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Pahela Baishakh will be warmly welcomed and joyfully celebrated throughout the country, but the most attractive events will take place in the capital at and around the Ramna Park and the Dhaka University campus.
   The Dhakaites, attired in traditional punjabi-pyjama and sari, will throng the roads to participate in the festivity, visit the various melas and see the numerous cultural programmes.
   The Baishakhi celebrations will begin in the Ramna Batamul at sunrise with the Chhayanaut, one of the oldest and most famous musical and cultural organisations in Bangladesh, presenting a soiree. Chhayanaut has welcomed the New Year with songs and dances since 1964.
   Students and teachers of the Institute of Fine Art will bring out a procession called ‘Mangal Shobhajatra’ at 9:00am. The colourful pageant will be display paper sculptures of characters and colourful masks from Bengali folklore. Floats of large roosters, doels and snakes will be part of the procession.
   The students of the institute will also stage two popular jatras — ‘Asru Diye Lekha’ and ‘Sohrab Rustam’ — on Baishakh 2 and 3 at the institute’s premises. Puppet shows will also be held there.
   The Sammilita Sangskritik Jote will also bring out another procession from the Central Shaheed Minar at 8:30am, which will march towards Rabindra Sarobar in Dhanmondi.
   The Bengal Foundation is holding a five-day festival at Gulshan field behind Wonderland.
   A number of Baishakhi melas have already begun at different places of the city.
   The government, amidst such festivity, has taken unprecedented security measures at venues of the Baishakhi celebrations in the capital for preventing gruesome incidents like the Ramna blasts of 2001 that claimed 10 lives.
   The Ramna Park and the adjacent areas, including the Institute of Fine Art, have already been covered by a security blanket with an additional deployment of 1,700 well-equipped members of the Rapid Action Battalion. Seven hundred members of the battalion are regularly deployed in the city.
   Strict vigilance will be maintained in and around the celebration venues. Archway metal detectors will be set up at the entrances of venues and closed-circuit television cameras will be placed at strategic points.
   The Dhaka Metropolitan Police has declared two major streets off limits for vehicular movement. The streets are Maulana Bhasani Road from Shahbagh to Matsya Bhaban and Kazi Nazrul Islam Avenue from Shahbagh to Doel Chattar.
   A guideline for entrance and exit at the festival venues has been formulated and all are asked to follow it. Police have also asked visitors and celebrants not to carry any bags, baskets, briefcases, packets or gift boxes.
   The day is a public holiday.
   The Awami League will bring out a procession from Bahadur Shah Park in the morning.
   The Bangla Academy will hold musical, lecture and recitation programmes at 8:00am on the academy’s Nazrul Mancha.
   A cultural group, Wrishiz, will stage an open-air musical programme in front of the Shishu Park at 7:00am.
   The Kendriya Kanchi Kanchar Mela will organise a cultural programme and ‘pitha utsav’ at 10:00am at Kachi Kanchar Bhaban.
   The Dhaka Reporters Unity will stage a cultural programme and Baishakhi celebration at its office at Segun Bagicha at 7:00am.
   The Sandhan Sangskritik Andolan will hold a cultural programme at Shalik Chhatar, behind the Dhaka University Central Mosque, from 3:00pm. The organisation will stage a jatra — Roopbaan — in the evening.
   Students of the Bulbul Academy of Fine Arts will present a musical programme at 8:00am at the National Press Club.
   A cultural group, Rital, will present 15 off-beat dances in the Shishu Academy auditorium in the afternoon.
   The Centre for Asian Art and Culture will hold discussions and screen films at 62, Science Laboratory Road.
   The Aziz Cooperative Super Market Shop Owners and Traders Welfare Association will organise a four-day Baishakhi fair at 4:00pm at the Aziz Cooperative Super Market.
   Women Entrepreneurs Association of Bangladesh will celebrate Pahela Baishakh with a reception programme featuring traditional Bangla food, and a cultural programme at 10:00am at Medlion Furniture Showroom, 44/2A, West Panthapath.
   The Ain O Salish Kendra will organise a lathi khela programme in the field near the bridge of Dhanmondi road no 8 at 4:15pm, and storytelling at 6:30pm.
   Squire Consumer Products will organise a concert to celebrate the new Bangla year at 1:00pm in the Dhanmondi Mahila Complex.
   The British Council is holding an exhibition of paintings to mark the Nababarsha.
   The Teachers-Students Centre of Dhaka University will hold a five-day fair in its central lawn.

GrameenPhone, the biggest mobile phone operator in the country, on Wednesday launched a new package called Djuice, targeting the young generation.
   The start-up price of a SIM under the new package is Tk 300, excluding the price of the handset.
   Djuice is a package for young people who use mobile phones for communication and entertainment, and provides the latest voice, messaging and content service and, according to GrameenPhone, offers a strong and different lifestyle.
   ‘Djuice is specially intended for the youths, who are a very important segment of the market, constituting 40 per cent of the population,’ said Erik Aas, managing director of GrameenPhone, whose number of customers recently crossed the three million mark.
   The package includes a 20-second pulse from the beginning of the first minute, and a customer can call at Tk 1.66 per pulse in any mobile during the peak hours, and Tk 0.66 per pulse for calling any mobile during the off-peak hours. Each short message service to any GP mobile will cost Tk 1 and Tk 1.5 to other mobiles of other companies.
   Djuice is a popular international brand developed by Telenor, the majority shareholder of GrameenPhone, and is currently operating in Norway, Sweden, Hungary and Ukraine.
   Kafil HS Muyeed, head of the marketing division of the company, said the existing prepaid customers will also be switched to the Djuice package from mid-May
   He said Djuice brand users will enjoy some special benefits, including group text messaging, SMS chat, latest information on music and movie chart toppers through SMS, more number and message storage capacity, and will also get discounts at some popular fast-food shops, fashion outlets, music stores and sports outlets.

The Awami League-backed educationists and party leaders on Wednesday congratulated Sheikh Hasina on her receiving the congressional medal of achievement from the Philippines House of Representatives.
   In a reception, organised by the Juba League, youth front of the Awami League, in honour of Hasina, they lauded her contribution in uniting the Asian countries and developing Bangladesh.
   Hasina, however, did not turn up at the programme at the Insti-tution of Engineers auditorium.
   Presided over by the Juba League chairman, Jahangir Kabir Nanak, the function was addressed, among others, by former Dhaka University vice chancellor AK Azad Chowdhury, national professor Kabir Chowdhury, the Dhaka University Teachers Association president, Arefin Siddique, the general secretary, Dr M Akhtaruzzaman, former Public Service Commission chairman Dr Mustafa Chowdhury, Dr Harun-or-Rashid, a professor of political science at the Dhaka University and the president of the Bangladesh Federation of Teachers Associations, Kazi Faruk Ahmed.

Nine KU students punished for ragging
Six students of Khulna University were suspended for two terms and fined with Tk 5,000 each for causing mental and physical torture to newcomers. Three others were fined with Tk 5,000 each for the same offence. The university authorities took the disciplinary action at a meeting on Wednesday. The suspended and fined students are Hasibul Khan, Suman Kar, Tapash Kumar Pal, Amiruzzaman Shohel, Dipankar Biswas and Mahfizur Rahman — all of bio-technology and genetic engineering department. The only fined are Sabbir Hossain, Moniruzzaman Babu and Bulbul Ahmed of the same department.
— UNB

Get favourite books through bank
The Oitijjhya, a publishing house, has taken up a project to reach out classic literatures to the readers through the Arab-Bangladesh Bank. The house has published complete works of Rabindranath Tagore and will publish complete works of Sharatchandra Chhattapad-dhay, Jibananda Dash, Bibhuti-bhushan Bandapaddhay and Manik Bandapaddhay. The house has signed an agreement with the bank on Wednesday for disseminating the books. The bank executive vice-president, Touhidul Islam, and owner of Oitijjhya Arifur Rahman Nayeem signed the agreement in presence of the bank’s managing director, Kaiser A Chowdhury. A reader would get his or her title by depositing the price with the nearest branch of the bank. Advanced booking for complete works of Sharatchandra Chhattapaddhay, Jibananda Dash, Bibhutibhushan Banda-paddhay and Manik Banda-paddhay can also be done under the scheme, said a news release.

VIP auditorium
of DRU opens
An auditorium of the Dhaka Reporter’s Unity media centre opened in the capital on Wednesday. The information minister, Shamsul Islam, inaugurated the auditorium as chief guest. The auditorium has been constructed with financial assistance from the Dhaka Bank. The state minister for education, Ehsanul Hoque Milan, as a special guest ensured to provide ten computers for the centre. The unity president, Shabul Karim, presi-ded over the ceremony while the general secretary, Shakhawat Hossain Badsha, spoke. The unity former president, Azmal Hossain Khadem, founder president Shafiqul Kabir, executive editor of the Ittefaq Hassan Shahriar, editor of the United News of Bangladesh Golam Tababur, senior official of the Dhaka Bank Hayatuz-zaman and managing director of the bank Shahed Noman were also present.
— New Age