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The government has planned to construct an expressway from Dhaka to Chittagong, the first of its kind in Bangladesh, involving Tk 7,000 crore from March 2005.
   A Malaysia-based private investment company, Ajimat Consortium, placed the proposal to the government for the implementation of the project on a build-operate-transfer scheme, said the minister for communications, Nazmul Huda, at a meeting in Dhaka on Monday.
   The meeting on the ‘Dhaka-Chittagong expressway construction project under foreign private investment’ was held in the ministry conference room.
   The meeting was told that the 210-kilometre road would reach Chittagong through Narayanganj, Munshiganj, Chandpur, Lakshmipur, Sonagazi, Sitakunda and Hathazari.
   Each of the six lanes of the expressway will be three metres in width and the expressway can made to have eight lanes and an emergency lane. There will be separate speed limits for each of the lanes.
   Necessary information and data will be collected through closed-circuit camera television installed at different points.
   The will be parking spaces, filling stations, toilets, waiting rooms, prayer rooms and food courts at different points along the way.
   The construction firm will build two bridges over the River Meghna and the River Sitalakhya and short flyovers at places for smooth traffic and protection of arable land.
   The consortium, composed of six Malaysian firms, placed the proposal for funds for the entire project. It sought 30 years to repatriate its investments from toll collection.

A mob on Monday forcibly stopped the reconstruction of an Ahamdiyya mosque at Uttara in the Dhaka city in the presence of law enforcers.
   A tense situation kept prevailing in the area where more than 30 Ahmadiyya families.
   Witnesses said a mob, led by Nurul Islam, a Dakkhinkhan union council member at Uttara, attacked the Nabdapara Ahmadiyya mosque at the place, forcibly took away the construction materials and dumped them in a pond in the presence of subinspector Abdul Bari, in charge of the local police outpost, at about 9:30am.
   The attackers also threatened the Ahmadiyya community with dire consequences if they resume the reconstruction work in the future.
   ‘The same group also attacked and forcibly took away our construction materials Friday morning. We filed a general diary with the Uttara police. But the police are yet to take any action in this regard,’ an Ahmadiyya leader told New Age.
   The local residents alleged that the Dakkhinkhan union council chairman was behind the attack.
   Local Ahmadiyya community chief Arman Ali Sarkar said, ‘We informed the higher authorities of the incident. The Uttara police officer-in-charge visited the place and assured us of security measures of all kinds. But we were attacked today in the presence of the police.’
   ‘It reflected an aggressive communal spirit. Thirty Ahmadiyya families in the area have become panicked,’ he said.
   The Uttara police officer-in-charge, Akhteruzzaman, said, ‘I talked with the Ahmadiyyas. The local people assured me that they would not attack the place any further.’
   ‘We will address the issues in two to three days,’ the officer-in-charge said.
   Khalil Mollah, who allegedly led the attack, told New Age, ‘The Ahmadiyyas have no rights to stay in Bangladesh. They are tarnishing the image of Islam and the Muslims.’
   ‘We will stop the reconstruction work of the Ahmadiyya mosque at any cost as the image of the Muslims is directly related to this. Muslims are ready to evict them from the place,’ he said

The Dhaka mayor, Sadeque Hossain Khoka, on Monday laid the foundation stone of a six-storey market, Nilkhet Square, at Nilkhet in the capital.
   The market will be constructed on 18.87 kathas of land of the old Nilkhet market by a private company, ESNA Resources Limited, on its own fund. It work will take two years and a half to be completed.
   The floor areas of the market will be shared between the corporation and the developer on a ration of 25:75. The city corporation will own the market.
   The market will have a parking space to accommodate 24 cars. There will be 483 shops, ranging between 72 square feet and 120 square feet.
   The mayor, chief guest of the programme, said the market would increase the beauty of the area.
   A process is under way to construct another market opposite the Nilkhet Square site, he said.
   Khondokar Mahbub Uddin Ahmad MP, the corporation’s chief executive officer Saifuddin Ahmed, ward commissioners Motahar Hossain Jahangir, Abul Khair Bablu, Shirin Jahan and Suraiya Begum, the corporation’s acting chief engineer Mehdi Ali Khan, Nilkhet Shop Owners’ Association president Delwar Hossain Palash and general secretary Abu Hena Salim also spoke.

Rajshahi University removed its estate officer, Mirza Motassim Billah, for alleged appropriation of shop rent. A syndicate meeting on Saturday decided on the removal.
   Sources said Billah was removed as he failed to collect rent from the traders on the campus. Billah initiated an eviction drive in June, but stopped the drive half-way.
   The traders, running their business legally, complained to the vice-chancellor on July 12.
   Registrar Abdus Salam was asked to do the job of the estate officer.

It was the first time for many children of the Bangladesh Agriculture Research Institute School in Gazipur that they have had a dental check-up by a qualified dentist.
   Saidul Islam of Class V was excited to become one of the 60 students who got the chance to enter the air-conditioned Denti Bus of Pepsodent and to have his teeth checked free.
   Like many other students, his teeth needed proper care and treatment as one of his teeth was affected by caries. ‘The doctor said my tooth needs to be uprooted,’ said Saidul, sheepishly.
   Tamanna of Class IV was also excited to visit a dentist for the first time. ‘The doctor told me my teeth have plaque. It’s all because of wrong way of brushing. He showed me how to brush,’ she said.
   The Denti Bus, equipped with a dental chair, a qualified dentist, and assistants, began its countrywide tour a year ago, offering services to more than three lakh students and elderly people.
   It holds a video show on dental hygiene at each of the schools and arranges a quiz competition. The winners get coupons to visit the dentist in the bus parked in the school compound.
   In the evening, the bus goes to local communities and provides dental care for elderly people.
   Unilever Bangladesh marketing manager Asif Iqbal said only 20 to 22 per cent of the people use toothpaste and toothbrush, giving a bleak picture of dental hygiene in Bangladesh.
   ‘As a corporation, we think beyond business. We do have some social responsibilities. And this is exactly the kind of work the society needs,’ Asif told the journalists from Dhaka who visited the school at the Bangladesh Agricultural Research Institute in Gazipur on Sunday.
   The dentist on the bus, AKM Tanzir Hasan, said the most common disease among Bangladeshi children is dental caries caused by ‘bad food habit.’
   ‘Refined carbohydrate in chocolate, lozenges, and fast food cause caries in teeth,’ he said. ‘Most people are ignorant of the way of brushing. Infection in gum is dominant among elderly people.’
   ‘It is mainly because of faulty brushing. Most people have been accustomed to brushing from right and left, and not up and down,’ he said.
   And most Bangladeshis brush their teeth before breakfast and not after, he said. His observations seemed true.
   In the quiz session when students were asked how to brush and when, most gave wrong answers.
   Like his students, the BARI School principal, Mahmudul Haq Nazir, was also amazed to see the innovative way of creating awareness of dental hygiene.
   ‘In our time, we learnt about brushing from textbooks. Now students are taught in an interactive way, using overhead projector. I am happy that my school was chosen by Denti Bus.’
   Dental problems will reduce if all the children are taught about dental hygiene this way, he said.
   ‘Bad news for dentists,’ laughed Nazir.

Lack of civic amenities in the Barisal City Corporation is causing a lot of sufferings to the dwellers.
   Most city streets, from the Chaker Bridge to the Bazar Road and at Fakirbari, Kalibari, Hospital Road, College Road, Kawnia Road, Bangla Bazar Road and other roads, are in a bad shape.
   The city dwellers cannot move either in rickshaws or on foot during the rains because of the poor road condition.
   The corporation also has no control over the number, fare and driving of rickshaws.
   Untrained rickshaw pullers regularly cause accidents and traffic jam in the city.
   As rickshaw is the main transport, the pullers charge extra fare from passengers. Old and unfit tempos are not only violating traffic rules, but also polluting environment.
   Most light posts in the city do not have bulbs. Water supply is inadequate; and the supply water is contaminated. The city corporation did not address the water crisis.
   Almost all the ward commissioners are linked with tenders and contractors and do whatever they like without considering the need of the dwellers.
   There are allegations that the people in the sections work only when they are bribed.
   Contractors pay money to the employees to get work orders, and the contractors, in their turn, discharge substandard works.
   The Barisal mayor, Majibur Rahman Sarwar, brushed aside such allegations, saying that the corporation is running fairly well.

A national workshop on ‘small scale water resources development master plan in greater Mymenshingh’ was held at LGED Bhaban in the capital on Monday.
   The Local Government Engineering Department and the Japan International Cooperation Agency organised the workshop with the LGED chief engineer, Shahidul Hassan, in the chair.
   The JICA study team leader, Keiji Matsumoto, while presenting the draft master plan, said considering greater Mymensingh as one of the poor regions of the country the draft master plan has been formulated in alignment with the government policy on the basis of a study conducted by JICA.
   The LGED chief engineer, Shahidul Hassan, said the study conducted by JICA is very intensive and detailed which could be model to the replicated in other districts as well.
   Former secretary Quamrul Islam Siddique attended the workshop as chief guest while the JICA Bangladesh additional residential representative, Noriaki Nagatomo, was special guest.
   Earlier, LGED superintending engineer Md Nurul Islam delivered the welcome speech.'

Shahjahanpur resident shot
An official of a private company was shot at near his house at Shahjahanpur in Dhaka on Monday. Anil Chandra Das, 42, vice-president of the Uttara Finance and Investment Limited, came under attack after he had gone out of his Railway Colony residence. He was taken to Dhaka Medical College Hospital and was shifted to a private clinic. No one was arrested till evening.
— New Age

7 jailed for
life in Khulna
A special court in Khulna on Monday sentenced seven people to rigorous life imprisonment and fined each with Tk 50,000, in default to suffer three more years in jail, in the murder case of a freedom fighter. The case was lodged with the Maheshpur police in Jhenaidah in November 2003. Liakat Ali alias Babu, Monsur Rahman, Rabiul Islam, Anisur Rahman, Moshiar Rahman, Shafiqur Rahman and Modhu alias Aminur Islam, all in jail, were sentenced to imprisonment.
— New Age

129 rounded
up in Ctg
The Chittagong Metropolitan Police arrested 129 people, including a wanted criminal, in the Chittagong city in 24 hours till 5:00pm Monday. A release said the police arrested one Mohammed Iusuf, 26, accused in abduction and robbery cases, at Paschim Naniabad in the Pahartali police area.
— New Age

Film appreciation course
The first film appreciation course of the Bangladesh Film Institute will begin in its studio room on the Green Road in Dhaka at 4:00pm on July 20. Film director Tanveer Mokammel will conduct the two-month course. Prothom Alo editor Matiur Rahman will be chief guest in the opening ceremony.
— New Age

Amader Samay
human chain
The daily Amader Samay observed a two-minute silence and formed a human chain near the National Press Club on Monday in memory of those who lost their lives in the London blast on July 7.
— BDNews

Anne Marchal to
leave Dhaka
The head of the political, economic, trade, press and information section of the delegation of the European Commission, Anne Marchal, will leave Bangladesh on August 2 on completion of her tenure. Marchal joined the Bangladesh delegation on July 9, 2001.
— BDNews

Essay contest
on Japan
The Japanese Universities Alumni Association in Bangladesh will hold an essay contest for higher secondary students. Interested students are asked to submit their essays on ‘natural disaster cannot be a constraint to development: Japan, an example,’ within 1,000 words in Bangla by August 20 to the association, housed at Rowshan Tower, on Green Road in Dhaka.
— BDNews