTIONS CODE-CRACKER

CROSSWORD

DILBERT

SUDOKU

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SATURDAY, MARCH 26, 2016

INSIDE INSIGHT

Dae'sh trains 400 fighters to attack Europe in wave of bloodshed Hillary Clinton is on a roll. If her candidacy ever looked in doubt to an insurgent Bernie Sanders, she's all but guaranteed the Democratic nomination -- thanks overwhelmingly to African Americans.

PAGE 22

Study: S Asia most exposed to disasters Countries and mega-cities across Asia are highly exposed to natural hazards ranging from cyclones to earthquakes, but people in sub-Saharan Africa are more vulnerable, according to a report released last week.

PAGE 23

Nepal looks to lessen dependence on India with China port deal

China will allow landlocked Nepal to use its ports for trading goods with third countries, a senior official in Kathmandu said on last week, potentially ending India's decades-long monopoly over the impoverished country's trading routes.

PAGE 24

The jihadist Dae'sh group has trained at least 400 fighters to target Europe in deadly waves of attacks, deploying interlocking terror cells like the ones that struck Brussels and Paris with orders to choose the time, place and method for maximum chaos, reports Associated Press quoting security officials.

The network of agile and semi-autonomous cells shows the reach of the extremist group in Europe even as it loses ground in Syria and Iraq.

The officials, including European and Iraqi intelligence officials and a French lawmaker who follows the jihadi networks, described camps in Syria, Iraq and possibly the former Soviet bloc where attackers are trained to target the West. Before being killed in a police raid, the ringleader of the November 13 Paris attacks claimed he had entered Europe in a multi-national group of 90 fighters, who scattered "more or less everywhere."

But the biggest break yet in the Paris attacks investigation — the arrest on Friday of fugitive Salah Abdeslam — did not thwart the multi-pronged attack just four days later on the Belgian capital's airport and subway system that left 31 people dead and an estimated 270 wounded. Three suicide bombers also died.

Just as in Paris, Belgian authorities were searching for at least one fugitive in Tuesday's attacks — this time for a man wearing a white jacket who was seen on airport security footage with the two suicide attackers. The fear is that the man, whose identity Belgian officials say is not known, will follow Abdeslam's path.

After fleeing Paris immediately after the November attacks, Abdeslam forged a new network back in his childhood neighborhood of Molenbeek, long known as a haven for jihadis, and renewed plotting, according to Belgian officials.

"Not only did he drop out of sight, but he did so to organise another attack, with accomplices everywhere. With suicide belts. Two attacks organised just like in Paris. And his arrest, since they knew he was going to talk, it was a response: 'So what if he was arrested? We'll show you that it doesn't change a thing,'" said French Senator Nathalie Goulet, co-head of a commission tracking jihadi networks.

Estimates range from 400 to 600 Dae'sh fighters trained specifically for external attacks, according to the officials, including Goulet. Some 5,000 Europeans have gone to Syria.

"The reality is that if we knew exactly how many there were, it wouldn't be happening," she said.

More than four sources with access to tallies of fighters tasked with Europe attacks independently corroborated the numbers of fighters who trained for specific attacks in Europe, including some who have spoken to fighters directly. Others have cross checked information regarding fighters leaving or returning.

In claiming responsibility for Tuesday's attack, the radical jihadist group described a "secret cell of soldiers" dispatched to Brussels for the purpose. The shadowy cells were con-

BIGSTOCK

How Hillary Clinton cornered the black vote

n Tribune Desk

firmed by the EU police agency, Europol, which said in a late January report that intelligence officials believed the group had "developed an external action command trained for special forces-style attacks."

French speakers with links to North Africa, France and Belgium appear to be leading the units and are responsible for developing attack

strategies in Europe, said a European security official spoke on condition of anonymity. He is also familiar with interrogations of former fighters who have returned to Europe. Some were jailed after leaving Dae'sh while others were kicked out of the terror group, and they include Muslims and Muslim converts from all across Europe. Fighters in the units are trained in battleground strategies, explosives, surveillance techniques and counter surveillance, the security official said.

"The difference is that in 2014, some of these Dae'sh fighters were only being given a couple weeks of training," he said. "Now the strategy has changed. Special units have been set up. The training is longer. And the objective appears to no longer be killing as many people as possible but rather to have as many terror operations as possible." l

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SATURDAY, MARCH 26, 2016

INSIGHT

How Hillary Clinton cornered the black vote economic inequality.

"That's the problem that blacks typically have with white progressives, that they look at everything through class and forget that race still matters, and it's that type of framing that has frustrated some blacks,"

Democratic US Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton visits a memorial dedicated to victims of gun violence called ‘Kids of the Block’, at Roseland neighborhood in Chicago on March 14 REUTERS

n AFP, New York Hillary Clinton is on a roll. If her candidacy ever looked in doubt to an insurgent Bernie Sanders, she's all but guaranteed the Democratic nomination -- thanks overwhelmingly to African Americans.

More than a month after her bruising defeat in New Hampshire, where Sanders won every category of voter except those older than 65 and earning more than $200,000 a year, Clinton has chalked up massive wins.

In Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Louisiana, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas and Virginia, and Mississippi she romped to victory, which all have sizeable African American communities.

Black voters have become critical to winning US elections. Without decisive African American turnout in seven states, Barack Obama would have lost to Mitt Romney in 2012, the independent Cook Political Report found.

Four years later, blacks are voting overwhelmingly for the former secretary of state, cold shouldering the white-haired democratic socialist from the north. But why?

Certainly Clinton has done much more than Sanders to address systemic racism, white privilege and the need for more opportunities for blacks.

"I have spent a lot of time with the mothers of African American children who have lost them," she told a recent Democratic debate in Flint, Michigan, the black majority city suffering from water contamination.

"I can't pretend to have the experience that you have had and others have had, but I will do everything that I possibly can, to not only do the best to understand and to empathize, but to tear down the barriers of systemic racism."

Forcefully

Clinton raised the specter of environmental racism, questioning whether the lead-contaminated scandal would have happened in wealthy white suburbs.

"She talks very forcefully about these issues in a way that she hasn't before and you don't normally have from presidential candidates," said Stefanie Brown James, Obama's African American vote director in 2012.

While Sanders has spent his career in Vermont, where only 1% of the population is black, Clinton was first lady of Arkansas for

12 years, taking on a prominent role in trying to improve health and education.

She ran legal clinics representing disenfranchised people.

While still a student at Yale Law School, she went to South Carolina to investigate juveniles in adult jails and to Alabama to investigate segregation in schools for the Children's Defence Fund.

After more than a generation on the national stage, all of this has become common knowledge -- particularly among blacks.

In South Carolina, she addressed the nation's oldest black sorority, dressed in green -- a courtesy to an organisation whose colors are green and pink. "That's the kind of little stuff, the attention to detail that people notice and appreciate," said Andra Gillespie, an associate professor of political science at Emory College in Atlanta, Georgia.

Right or wrong for a feminist campaigning to become the first woman president of the US, experts also agree that much of her appeal stems from her marriage to Bill Clinton.

For more than a generation black Americans have embraced the Clintons as a couple who have worked against racial prejudice and presided over economic prosperity in the 1990s when black unemployment fell and incomes rose.

Race matters

On the campaign trail, Clinton frequently recalls the economic growth of her husband's administration as a legacy she will continue.

Bill Clinton's poor southern background and easy manner -- playing saxophone on television wearing shades -- won him love and admiration from black voters.

He supported affirmative action, appointed a record number of African Americans to his cabinet and was close friends with business executive and civil rights figure Vernon Jordan.

During the Monica Lewinsky scandal, Nobel Prize winning novelist Toni Morrison famously dubbed him the first black president by comparing him to the black man always presumed guilty.

The Clinton record is not unblemished -Bill Clinton's welfare reform and crime bill are blamed for fanning poverty and record incarceration rates which have hit blacks disproportionately -- both have since expressed regret.

While Sanders has spoken of being arrested during the 1960s civil rights movement, his plea for votes has focused far more on

said Gillespie.

African Americans who agonised in 2008 about whether to vote for Clinton or Obama and picked Obama now feel they can do right

by Clinton, the woman who has gone out of her way to present herself as Obama's heir. l

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SATURDAY, MARCH 26, 2016

Study: S Asia most exposed to disasters n AFP, Paris Countries and mega-cities across Asia are highly exposed to natural hazards ranging from cyclones to earthquakes, but people in sub-Saharan Africa are more vulnerable, according to a report released last week.

Nearly 1.4bn people in South Asia -- India, Bangladesh, Pakistan -- face at least one major threat from Nature, especially flooding, severe storms boosted by rising seas, and quakes.

In the case of Bangladesh, 100% of its population is exposed, compared to 82% for India and 70% in Pakistan.

China, Indonesia, Japan and the Philippines are also among the nations with the largest numbers of people in harm's way.

The United States, Mexico and Brazil round out the top ten.

When it comes to vulnerability, however, Africa is the continent where people are most likely to suffer injury, disease and death

Two partially collapsed buildings after two major earthquakes hit Nepal on April and May last year BIGSTOCK as a result of natural disasters, according to the Natural Hazards Vulnerability Index from risk analysts Verisk Maplecroft.

The capacity to cope with disaster can determine whether a high-magnitude earthquake, for example, will cause hundreds of deaths, as happened in Chile in 2010, or hundreds of thousands, as befell Haiti in the same year.

Nine out of ten countries ranked as most vulnerable to natural hazards in the index are in sub-Saharan Africa, and 23 of 25 are on the continent.

South Sudan -- plagued by drought and war -- heads the list of the countries most defenceless against disaster, followed by Burundi, Afghanistan, Eritrea, Chad, Niger, Sudan, Mali and the Demo-

cratic Republic of Congo.

"The frequency and magnitude of natural hazard events cannot be controlled," the report noted.

"But the development and implementation of disaster risk reduction strategies can help minimise the humanitarian and economic impacts."

Among mega-cities, Manila -- facing a triple threat from cyclones, superstorms and earthquakes -- tops the list of urban areas with the highest number of people exposed.

Tokyo and Jakarta and in second and third place, with Dongguan in southern China, Dhaka and Kolkata following close behind.

Mexico City, Delhi and Sao Paulo all have huge populations exposed to major storms. "This analysis shows that governance is key to lower vulnerability," the report said.

Without major reforms and political stability, "countries such as India and the Philippines are unlikely to see improvements in the near term." l

Myanmar launches first shares on fledgling bourse n

AFP, Yangon

Myanmar launched its first stock exchange with just one listed company Friday in the hopes of boosting the country's economy as it emerges from decades of isolationist military rule.

The Yangon Stock Exchange (YSX) officially opened for trading, 20 years after it had first been conceived, with the clang of a bell and cheers from a business elite who are hungry for investment.

Maung Maung Thein, head of Myanmar's Securities and Exchange Commission, said it marked a "great day" for the country, which would now leave the tiny club of nations without a functioning stock exchange.

YSX started trading with just a single firm, First Myanmar Investment (FMI), which is one of the country's largest companies with stakes in financial services, real estate, aviation and health industries.

With its sister firm Yoma Stra-

tegic Holdings listed in Singapore, and with around 6,800 shareholders through an in-house system, FMI already has experience of stock trading and open investor relations, a rarity in Myanmar.

According to the YSX official website shares closed on Friday up 19.2% at a value of 31,000 kyat ($25.6), with a trading volume of 112,845 shares.

Several other firms have been granted provisional approval to list, including the Japan-backed

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Thilawa Special Economic Zone, but have yet to finalise their preparations.

State-owned Myanma Economic Bank has a controlling 51% stake in YSX, with the remainder divided between Japanese partners the Japan Exchange Group and Daiwa Institute of Research.

The bourse is currently open only to domestic investors and firms, although there are plans to allow foreign involvement in the future. l

SOUTH ASIA

Pakistan claims nabbing of Indian spy Pakistan summoned the Indian ambassador on Friday to protest against the illegal entry of an Indian spy who Pakistan said was captured in the violence-plagued province of Baluchistan the previous day. Pakistan believes India is supporting a separatist insurgency in resource-rich province.

-REUTERS

INDIA

2 students held over pro-Pakistan Whatsapp message Two college students in Karnataka were detained for sharing pro-Pakistan slogans on WhatsApp during the India-Pakistan cricket match last Saturday and released later on the same day, police said.

One of the students posted on a WhatsApp group a message saying ‘Pakistan Ki Jai’, to which his classmates objected, police said on Friday.

-HT

CHINA

China beefs up airport security after Brussels attack China stepped up its airport security in response to the Brussels attacks. Security personnel at airports in Beijing, Shanghai and Chengdu swabbed some passengers’ bags outside terminals Friday. The measures were taken “because of terrorist incidents in Belgium,” The Civil Aviation Administration of China said in an email.

-AFP

ASIA PACIFIC

Japan utility to scrap reactor over heavy safety costs Japanese nuclear power operator said Friday it would decommission an ageing reactor because of the cost of upgrading, the sixth to be scrapped due to tougher rules brought in after the Fukushima disaster. Shikoku Electric Power had planned to restart the No 1 reactor at Ikata nuclear complex in Ehime, but said Friday it would decommission the 39-year-old technology instead.

-AFP

MIDDLE EAST

Syria regime forces retake control of Palmyra citadel Syrian soldiers recaptured the old citadel of Palmyra overlooking the city’s ancient ruins on Friday. Palmyra is the site of some of the most extensive ruins of the ancient Roman empire, and temples and tombs were dynamited by the jihadist fighters in what the UN has described as a war crime. -REUTERS

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SATURDAY, MARCH 26, 2016

USA

Biden makes the case for SCOTUS nominee Garland Joe Biden on Thursday ramped up Oval Office efforts to get a Senate confirmation hearing for Supreme Court pick Merrick Garland, as the US vice president offered defence for his 1992 comments that senators should not consider a nominee in a election year. Biden emphasised Garland’s record and that GOP previously had suggested Garland would be a consensus Supreme Court candidate. -REUTERS

THE AMERICAS

Brazil’s Dilma slams attempts to oust her Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff on Thursday condemned the “fascist methods” of opponents seeking her ouster. In the interview with The Guardian, The New York Times, Le Monde, El Pais and Argentina’s Pagina 12, Rousseff said any attempt to remove her without legal basis would represent a “coup”.

-AFP

UK

Ex-CIA chief says Brexit won’t impact UK security The European Union is not a “natural contributor to national security” and a British exit from the bloc would have a limited impact on US intelligence cooperation, the former head of CIA said has said. Asked in BBC radio interview if a British EU exit, would upset US intelligence officials, Michael Hayden said: “With regard to this specific line of national security ... it wouldn’t have much effect certainly on the American ability to cooperate with national security services.”

-AFP

EUROPE

Belgium detains 7 in attack inquiry, Germany arrests 2

INSIGHT

Nepal looks to lessen dependence on India with China port deal n Reuters, Kathmandu China will allow landlocked Nepal to use its ports for trading goods with third countries, a senior official in Kathmandu said on last week, potentially ending India's decades-long monopoly over the impoverished country's trading routes.

A prolonged blockade of its border crossings with India last year by protesters demanding changes to a new constitution left Nepal desperately short of fuel and goods, throwing into sharp relief its dependence on routes into its southern neighbour.

Nepal's prime minister KP Oli signed an agreement with his Chinese counterpart Li Keqiang during a visit to Beijing last week to give Nepalese traders access to land routes and ports in China, according to a Nepalese commerce ministry official Rabi Shankar Sainju.

"This is a historic agreement for Nepal," Sainju said. "This can-

not be an alternative to the Indian port but it is an additional route to boost our trade."

The routes and ports that Nepal, sandwiched between China and India, can use would be decided by officials from Kathmandu and Beijing soon, he said.

China is vying to increase its influence in Nepal, challenging India's long-held position as the dominant outside power.

Beijing this week also agreed to consider building a railway into Nepal, supply petroleum products and to start a feasibility study for a

Dae’sh finance chief, other leaders, likely killed n Reuters, Washington, DC Jihaidst group Dae’sh’s top finance officer and other senior leaders were likely killed this week in a major offensive targeting the militant group’s financial operation, US Defence Secretary Ash Carter said on Friday.

Carter said the United States

Belgian police arrested seven people and Germany arrested two in investigations into Dae’sh suicide bombings in Brussels. The Belgian federal prosecutor’s office said the 7 people were held during searches in the Brussels neighbourhoods on Friday. Germany’s Der Spiegel magazine said German police had arrested two people.

-REUTERS

AFRICA

2 female suicide bombers caught in NE Nigeria A female suicide bomber set off her explosives and the other was killed by troops outside the northeastern Nigerian town of Maiduguri, where a twin suicide attack last week killed 25 people, vigilantes said. The two were spotted by civilian vigilantes helping the military fight the Boko Haram group, Army spokesman Sani Usman confirmed the incident.-AFP

Sea port of Kolkata, through which Nepal conducts maximum of it's maritime trade FLICKR

free trade agreement.

Nepal, still trying to recover from two devastating earthquakes last year, adopted its first post-monarchy constitution in September hoping this would usher in peace and stability after years of conflict.

But protesters blocked trucks coming in from India, leading to acute shortages. Nepal blamed New Delhi for siding with the protesters, a charge India denied.

Nepal currently uses the eastern Indian port at Kolkata for trade but officials said this is has become congested. India has offered to allow Nepal use of a second port.

The Federation of Nepalese Chambers of Commerce and Industry said Nepal lacked the roads and railways to reach Chinese ports located more than 3,000km from its border. "Theoretically it is a good thing. But we have to do a lot of work before we can actually use the Chinese route," senior official Bhawani Rana said. l

www.dhakatribune.com

believes it killed Haji Iman, a senior Dae’sh leader in charge of the group’s finances as well as some plots and external affairs.

“We are systematically eliminating ISIL’s cabinet,” Carter told reporters at a briefing at the Pentagon, using an acronym to refer to the group.

Earlier media reports said

Haji Iman, who also went by Abd ar-Rahman Mustafa al-Qaduli and other aliases, had been killed in a US air strike in Syria, but Pentagon officials gave few details of the operation.

The operations came as US officials said they were helping Iraqis prepare for a major operation in Mosul to take back territory from

the militant group, which aims to establish a caliphate in Iraq and Syria.

US Marine General Joseph Dunford, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the Pentagon expects increased capabilities will be provided to Iraqis in preparation for Mosul operations in the coming months. l

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SATURDAY, MARCH 26, 2016

INSIDE

BCB to extend head coach's contract BCB is planning to extend the contract of national coach Hathurusingha. According to sources within the board, the BCB is mulling offering the former Sri Lankan cricketer a two-year extension while the terms of the contract are also likely to be revised. PAGE 27

(L-R) Bangladeshi cricketers Al Amin Hossain, Mohammad Mithun, Shakib al Hasan, Saqlain Sajib, Nasir Hossain, Tamim Iqbal and Nurul Hasan offering jummah prayers at Mohammedan Sporting Club in Kolkata yesterday

Smith, Faulkner lift Australia to victory

AP

Australia beat Pakistan by 21 runs in their World Twenty20 Super 10 stage match in Mohali yesterday to stay on course for the semi-finals and eliminate their opponents from the tournament. Australia skipper Steven Smith struck an unbeaten 63 off 43 to steer Australia to 193-4. PAGE 27

Big guns into BGMEA Cup semis Apparel Industry Ltd, Bando Design Ltd, Comfit Composite Knit Ltd and Envoy Group sealed their semi-final spots in the inaugural BGMEA Cup 7-a-side football tournament at International Turkish Hope School yesterday. PAGE 28

Federer calls for global dope testing Federer believes tennis does not face a major doping problem but voiced concern here that drug testing protocols are not being taken seriously enough in certain parts of the world. He spoke out at the ATP Miami Open, where he ends an eight-week injury layoff. PAGE 29

Crestfallen Tigers eye consolation win Uddin Khan n Minhaz from Kolkata The heartbreaking one-run loss against hosts India in Bangalore still haunts the Bangladesh cricketers. The team members during a conversation often end up talking about the game only to see someone interrupt and change the topic.

And if the highlights of the Super 10 tie is shown on television, one of them instantly hunts for the remote and switches the channel straight away.

The Tigers are desperate to erase the bitter memories of the defeat and aiming to end their 2016 World Twenty20 campaign on a high when they take on New Zealand in their last match today at Eden Gardens in Kolkata.

However, Eden Gardens does not hold good memories for the

Tigers. Having qualified for the main round after defeating the Netherlands and Oman in the first round, Bangladesh were up against Pakistan in their Super 10 opener in Kolkata. Pakistan dominated the Bangladesh bowlers on their way to a 200+ total.

In reply, the Tigers could master only 146 as Pakistan strolled to a 55-run win.

The grassy wickets at the historic venue often mislead the teams. The venue has hosted three matches in the tournament so far and only the India-Pakistan encounter did not witness 150+ totals.

The Bangladesh bowlers will need to find something extra to puncture the aggression of the Kiwi batsmen who have posted challenging totals in all of their three Super 10 matches. Rocked by the suspensions of fast bowler

Taskin Ahmed and Arafat Sunny, the Tigers put up a commendable display against the hosts.

And at Eden Gardens today, all-rounder Shakib al Hasan will be expected to lead the bowling attack again after a fine show against the Indians. Alongside Afghanistan spinner Mohammad Nabi, Shakib is the leading wicket-taker of the competition with 10 scalps and the left-handed all-rounder will be eager to register an economical spell at the home of the Indian Premier League franchise Kolkata Knight Riders.

The real challenge though will rest with the Bangladesh batsmen. New Zealand batted first in all of their three matches and brilliant bowling efforts, led by leftarm spinner Mitchell Santner, saw them defend their tallies every time. Their best performance per-

haps came against the home side when they skittled out the mighty Indian batting line up for just 79.

Santner was the hero that day with four wickets coming at the expense of only 11 runs, the second best bowling figure in the Super 10 phase of the 2016 edition.

In-form opening batsman Tamim Iqbal should lead the way with the willow. With 292 runs from five games, the southpaw is the highest scorer of the tournament and would very much like to end on a bright note. Shakib, Sabbir Rahman and Mahmudullah will have to make sure the innings is on track.

On the other hand, the game will offer the Kiwis a chance to test different combinations. With three straight wins, they have already qualified for the semi-finals so today’s game will be a mere formality for the high-flying Kiwis. l

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Mashrafe not pondering retirement, as of now Uddin Khan n Minhaz from Kolkata Bangladesh will end their 2016 World Twenty20 journey today when they face a high-flying New Zealand in their last Super 10 game at Eden Gardens.

On the eve of the clash against the Kiwis, rumours are doing the rounds that Bangladesh limited-over captain Mashrafe bin Mortaza will call it a day following the mega event. But all the discussions were termed as “speculation” by Mashrafe himself.

Replying to a question as to whether he will retire from the shortest format after the World T20, Mashrafe said, “Let me go back home and think. As of now I have not thought of it.”

Mashrafe’s reply should come as a relief to the cricket-mad Bangladesh fans who never want to see him hang up his boots. Considered as the finest Bangladesh leader in history, the majority longs for Mashrafe to carry on until his body is no longer fit for international cricket.

It is Mashrafe’s leadership quality that has endeared him with the public. There has been many occasions when Bangladesh were in a dilemma but Mashrafe made sure

of holding onto his team strong and keep it moving.

The Tigers are facing such a situation at the moment.

However, Mashrafe informed that all the bases have been covered ahead of the New Zealand tie and said the players are motivated to conclude the tournament on a high.

TODAY'S MATCHES 3:30PM, Group 2, Kolkata

Bangladesh v New Zealand 8:00PM, Group 1, Delhi

England v Sri Lanka

Maasranga TV, Gazi TV, Star Sports 1

“Recovery from last match is difficult (so soon) but the boys have had some time and hope they have calmed down now. They have had 48 hours to think about it. I think (now) we have to play hard and ensure we finish this tournament well,” Mashrafe told the media at Eden Gardens yesterday.

“We still have one match left and we have to play our best. If we get a chance, obviously, we have to win.

But yes, all the Bangladeshis are pas-

PLAYERS TO WATCH Bangladesh V New Zealand

TAMIM IQBAL

sionate about cricket and it’s disappointing (to see the team lose). The way we lost the other match, you can’t describe (it) really. There’s no word for any player. I think even if we say sorry, it’s not good enough.

But we can think positively. If we get the chance to win, we will grab it.

“They (New Zealand) have adapted to the conditions very well and are at a good position in the tournament. We have nothing to lose at the moment so I hope we will be able to play some good cricket [today],” he said.

Mashrafe stated that he is satisfied with the overall performance of his team, bearing in mind the Tigers’ record in the shortest format of the game.

There were also doubts over whether Bangladesh would be able to deal with the Indian conditions but Mashrafe said, “I am happy with how the players have performed. We have never played in India before but the team has coped with the conditions well. It was tough for us to initially set our mindset. We might have won one or two matches if a few mistakes were not committed. But we do not want to hold onto these things. We want to move forward. This experience will help us.” l

WHAT HE SAID ISH SODHI

Leg-spinner, New Zealand

Bangladesh

The left-handed opening batsman has been in superb form for quite some time now. He brought his purple patch into the 2016 World Twenty20 and performed wonders in several matches. Tamim is the tournament’s highest scorer with 292 runs in five matches at a whopping average of 97.33. The southpaw experienced a slight hiccup midway through the competition as he missed the Super 10 clash against Australia due to a troubled stomach but came back strong in the very next game against India, scoring a 32-ball 35. With New Zealand already through to the semi-finals, today’s game will be a mere formality but Tamim, given the character that he is, would like to leave a final mark before heading home.

MITCHELL SANTNER

New Zealand

Santner has been the most surprising performer of the sixth edition of the flagship event. It was thought that the sub-continent spinners will dominate the tournament but Santner had other ideas.

The left-arm spinner was the chief architect behind the convincing win against India, bagging four miserly wickets conceding only 11 runs. The 24-year old picked up two wickets each in the following two games, successfully helping his side to defend their totals.

The Tigers batsmen need to watch out for this particular bowler if they are to match their ambition of posting a consolation victory. l –MINHAZ UDDIN KHAN FROM KOLKATA

On Bangladesh To be honest, most of the times we have played them in these (sub-continental) conditions, they have been a really good opposition. The last game (India v Bangladesh) was just a highlight of how strong they can be in these conditions and for them to take it so close against a team like India, I don’t think anyone can take them lightly. We have to start again, adapt to the conditions and try to gauge the players we are playing against because there are fantastic players in Bangladesh team.

Game-plan We’re just going to keep things relatively similar to what we have been doing. Because, the opposition is completely different to the ones we’ve faced. We’re just going to treat it like any other game and play the same way that we have been playing. Adapt to conditions, adapt to the players we are playing against and try to combat what we can on the ground, things that have put us in front.l

Bangladesh fast bowler Taskin Ahmed arrives at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport yesterday DHAKA TRIBUNE

BCB mulling extending Hathurusingha contract Uddin Khan n Minhaz from Kolkata Bangladesh Cricket Board is planning to extend the contract of national head coach Chandika Hathurusingha. According to sources within the board, the BCB is mulling offering the former Sri Lankan cricketer a two-year extension while the terms of the contract are also likely to be revised.

Hathurusingha’s current contract expires this June.

A few senior members of the team believe Hathurusingha should be offered a three-year contract, as opposed to two years, as it will cover the 2019 World Cup. Ever since Hathurusingha took up the Bangladesh job, leaving his position as the assistant coach of New South Wales and coach of Sydney Thunder, the Tigers have achieved great heights. The men in red and green qualified for the quarter-finals of a World Cup for the very first time in history and also registered memorable series wins over Pakistan, India and South Africa.

Besides the on-field achieve-

ments, Hathurusingha was also lauded for his dedication and passion for the team. He has often been offensive when fingers were raised towards any of his charges, something that went down well with the cricketers.

Above everything else, the 47year old has injected a never-saydie attitude among the Bangladesh cricketers.

Hathurusingha was named as the Bangladesh coach in May 2014 and his first assignment was a home ODI series against India a month later. l

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SATURDAY, MARCH 26, 2016

Coach Younis laments decline of Pakistan n AFP, Mohali Coach Waqar Younis yesterday lamented the decline of Pakistan cricket after his team were knocked out of the World Twenty20 with a disappointing 21-run defeat against Australia.

A wayward Pakistan let Australia off the hook after having them in early trouble at 57-3 in the mustwin group tie at Mohali.

The Aussies were quick to capitalise on some shoddy bowling and fielding, posting a commanding 193-4 before restricting Shahid Afridi’s men to 172-8.

The early ouster of the 2009 champions from the tournament has put skipper Afridi as well as Younis under pressure, with both likely to lose their jobs sooner than later.

Younis, a dreaded fast bowler in his playing days, did not mince his words as he called for an overhaul back home.

“We have just lost the match and whatever I say will look like an excuse,” Younis, 44, said at a postmatch press conference.

“If we think deeply we will see that Pakistan hasn’t seen any international cricket for last seven-eight years and that has hurt us.

“And that has started showing now. Earlier we had match winners like Saeed Ajmal and Mohammad Hafeez who could bowl.

“Yes, I would say that Pakistan cricket is in a bit of a decline and we need to control it. We will have to look at our domestic cricket and infrastructure.”l

WI v SA SOUTH AFRICA H. Amla run out Q. de Kock b Russell F. du Plessis c Benn b Russell R. Rossouw c Russell b Gayle AB. de Villiers b Bravo D. Miller b Gayle D. Wiese c Sammy b Bravo C. Morris not out A. Phangiso run out Extras (b 4, w 2)

R B 1 1 47 46 9 7 0 2 10 12 1 4 28 26 16 17 4 5 6

Total (for 8 wickets, 20 overs)

122

Bowling: Badree 3-0-22-0, Russell 4-028-2, Gayle 3-0-17-2, Brathwaite 2-0-11-0, Benn 4-0-20-0, Bravo 4-0-20-2 WEST INDIES J. Charles c du Plessis b Wiese C. Gayle b Rabada A. Fletcher run out (Rossouw) M. Samuels c de Villers b Morris D. Bravo c Wiese b Phangiso A. Russell c Miller b Tahir D. Sammy b Tahir C. Brathwaite not out D. Ramdin not out Extras (lb 1, w 8)

R B 32 35 4 2 11 11 44 44 8 6 4 8 0 1 10 10 1 1 9

Total (for 7 wickets, 19.4 overs) 123 Bowling: Rabada 3.4-0-38-1, Morris 4-0-33-1, Tahir 4-0-13-2, Wiese 4-0-19-1, Phangiso 4-0-19-1 Result: West Indies won by three wickets MoM: M Samuels (West Indies)

GROUP 2 Teams

P

W

L Pts NRR

New Zealand

3

3

0

Australia

3

2

1

4 +0.440

India

3

2

1

4 -0.546

Pakistan

4

1

3

2 -0.093

Bangladesh

3

0

3

0

6 +1.283

-1.165

AUS v PAK

Pakistan's Shahid Afridi, left, looks back to see Australia's Peter Nevill dismiss him out stumped for 14 runs during their ICC World Twenty20 2016 match in Mohali, India yesterday AP

Smith, Faulkner lift Australia to victory over Pakistan n Reuters Australia beat Pakistan by 21 runs in their World Twenty20 Super 10 stage match in Mohali yesterday to stay on course for the semi-finals and eliminate their opponents from the tournament.

Australia skipper Steven Smith struck an unbeaten 63 off 43 to steer Australia to 193-4, before James Faulkner took five wickets, including two off consecutive deliveries in the final over, to help his team seal the win.

Man-of-the-match Faulkner gave away just 27 runs and was

helped by another impressive performance by young leg-spinner Adam Zampa, who took two for 32.

Australia, batting first on a green-tinged pitch, lost three wickets in quick succession, with fit-again paceman Wahab Riaz doing the initial damage by bowling in-form Usman Khawaja for 21 and castling David Warner on nine.

Aaron Finch went next, bowled by left-arm spinner Imad Wasim for 15 to leave Australia struggling on 57-3.

Smith, however, steadied the ship aided first by Glenn Maxwell (30 off 24 deliveries) and then by

the big-hitting Shane Watson.

Pakistan got off to a poor start, losing Ahmed Shehzad for one, and Faulkner picked up the key wicket of opener Sharjeel Khan who smashed six boundaries en route to a quick-fire 30.

Zampa got into the act by getting Pakistani skipper Shahid Afridi stumped for 14 and bowled Umar Akmal, who was looking dangerous after racking up 32 in 20 balls.

But Faulkner took the plaudits with a match-winning performance, bowling the settled Khalid Latif (46 off 64 balls) before striking again next ball to get Wasim. l

West Indies beat South Africa, enter WT20 semis n AFP, Nagpur West Indies beat South Africa by three wickets in Nagpur yesterday to qualify for the semi-finals of the World Twenty20.

Electing to field, the West Indies bowlers restricted South Africa to 122 for eight before they rode on batsman Marlon Samuels’ 44 to achieve the target with two balls to spare.

The win saw West Indies stay at the top of the Group One table with three wins from as many matches while South Africa’s chances of advancing dimmed after two losses.

Earlier, Chris Gayle grabbed two wickets as the West Indies restricted South Africa to 122/8. Left-hander Quinton de Kock top-scored for the Proteas with 47 while David Wiese, batting at number seven, notched 28 after South Africa’s top-order fell like a pack of cards.

The South Africans, who can

GROUP 1 P W

L Pts

West Indies

3

3

0

6

England

3

2

1

4

+0.018

South Africa

3

1

2

2

+0.485

Sri Lanka

2

1

1

2

-0.171

Afghanistan

3

0

3

0

-1.067

R 21 15 9 61 30 44 13

Total (for 4 wickets, 20 overs)

193

B 16 16 6 43 18 21

Fall of wickets 1-28 (Khawaja), 2-42 (Warner), 3-57 (Finch), 4-119 (Maxwell) Bowling Amir 4-0-39-0, Sami 4-0-53-0, Riaz 4-035-2, Afridi 4-0-27-0, Wasim 4-0-31-2 PAKISTAN S. Khan b Faulkner A. Shehzad b Hazlewood K. Latif b Faulkner U. Akmal b Zampa S. Afridi st Nevill b Zampa S. Malik not out I. Wasim c Coulter-Nile b Faulkner S. Ahmed c Khawaja b Faulkner W. Riaz Khawaja b Faulkner M. Sami not out Extras (b 1, lb1, w 1)

R 30 1 46 32 14 40 0 2 0 4 3

Total (for 8 wickets, 20 overs)

172

B 19 6 41 20 7 20 1 3 1 2

Fall of wickets 1-20 (Shehzad), 2-40 (Khan), 3-85 (Akmal), 4-110 (Afridi), 5-147 (Latif), 6-147 (Wasim), 7-164 (Ahmed) Bowling Hazlewood 4-0-26-1, Coulter-Nile 4-0-450, Faulkner 4-0-27-5, Watson 2-0-27-0, Zampa 4-0-32-2, Maxwell 2-0-13-0 Result: Australia won by 21 runs MoM: JP Faulkner (Australia)

Holders Sri Lanka fight to avoid World T20 exit n AFP, New Delhi

ill afford to lose the match, got off to the worst possible start when opener Hashim Amla was run out for one on just the third ball of the innings. Captain Faf du Plessis came in and didn’t last long, scoring nine off seven balls before being caught by Sulieman Benn off paceman Andre Russell.

South Africa needed AB de Villiers to put a big score on the board but the classy stroke-player could only manage 10 before being cleaned up by Dwayne Bravo.l

Team

AUSTRALIA U. Khawaja b Riaz A. Finch b Wasim D. Warner b Riaz S. Smith not out G. Maxwell c Shehzad b Wasim S. Watson not out Extras (lb 8, w 5)

NRR +0.609

West Indies' Marlon Samuels bats during their ICC World T20 2016 match against South Africa yesterday AP

Holders Sri Lanka face being dumped out of cricket’s World Twenty20 todayay unless they can overcome an England team desperate for runs to clinch their own spot in the semi-finals.

After a stuttering start to their title defence, the islanders will have next to no chance of reaching next week’s semis if they lose in New Delhi even though they still have one more game to go.

Little has gone right for Sri Lanka of late and they were left reeling by the withdrawal of leading paceman Lasith Malinga at the start of the tournament with injury problems.

Angelo Mathews, who replaced Malinga as skipper, said after the West Indies match that “the top order let us down” and the team would work hard on their fielding as it had been “so sloppy”. l

DT

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Sport

SATURDAY, MARCH 26, 2016

HOW THE WORLD REACTED TO THE DEATH OF JOHAN CRUYFF “We have lost a great man. May we carry on his example of excellence.

Johan Cruyff was a great player and coach. He leaves a very important legacy for our family of football.”

Brazilian legend Pele “We will never forget you, skinny.”

Argentine legend Maradona “Another legend has left us.”

Argentine star Messi on Facebook

Real and Spain defender Ramos.

“My first coach overseas, one of the best coaches I ever had. A very important man in my career. We had a great loss”

Former Barca, Portugal star Figo “As a player, as a coach, you changed the history of our club. Thanks, Johan.”

Barcelona president Bartomeu

“We will always love you, Johan. Rest in peace.”

“Very very saddened by the demise of @JohanCruyff RIP Sir. Football has truly lost a jewel. My thoughts and prayers with his family.”

Barcelona, via Twitter

India cricket star Virat Kohli

“I’ve lost a friend, the world has lost a great man. I admired him, he was the best player of all time.”

“I don’t have the words to describe the pain I am feeling. MY COACH, my friend. Rest in peace, my friend.

Thanks for everything. You will always by at my side.”

Former French great Platini “He was one of the greatest footballers I have ever seen, you would put him in the same class as Pele, (Alfredo) di Stefano and (Diego) Maradona. The kind of football he played changed the game and still has an impact today.”

England hero Bobby Charlton “I am shocked. Johan Cruyff is dead.

He was not only a very good friend, but also a brother to me.”

Franz Beckenbauer on Twitter “A sad day. A legend and key person for Barca and football departs. My deepest condolences to the family.”

Barcelona, Spain player Iniesta “Johan Cruyff gave football a unique touch that some try to copy. I’m very moved. He was an extraordinary personality who, along with Rinus Michels, kicked off total football.”

Former FIFA president Blatter “Deeply saddened at the death of my best coach and good friend. Thanks for everything. Forever in our heart.”

Ex-Dutch international Koeman “Goodbye to one of the legends of the history of football.”

Former Barca star Stoitchkov “Thank you for all you gave to football, to Ajax and to Barca.”

Current Barcelona and former Ajax striker Luis Suarez “World football is sad today after the death of Johan Cruyff. He left an indelible imprint on the game.”

France coach Didier Deschamps “A genius has left us and when a genius leaves us we are left with a feeling of emptiness.”

Portugal coach Santos “Very sad to hear of the passing of Johan Cruyff, who I was lucky enough to meet. A very important person for our sport.”

- Spanish tennis ace Nadal, “Sad news about Johan Cruyff earlier today. Football has lost a true great #legend.”

- England star Wayne Rooney “We know the importance of Cruyff in football. It is a huge loss and everyone is sad when such an important person leaves us.”

- Brazil, Barca striker Neymar

Players and officials of Sterling Group and Rayon Tex Group pose for a photograph with BGMEA president Siddiqur Rahman and first vice president of FBCCI, Shafiul Islam Mahiuddin, and other BGMEA high-ups at ITHS yesterday AMIR AL FAHIM

Apparel, Bando, Comfit and Envoy into BGMEA Cup semis n Tribune Report Apparel Industry Ltd, Bando Design Ltd, Comfit Composite Knit Ltd and Envoy Group sealed their CUP semi-final spots 2016 in the inaugural BGMEA Cup seven-a-side football tournament at International Turkish Hope School yesterday.

Meanwhile, Versatile Group, Epyllion Group, Torque Fashions Ltd and Sterling Group made it to the semi-finals in the Plate category.

The most entertaining match on the evening was between Rayon Tex Group and Sterling in which the latter, reduced to six men early in the second half, scored in the

dying seconds to clinch a point and progress further in the tournament. Despite having a two-goal advantage, Rayon Tex conceded two in the last three minutes with Rion’s long range strike sealing a crucial draw for Sterling.

RESULTS Torque

1-0

Ananta

Envoy

9-0

Interstoff

Apparel

3-1

Epyllion

Sterling

2-2

Rayon Tex

Versatile

3-2

Tamanna

Earlier, Torque beat Ananta Garments 1-0 to put the latter out of contention as Epyllion, despite losing 1-3 to Apparel, booked a place in the Plate semis from Group A.

Terms & Conditions:

Prizes: (Second Round)

The lucky winners among all the participants who have answered correctly will be selected in an official lottery and will have their picture published in the newspaper. v Answers must be sent in only the coupon (photocopy will not be accepted). v Quiz coupon should be submitted in the Dhaka Tribune newspaper address. v No one affiliated with Dhaka Tribune and Walton will be able to participate. v Coupon submission deadline April 4, 2016. v A person can send as many coupons as he/she wants. v Walton-Dhaka Tribune T20 World Cup should be written on top of the envelope.

1st prize 2nd prize 3rd prize 4th prize 5th prize

v

01: Who scored the first T20I century for Bangladesh?

Ans: Tamim Mashrafe Taskin 02:Who won the first World T20 in 2007?

Ans: India Zimbabwe Afghanistan 03:In which year did Bangladesh host the World T20?

Ans: 2014 2004 2015

Ishmam Murshedy netted four goals for Envoy as they hammered nine goals past Interstoff Group.

Versatile came back from two goals down to beat Tamanna Apparels Group 3-2, thanks to a hattrick from Rana.

The semi-finals of both the Cup and Plate categories, along with the Plate final, will be played today.

The grand finale will be played this Friday at Army Stadium.

BGMEA president Siddiqur Rahman, vice presidents Mohammad Nasir and Ferdous Parvez Bivon, former vice president Riaz bin Mahmud, ex-presidents Abdus Salam Murshedy, Atikul Islam and Safiul Islam Mahiuddin and director Monsurul Haq Monju were present among other dignitaries and presented the Man of the Match awards on the day. l

Name...................................................................................................

Father's Name.....................................................................................

Address...............................................................................................

Phone/Cell...........................................................Age.........................

Dhaka Tribune, F.R.Tower, 8/C, Panthapath, Sukrabad, Dhaka – 1207.

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29

DT

Sport

SATURDAY, MARCH 26, 2016

27 Russian athletes tested positive for meldonium n

Federer calls for consistent global dope testing n AFP, Miami

AFP, Moscow

Russian Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko said yesterday that 27 of the country’s athletes have tested positive for meldonium since the endurance-boosting drug was banned on January 1.

“Twenty-seven have tested positive for meldonium and there are some 127 cases in the world,” Mutko told R-Sport news agency. “But these figures can change.”

Meldonium was propelled into the headlines earlier this month after Russian tennis star Maria Sharapova announced she had tested positive for the drug at the Australian Open in January.l

DAY’S WATCH CRICKET STAR SPORTS 2 3:30 PM ICC World T20 2016 Bangladesh v New Zealand 7:30 PM Sri Lanka v England

STAR SPORTS 2 3:30 PM ICC Women’s World T20 2016 Australia v Ireland

FOOTBALL SONY ESPN 7:00 AM FIFA World Cup Qualifiers Brazil v Uruguay

TEN HD 2:30 PM A-League 2015/16 Brisbane Roar FC v Sydney FC 6:30 PM Sky Bet Championship 2015/16 Burton Albion v Oldham Athletic 9:00 PM Bradford City v Millwall

SONY ESPN 1:30 AM International Friendly Germany v England

BASKETBALL SONY SIX 6:00 AM NBA Season 2015/16 Houston v Toronto 8:30 AM Golden State v Dallas

TENNIS SONY SIX HD 9:00 PM ATP 1000 Masters 2016 Miami Open Day 4

Argentina's Lionel Messi (L) and Chile's Eugenio Mena vie for the ball during their Russia 2018 Fifa World Cup South American Qualifier in Santiago on Thursday AFP

Revenge for Argentina, Ecuador leave it late in WC qualifiers n AFP, Montevideo Argentina avenged their Copa America final defeat to Chile with a 2-1 victory on Thursday as Ecuador scrambled a late draw with Paraguay to preserve their unbeaten start to South America’s 2018 World Cup qualifying competition.

Goals from Angel Di Maria and defender Gabriel Mercado secured a vital three points for Argentina in Santiago after Chile had taken an 11th-minute lead through Felipe Gutierrez at the National Stadium.

Victory was sweet for Argentina,

who were beaten on penalties by Chile at the same venue in the final of last year’s Copa America, extending the two-time world champions title drought.

Elsewhere on Thursday, Ecuador scrambled a 2-2 draw with Paraguay in Quito thanks to a controversial injury-time equaliser from Angel Mena.

An injury-time goal also proved decisive in La Paz, where Colombia snaffled a 3-2 win over Bolivia thanks to Edwin Cardona’s strike in the second minute of stoppage time. l

RESULTS Chile

1-2

Gutierrez 11

Bolivia

2-3

Arce 50-P, Chumacero 62

Ecuador

Guerrero 61, Ruidiaz 90+4

Colombia Rodriguez 10, Bacca 41, Cardona 90+2

2-2

Enner Valencia 19, Mena 90+1

Peru

Argentina Di Maria 20, Mercado 25

Paraguay Dario Lezcano 37, 58

2-2

Venezuela Otero 32-P, Villanueva 58

Aduriz’s first Spain goal secures draw with Italy in friendly n Reuters, Udine Aritz Aduriz scored his first goal for Spain at the age of 35 to give the European champions a fortuitous 1-1 draw away to Italy in a Euro 2016 warm-up for both teams on Thursday.

Lorenzo Insigne, playing his first international for two years, ended Spain’s run of six successive clean sheets when he finished off a counter-attack to give the hosts a deserved lead midway through the

second half at the Stadio Friuli.

But Aduriz, who made his only previous appearance for Spain six years ago and was recalled thanks to his prolific form with Athletic Bilbao, replied three minutes later from Spain’s first shot on target.

The result ended Spain’s run of seven successive wins and they would have lost if had it not been for an inspired performance by their goalkeeper David de Gea. Italy were missing midfielders Claudio Marchisio and Marco

Verratti and defenders Andrea Barzagli and Giorgio Chiellini, while Spain were without forward Diego Costa.

De Gea made further saves from Insigne and Alessandro Florenzi before Italy finally went ahead in the 67th minute. They led for only three minutes before Cesc Fabregas floated a free kick into the area, Gianluigi Buffon failed to hold Alvaro Morata’s header and Aduriz fired the rebound into the roof of the net.l

Roger Federer believes tennis does not face a major doping problem but voiced concern here Thursday that drug testing protocols are not being taken seriously enough in certain parts of the world.

The record 17-time Grand Slam singles champion spoke out at the ATP and WTA Miami Open, where he ends an eight-week knee injury layoff Friday.

Third-ranked Federer believes there should be more consistency in the hunt for dope cheats, saying he gets tested more in his homeland than anywhere else.

“I’ve been in Dubai for 10 years now and been tested once. That’s not OK for me,” the 34-year-old Swiss said.

“I get tested more in Switzerland because the guy from Switzerland lives in my village. He comes to see me the day after my surgery.

“In certain countries, maybe the testing is not as serious as in Switzerland. I would like to see that across the board to be the same way and fair.

“But I think tennis is doing more and more. I really don’t think there is a major problem.

“Tennis is doing a lot better than it has in the past. We’re getting more professional. The program is getting bigger and stronger.”

Federer said he was shocked to learn that Russian star Maria Sharapova, a four-time Grand Slam singles champion, tested positive at the Australian Open for meldonium, which was added to the World Anti-Doping Agency’s ban list on January 1.

“It was very disappointing news to say the least,” Federer said.

“Clearly I was very surprised. I thought she was going to announce retirement or something. But it also shows the famous players can get caught in the system that seems to be working.” l

RESULTS Turkey

2-1

Tosun 32, 81

Greece

2-1

Tzavellas 54, Karelis 63

Ukraine

Sweden Granqvist 74

Montenegro Tomasevic 56

1-0

Cyprus

Stepanenko 40

Denmark

2-1

Jorgensen 50, 54

Italy

1-1

Insigne 68

Wales

Spain Aduriz 70

1-1

Church 90-P

Czech Republic

Iceland Traustason 90

Northern Ireland Cathcart 60

0-1

Scotland Anya 10

Estonia

0-0

Norway

DT

30

SATURDAY, MARCH 26, 2016

Showtime

And the next Dhallywood queen is... n Showtime Desk When it comes to Dhallywood, a flock of new and interesting actors and actresses are seen emerging through popular songs and films. While there are criticisms underlying the poor quality of films in the country, there are some faces in Dhallywood who seem to have made themselves a massive fan base. Here is a list of promising heroines from Bangladesh who have ingrained their names in the film fraternity with glamour, beauty, talent and promise.

Mahiya Mahi Mahi started her career with a bang with Bhalobashar Rong in 2012, opposite to another debutant Bappy

Chowdhury. Bhalobashar Rong is claimed to be the first Bangladeshi digital film by Jaaz Multimedia.

The film was declared a huge financial success. Followed by the success of Agni, Agni 2 and recently, Krishnopokhkho, Mahia has developed a huge fanfollowing.

Bidya Sinha Saha Mim After winning a beauty pageant, Mim never really looked back.

With exceptional dance skills and excellent expressions, the audience loves Mim. As far as being a heroine is concerned, she has everything that one needs to be crowned as the queen of Dhallywood. Mim has also acted in Tollywood films, soon after she started her career in Dhallywood with Amar achey jol.

Nusrat Faria Mazhar She is a model, TV show presenter and radio jockey. Nusrat Faria started her showbiz career as a model in television commercials.

In 2014, she hosted a reality show, Fair and Handsome: The Ultimate Man. Last year, she signed a deal with Jaaz Multimedia to appear in two films, Aashiqui and Dabanol.

According to the fans who refer her as

the beauty queen of Dhallywood, Nusrat Faria has a lot of potential to prosper in the industry.

Eamin Hauque Bobby In 2011, Eamin Haque Bobby became the title winner of the beauty pageant contest Miss Asia Pacific Bangladesh. Popularly known as Bobby in the industry and among fans, she became the center of attraction when YouTube buzzed with her song “Tumi chara” opposite Shakib Khan.

Bobby made her debut in Dhallywood in 2010 with Khoj: The Search. She then appeared in Dehorokkhi, a film directed by Iftakar Chowdhury. Her next films were Full and Final starring Shakib Khan and in Inchi Inchi Prem opposite to Bappy Chowdhury. Bobby is now an established star in Dhallywood, showcasing her versatility and talents, time and time again.

Although she has been in the industry for only half a decade, she has hit it big with producers and directors, acting alongside all the big names of recent times.

Nusrat Imroz Tisha “Eka Ekai khaiba- amare dibana” is the dialogue from Tisha’s hit TVC in the 90s that made her very popular back then. She was very young when she started her career. At the age of five, she started taking music lessons. In 1993, she stood

second place in Bangladesh Television’s Notun Kuri - a talenthunt program. In the same contest, two years later, she won the gold cup award.

Tisha has been very active in the industry ever since, proving her talent over and over again. Recently, Tisha made news about her working with the talented Bollywood actor, Irfan Khan in Mostofa Sarwar Farooki’s No Bed of Roses (Doob in Bangla). l

Camilla Belle to star in a drama with James Franco n Showtime Desk

A historical drama, The Mad Whale stars Camilla Belle and James Franco in the lead alongside Dominic Rains, Summer Phoenix and Nicole Starrett, according to Variety.

It is an exclusive co-production between Franco’s Elysium Bandini Studios and USC’s School of Cinema. The gothic drama is set in a claustrophobic and brutal world of a women’s mental asylum. The series takes us back to the late 1800s, when the

patients of the asylum, some of whom were mentally challenged, were assigned to stage a play based on Herman Melville’s Moby Dick.

The Mad Whale is the fourth repetition of the “Franco Feature” that professors Franco and John Watson teach at USC. The film’s producers include Austin Kolodney and Brandon Somerhalder, who were Franco’s students at USC two years ago.

Belle has previously worked in hits including The Ballad of Jack and Rose, 10,000 BC, Push and Breakaway. l

The first time they felt independent

n Promiti Prova Chowdhury On the occasion of Independence Day, a few of our favourite celebrities took the opportunity to talk about a moment in their lives when they felt independent for the first time. Let’s have a look at what they had to share.

“I started doing music since I was in the ninth grade. That was perhaps the first time when I felt liberated; I was only 16 years old back then. Through music, I

could express my inner feelings for the first time.” – Zohad, vocals, Nemesis “I started feeling independent during my A Levels. It was unexpected because at that time my father was severely ill.

He stayed in the hospital for months. I had to take care of the house and myself. My mother’s trust in me, gave me confidence.

Another moment in my life when I felt independent was when I got my first job at a school in 2011. I

‘Hrithik was very close to Kangana even the day they filed for divorce’ n Showtime Desk Every time Sussanne Khan is asked about her divorce with Hrithik Roshan, “Kuch nahi (nothing)” is the only thing she keeps on saying. However, one of her friends recently disclosed her thoughts during a party. According to the sources, her friend commented: “Sussanne was not living in some other planet. A wife can smell it if her husband is attracted to another woman. Sussanne knew that Hrithik was drawn towards Kangana.”

Is Kangana really the reason of

Sussanne and Hrithik’s divorce?

The friend answered, “No.” She also said that Sussanne and Hrithik’s marriage was virtually over when Barbara Mori, the Mexican beauty in Kites, entered Hrithik’s life.

The friend added, “they were just pulling on. Kangana or no Kangana, they would have gone for a legal separation anyway.”

“But yes, let me tell you that Hrithik was very close to Kangana even the day they filed for divorce on April 30, 2014,” Sussanne’s friend also added. l Source: SpotboyE

was only 18. It was for the first time that I took rickshaws, buses and auto rickshaws to office.

Gradually, I learned how to travel alone in this city. I believe, independence comes with responsibilities.” – Sumaiya Kabir Arunima, RJ, Radio Foorti “I used to work for the Machhranga production house. I had to abide by certain rules, the kind of rules you have to follow in a job. Then I decided to do something on my own. I decided

to make TV plays by myself and start my own company. The day I left the job and came home with this thought in mind, that was the very moment when I felt independent for the first time in my life.” – Amitabh Reza, director and film-maker “I felt independent for the first time when I got my first job.

The joy was doubled with the first salary. It was only Tk3,500 back in 1989 when I joined as a teacher at a school. After getting the job, I did not have to ask for money from anyone else. I was still a student and used to go to Mohila Samity in Bailey Road. I started bearing my conveyance and felt independent as an individual.” – Rosey Siddique, actress “I felt independent in 1971.

I was born in 1968 and grew up in an independent nation.

What can be better than that?

Nothing compares to the feeling of living in an independent nation.” – Afsana Mimi, actress and director “I feel that independence is achieved when you do not feel any barrier in your mind while implementing your decisions or fulfilling your aim. To be able to think freely is independence, I believe. In 2001, right after passing HSC, I got into a job instead of joining university.

That was the first time I felt that I had become independent.” – FS Nayeem, model and actor. l

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SATURDAY, MARCH 26, 2016

WHAT TO WATCH

San Andreas HBO 9:30pm After the infamous San Andreas Fault triggers a massive earthquake in California, a search and rescue helicopter pilot and his estranged wife make their way together from Los Angeles to San Francisco to save their only daughter.

Cast: Dwayne Johnson, Carla Gugino, Alexandra Daddario, Ioan Gruffudd, Archie Panjabi, Paul Giamatti A Good Day to Die Hard Star Movies 7:26pm Iconoclastic cop John McClane who, for the first time, finds himself on foreign soil after travelling to Moscow to help his wayward son Jack. He is unaware that his son is actually a highly-trained CIA operative out to stop a nuclear weapons heist.

Cast: Bruce Willis, Jai Courtney, Sebastian Koch, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Yuliya Snigir, Radivoje Bukvic Supernatural AXN 9:30pm Dean’s deal to bring Sam back from the dead means that he faces hell for one year. What’s worse is that the Demon says Sam may not be what others perceive of him. Can Dean trust his brother? And can Sam save Dean from his bargain?

Cast: Jared Padalecki, Jensen Ackles, Jim Beaver, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Lauren Cohan Killing for a Living Animal Planet 7:30pm Killing for a living is a documentary about animals that work in well-organised gangs.

Genre: documentary World Cafe: Asia TLC 10:00pm Street food and drink can often bring an insight to the history of the city’s people, the geography of the land and is one of the best ways to taste authentic local culture.

Host: Bobby Chinn

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Back Page

SATURDAY, MARCH 26, 2016

Sheikh Hasina: Her accomplishments as a woman, a leader n Tribune Desk

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s becoming 10th among the Fortune magazine’s latest list of the World’s 50 Greatest Leaders is one of a dozen other awards and recognitions she has received in the last couple of years.

The US-based magazine says Hasina has deftly navigated the competing demands of Islamic tradition and women’s rights.

In December last year, Hasina was named one of the world’s top 100 leading thinkers listed by Foreign Policy, a Washington-based magazine.

She secured the place in “Decision Makers” category for her outstanding contribution to addressing climate change.

On September 27 last year, Hasina received the UN’s “Champions of the Earth” in recognition of Bangladesh’s far-reaching initiatives to combat the adverse impacts of climate change. United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP) Executive Director Achim Steiner handed her the award at a gala reception.

She received the “ICT Sustainable Development Award” from the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) at the UN Headquarters on September 26 last year. She was recognised for her contributions to promoting the use of ICTs for achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Hasina was ranked at 59th among the “World’s 100 Most

Powerful Women in 2015” by US-based magazine Forbes on May 26 last year. She secured 47th position in 2014.

Forbes selected 100 of the most influential women from eight categories or power bases: billionaires, businesses, celebrities, finance, media, philanthropy and intergovernmental organisations, politics and technology.

On November 21, 2014, the premier was honoured with “South South Cooperation Visionary Award” of the UN for her contribution in expanding IT, ensuring healthcare to grassroots level, improvement of society’s distress people through safety net programme and success in poverty alleviation.

Hasina, serving as the president of the Awami League since 1981, received the “Tree of Peace” memento from Unesco in recognition of her outstanding contribution to promotion of girls’ and women’s education, on September 8, 2014.

On June 13, 2013, on behalf of the government of Bangladesh, the premier was invited by the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation for halving the incidence of hunger well ahead before target year 2015.

On June 8 the same year, Hasina received Rotary Peace Prize at the Platinum Jubilee of Rotary International District 3280. It was a recognition of her endeavour to promote peace among communities and across the globe. l

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