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Two special graft courts on Monday jailed former communications minister Nazmul Huda for seven years, his wife Sigma Huda for three years, and Rabeya Siraj, wife of former forest and environment minister Shajahan Siraj, for 32 years.
   AK Roy, judge of Special Judge’s Court-2 of Dhaka, sentenced Nazmul Huda to seven years’ rigorous imprisonment and his wife to simple imprisonment for three years in the Tk 2.4 crore bribery case.
   The court also fined Nazmul Tk 2.5 crore or in default to serve one more year in jail.
   It also ordered confiscation of Tk 2.4 crore that Nazmul Huda took in three bank cheques in bribe from Mir Zahir Hossain, managing director of a construction firm, Mir Akhtar Hossain Ltd. Mir Zahir is elder brother of Mir Nasir Hossain, president of the Federation of Bangladesh Chambers of Commerce and Industry.
   The court, after examining the testimonies of witnesses and the records in the case, handed down the verdict convicting the detained former BNP minister on two counts — taking bribe, under Section 161 of the Penal Code, and misconduct, under Section 5(2) of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1947. He committed the misconduct by taking the bribe.
   Sigma was convicted of abetting her husband in committing the offences by depositing the cheques in a bank account she maintained in the name of Khoborer Antoraley, a Bangla weekly magazine she published.
   She also withdrew Tk 1 crore from the account and
   opened fixed deposit receipts in the names of their two daughters.
   Anti-Corruption Commission deputy director Md Shafiqul Islam filed the case against Nazmul and his wife on March 21 with Dhanmondi police station.
   The special court housed in the Jatiya Sangsad Bhaban’s MP Hostel framed the charges on July 5.
   A total of 40 prosecution witnesses testified against the Huda couple while eight defence witnesses made their depositions defending them.
   Another special graft court, presided over by Shamsunnahar, sentenced Rabeya Siraj to 32 years in jail — eight years in each of the four cases filed against her for tax evasion.
   The court also ordered confiscation of 80.5 decimals of land she owns at Kalihati in Tangail, for which she had not paid any tax.
   Although the court found her dodging tax on an amount she had donated to a school at Kalihati, it did not order confiscation of the money.
   The court convicted her on two counts in each of the four cases and sentenced her to three years’ imprisonment for concealing information in her tax files and five years’ in jail for tax evasion.
   The court, however, ordered the execution of all the sentences concurrently, meaning that Rabeya, who remains a fugitive and had been tried in absentia, would have to serve only five years in jail.
   After the verdict, Nazmul and Sigma’s legal counsel M Shahjahan told reporters that the couple would prefer appeal to the Supreme Court against the verdict.
   Rabeya, however, will have no scope to appeal against her conviction until she surrenders before the court.

Twelve bigwig corruption suspects — 10 politicians, a businessman, and a police officer — have so far been convicted of graft and sentenced to different terms in jail since the special judges’ courts started functioning in May.
   The Anti-Corruption Commission, reconstituted on February 25 by the interim government, to date has lodged 54 cases against high-profile corruption suspects, ACC secretary Mokhles ur Rahman told a regular news briefing on Monday.
   Sixteen of the cases are now being tried in the special courts and 26 are under investigation, he told reporters.
   The commission so far has served notices on 215 corruption suspects asking for their wealth statements and 192 of them have submitted their wealth reports.
   Five cases have been
   filed for non-submission of wealth statements, the ACC secretary said.
   Former state ministers Mohiuddin Khan Alamgir, Amanullah Aman, and Mir Nasiruddin, BTTB CBA leader Firoz Miah, former BNP lawmaker Abdul Wadud Bhuiyan and Awami Sechchhasebak League general secretary Pankaj Devnath have been convicted of submitting false wealth statements and amassing wealth beyond their known sources of income.
   Former prime minister Khaleda Zia’s political secretary Harris Chowdhury, former Awami League lawmakers Jaynal Hazari and Shamin Osman, and businessman Giasuddin Al Mamun have been convicted of not submitting their wealth statements as asked.
   A special court on
   Monday jailed former communications minister Nazmul
   Huda for seven years for taking bribe. Earlier, Ashraful Islam, former officer-in-charge of Fatulla police station in Narayanganj, was also convicted of taking bribe.

The Appellate Division on Monday stayed the High Court’s orders that granted Awami League president Sheikh Hasina bail in two extortion cases.
   The appeal court’s ruling means the detained former prime minister will have to remain in confinement at least until the High Court resolves her writ petitions challenging trial of the cases filed by two businessmen.
   The six-member full court of the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court also ordered that Hasina would have to submit her wealth statement to the Anti-Corruption Commission in seven days.
   Chief justice M Ruhul Amin headed the court which, however, refused the government plea for permission to appeal against the High Court orders and ordered the High Court to dispose of the three writ petitions filed by Hasina challenging the government move to try her under the emergency rules and the ACC’s notification asking for her wealth reports.
   The court also stayed the High Court order that granted bail to former president of Federation of Bangladesh Chambers of Commerce and Industry, Abdul Awal Mintoo, against his detention.
   The court passed the orders in the courtroom jam-packed with lawyers, journalists and Awami League leaders and workers, while security in the Supreme Court premises was tightened.
   A High Court bench of justice Shah Abu Nayeem Mominur Rahman and justice Zubayer Rahman Chowdhury on July 30 granted Hasina bail in the Tk 2.99 crore extortion case filed by businessman Azam J Chowdhury.
   The court also directed the government not to proceed with the case under the Emergency Powers Rules.
   On August 7, the same bench granted her bail in another extortion case of Tk 5 crore filed by businessman Noor Ali and asked the government to explain why the placement of the case under the emergency rules would not be declared illegal.
   It also stayed the execution of ACC notice asking Hasina to submit her wealth statement and asked the ACC to explain why its notice issued on July 17 would not be declared illegal.
   The same bench on the same day also granted bail to Mintoo against his detention and issued a ruled on the government to explain why his detention would not be declared illegal.
   According to the separate orders passed by the Appellate Division full court on Monday, all of those interim orders of the High Court will remain stayed until the High Court resolves the writ petitions.
   With the Monday’s orders, there will be no legal bar on continuing the proceedings in the extortion cases against Hasina under the emergency rules, legal experts said.
   The government on August 9 filed separate petitions seeking permission to appeal against all of those High Court orders and stay on them.
   The joint forces arrested the Awami League president at Sudha Sadan in Dhaka on July 16 and a court sent her to jail the same day. Since her arrest, Hasina has been in a special jail set up on the Jatiya Sangsad complex.
   Attorney general Fida M Kamal moved the government petitions, while Rafique ul Huq appeared for Hasina and Mintoo.

The High Court on Monday issued a rule on the government to explain in eight weeks why the Chittagong Hill Tracts Peace Treaty signed with the erstwhile Shanti Bahini in 1997 should not be declared devoid of lawful authority.
   The High Court bench of Justice Shah Abu Nayeem Mominur Rahman and Justice Zubayer Rahman Chowdhury also ordered the authorities concerned not to debar any non-tribal Bangladeshi living in the hill tracts from registering as a voter until the writ petition is resolved.
   The court passed the order after hearing a public interest litigation writ filed by a Supreme Court lawyer, Mohammad Tajul Islam, challenging the 1997 treaty that had led to disbanding of the Shanti Bahini ending its protracted bush war in demand of self-rule.
   Moving the petition, Tajul argued that the CHT peace treaty questioned the very integrity and sovereignty of the state. It is also tantamount to violation of the constitution, he added.
   With the issuance of rule, the CHT peace accord got challenged after a decade since it had been inked.
   On December 2, 1997, the Awami League government signed the accord with Parbatya Chattagram Jana Sanghati Samity leader Jyotirindra Bodhipriya Larma alias Shantu Larma, putting an end to bloodletting bush war of more than two decades. The treaty also provided for return of refugees from camps across the border.

Frequent changes in schedule, delays and cancellations of international flights of Biman Bangladesh Airlines Limited have put the security of Zia International Airport at risk, says a government report.
   A Bangladesh Air Force taskforce prepared the report and submitted it to the civil aviation ministry this week. It said there were much protest and demonstration inside the airport on August 15 and 17 following disarray in flight schedule as well as cancellation of flights of the airline, particularly on the Dhaka-Kuala Lumpur route.
   Seven Kuala Lumpur-bound flights of Biman were either delayed or cancelled on those two days, forcing around 500 to 600 passengers, mostly labourers seeking fortunes in Malaysia, to stay in the airport for two to three days amid uncertainty and without food and accommodation that were supposed to be arranged by the airline. Biman, however, arranged boarding for another five to six hundred passengers, also scheduled to leave on the cancelled flights.
   ‘As Biman did not arrange food and accommodation for several hundred passengers, it gave rise to extreme resentment among those stranded passengers who had to pass the night sleeping on the floor in the airport,’ the report said.
   At one stage, the agitated passengers became engaged in altercation with the security personnel and later staged demonstrations at ZIA.
   ‘Such incidents inside the airport are a serious threat to the overall security of the airport which can lead to graver situation,’ the report observed, adding that Biman should solve these problems immediately to avoid further deterioration of the situation.
   The report blamed insufficient number of planes, overbooking of passengers, inadequate arrangement of hotel accommodation, and mismanagement of flights for such harassments of Biman’s passengers.
   It recommended that Biman should adjust the number of its international flights to the strength of its current fleet until it could lease or buy additional planes to meet the requirement.

Almost two per cent poor have come out of poverty every year in recent time although regional inequality in the country has widened simultaneously, says the World Bank, claiming acceleration in poverty reduction between 2000 and 2005.
   The lending agency officials at a seminar on poverty-related issues on Monday depicted an east-west divide in terms of Bangladesh’s economic disparity — a contention which the country’s economists found to be a simplistic interpretation of the poverty syndrome.
   ‘Such analysis of disparity between the country’s eastern and western parts will only sensitise the bureaucrats [to undertake certain programmes] and give a wrong message to all concerned,’ observed economist Hossain Zillur Rahman.
   In his view, inequality in Bangladesh’s context has multiple dimensions and factors, such as poverty pockets of monga (a famine-like situation in the north) and ecologically vulnerable zones including haor (marshland) and coastal areas, cultural barriers to development, and urban-rural divide in quality of education.
   At the workshop titled ‘Poverty Determinants, Employment Patterns and Regional Differences’, World Bank country director Xian Zhu said, ‘While the overall progress in reducing poverty in Bangladesh is impressive, there are major differences between the eastern and western parts of the country.’
   He appreciated the interim government’s initiative to set up a ‘Regional Inequality Committee’ to find out reasons for regional disparities and suggest policy measures to address the imbalances.
   The gap between urban and rural areas in terms of average per capita consumption expenditure has shrunk to some extent while the variation between regions and divisions has increased, said Hassan Zaman of the lending agency in a paper on ‘Trends and Patterns of Poverty in Bangladesh in Recent Years’.
   The poverty headcount ranged from a low of 32 per cent in Dhaka and 34 per cent in Chittagong and Sylhet to over 50 per cent in Barisal and Rajshahi, Zhu said in the light of the latest household income and expenditure surveys.
   The Bureau of Statistics in collaboration with the World Bank conducted the surveys on 10,000 households distributed across the country’s six administrative divisions. Bangladesh is said to have one of the fastest rates of poverty reduction in South Asia over the period between 2000 and 2005 when six million people were lifted out of poverty.
   Debapriya Bhattacharya, another economist, challenged the findings of the surveys because of their narrow base. He also expressed concern at the growing inequality in the society, which, he said, would eventually hinder the process of poverty reduction.
   ‘Reducing relative poverty is important, even after a significant reduction in extreme poverty. The higher the inequality the more difficult it will be to reduce poverty,’ he said, terming inequality a major policy challenge as the surveys could not cover the middle-income people.
   With the assumption of current growth in gross domestic product at 5.3 per cent, Hassan Zaman forecast that Bangladesh would be able to achieve the UN Millennium Development Goal of halving poverty by 2015.
   Hossain Zillur Rahman, however, criticised the general mindset of economists of not accepting the reality of poverty reduction, saying that poverty statistics stood problematic for policymaking and governance agenda.
   ‘Do you want to equalise poverty or accept dynamics of poverty reduction,’ he asked, emphasising the need for appreciating the decline in poverty for confidence building and keeping concerns of inequality for corrective measures.
   He also pointed out the interim government’s ‘philosophical mistake’ in dealing with the poor while trying to improve governance and carrying out anti-corruption drives.
   When asked after the workshop if various government actions would lead to economic stagnation, he told journalists, ‘The government must be careful and correct its mistake while taking any action. Otherwise, the pace of poverty reduction may be affected.’
   Dwelling on the WB officials’ observation on the regional disparity linked to the lack of road connectivity, economist Atiur Rahman pointed out that a region, such as Rajshahi division, might be well-connected with Dhaka but not provided with the facilities of power and gas supply.
   He came up with the suggestion that the government must make interventions in the poverty pockets like char and haor areas and allocate more resources for greater safety net programmes and investment to create various opportunities.
   Non-farm rural activities have been constrained by infrastructural problems in the form of frequent power outage in recent years, said Mahbub Rahman of BRAC while presiding over one of the sessions of the workshop held at the World Bank office. The workshop was dedicated to Syed Nizamudduin, a senior economist of the bank who died recently.

The Dhaka University syndicate on Monday expressed concern at the state of panic and insecurity among the teachers and students caused by the events following widespread student protests last week.
   The syndicate at a meeting urged the government’s policymakers to ensure safety and security of the students, teachers, officers and employees of the university and their families. It also demanded that the authorities should ensure free movement of the teachers and students.
   The syndicate was informed about the panic created among the teachers and staffs of Dhaka University by the filing of wholesale cases accusing about one lakh unidentified people and, members of the syndicate feared, it could create scope for harassment of the teachers, students, employees and their families.
   The syndicate also called for taking measures for restoring academic atmosphere at the university through united efforts.
   It also suspended all examinations at the university until further order.

The one-member judicial inquiry commission of Justice Habibur Rahman Khan will begin today its inquiry into the August 20–21 Dhaka University incidents stemming from manhandling of some students by army troops and the subsequent countrywide flare-up.
   ‘I received the notification on the formation of the commission on Saturday. I will begin the inquiry tomorrow [Tuesday],’ Justice Khan told New Age on Monday, when he went to the commission’s office at the Circuit House at Kakrail in the capital to look into the preparations.
   ‘I could not start the formal inquiry as the preparatory work, including provision of logistic support for the commission, was yet to be completed,’ he said.
   A deputy secretary of the home ministry, Khorshed Alam, who joined the commission on Sunday as its secretary, told New Age later on Monday that the preparations were complete.
   The commission’s terms of reference include establishment of the cause for the incidents at Dhaka University and the subsequent flare-up, identification of the people or group primarily responsible for the incidents, recommending measures to prevent recurrence of such incidents in future, and commenting on other relevant issues.
   The commission is yet to set the method of the inquiry, said the chairman. He, however, said the commission would record and examine statements of witnesses and issue a notification requesting people who had witnessed the incidents to give their statements.
   Justice Khan sought cooperation of people from all walks of life and hoped to complete the investigation successfully like other judicial inquiries he had conducted including the one into the killing of a university student, Shamim Reza Rubel, in 1998 and another into the Jessore jail revolt. Rubel was killed in custody of the Detective Branch of police.
   No reports of such commissions have ever been made public. When he was asked about the fate of the report of this commission, the former High Court judge said, ‘I believe the reports of the commissions should be made public, as people still have confidence in such commissions led by judges.’
   ‘Although my report on the Rubel murder has never been published, people know almost the entire 20-point recommendation as I disclosed the salient features of the report to the press,’ he said.
   He is, however, satisfied with the follow-up of the report as the High Court delivered a landmark verdict upholding the recommendations and ordering the government to amend the laws on police remand and the powers of the police to arrest any people on suspicion without warrant.
   As the recommendations and the subsequent High Court verdict are yet to be implemented, the government should be put under continuous pressure for their implementation, he said.
   The publication of reports of any inquiry commission, however, is under the absolute jurisdiction of the government, said Justice Khan, referring to the Commissions of Inquiry Act, 1956.
   The act contains no mandatory provision for making public the report of such a commission, he said. The act also says there is no legal enforcement of the report of the commission. The government, if thinks fit, may use any part of such a report in the prosecution.
   A judicial inquiry commission is ordinarily set up by an executive order to inquire into a matter of public importance. The subject can be diverse as long as it is a matter of serious concern to the public.
   The commission is not a court of law, but is essentially a ‘fact-finding’ body to put forth recommendations to the government of the day. The recommendations are not ‘judicial orders or verdicts.’ They are advisory in nature.
   In India, the Commissions of Inquiry Act, 1952 has been amended, making mandatory provisions for placing the report of any judicial inquiry commissions before parliament within six months of its submission.
   In England legislation has been made for publication of the reports of any judicial inquiry commission, said Justice Khan.

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales has resigned, an official said on Monday, ending a controversial tenure as chief law enforcement officer that blemished the administration of president George W Bush.
   The official confirmed a Web site report of the resignation by The New York Times, telling Reuters an official announcement would be made later in the day.
   The 51-year-old Bush loyalist was at the centre of a political firestorm over the sacking of federal prosecutors last year, which critics in Congress complained were politically motivated.
   The official told The Times that Gonzales had told Bush on Friday in a telephone call that he would resign. The official said the job would not be open for long.
   Gonzales worked for Bush when he was governor of Texas in the 1990s. He served as White House lawyer in Bush’s first term as president before becoming the first Hispanic attorney general in February 2005.
   Current and former administration officials had said the department’s integrity had been damaged under Gonzales with controversy over the firing of the prosecutors, his support for Bush’s warrant less domestic spying program and other issues.
   They said as a result employee morale had been hurt and Gonzales’ relations with the Democratic-controlled Congress had deteriorated beyond repair in a firestorm of criticism from lawmakers, including some Republicans.
   Several senators had said they had lost confidence in Gonzales and his ability to head the Justice Department.
   While acknowledging
   mistakes in the handling
   of the dismissals, Gonzales had denied the firings were politically motivated to influence federal probes involving Democratic or Republican lawmakers.
   Bush has defended Gonzales and cited Gonzales’ rise as an achievement for Hispanics, the largest minority in the United States.
   ‘I haven’t seen Congress say he’s done anything wrong,’ Bush said at a recent news conference. ‘As a matter of fact, I believe we’re watching ... a political exercise.’
   Gonzales drew fire from civil liberties groups for writing in January 2002 that parts of the half-century-old Geneva Convention on the treatment of prisoners of war were ‘obsolete’ and some provisions were ‘quaint.’
   He also was criticised for Bush’s warrant less domestic spying programme adopted after the September 11 attacks. Only in January, in an abrupt reversal, Gonzales said the program finally would be subject to court approval.

Law and information adviser Mainul Hosein has described the present administration as a military-backed ‘national government’ and said there should not be any confusion about its ‘exit plan’ after handing over power in a democratic way.
   ‘It is a national government in reality…a collective government…..a military-backed government,’ Mainul told reporters after a meeting with the heads of news of the electronic media at the information ministry on Monday.
   This was his second meeting with the media bosses after a similar parley with newspaper editors on Sunday against the backdrop of reported incidents of intimidation and harassment of newsmen by the law enforcers during curfew hours over the last few days.
   Mainul said the government has an ‘exit plan’ after handing over power in a democratic way and there should not be any confusion about it.
   ‘If the government’s exit plan is obstructed, the plan of many people to survive will not work,’ he cautioned.
   On August 22, the interim administration clamped curfew on Dhaka and five other divisional cities to quell student protests which erupted at Dhaka University on August 20 and quickly spread to other campuses across the country.
   Terming the incidents at Dhaka University as politically motivated, the law adviser said the government had successfully overcome the ‘dangerous plan to pit common people against the army.’
   He said it would require framing charges against a limited number of people in this connection, not against a large number.
   He claimed that the present administration was different from other interim governments as it was following a roadmap to democracy, not working for elections only.
   Mainul said their objective is to restore democracy by creating opportunities for honest people to contest polls.
   Referring to the formation of the present cabinet, he claimed that this government had saved the nation from a civil war. ‘We came to power after the democratic process had collapsed.’
   The interim government of Fakhruddin Ahmed assumed office on January 12, a day after a state of emergency was proclaimed slapping ban on politics.

The Supreme Court on Monday ordered the government to review the number of posts in judicial magistracy as it found that approved organogram and logistics were not enough to carry out the uphill task of judicial service delivery.
   The six-member full court of the Appellate Division, headed by chief justice M Ruhin Amin, asked the government to report back to it the compliance of the order by September 16.
   The court also asked the public works ministry to inform it of the latest position logistics, like court accommodations and furniture for judicial magistracy by September 16.
   The government has been asked to constitute a committee comprising representative from the concerned ministries and the Supreme Court registrar to assess the further requirements of posts and other logistic supports for equipping the judicial magistracy fully.
   The court adjourned till September 17 the hearing of the contempt-of-court proceedings against 13 officials, including four top-ranking bureaucrats, for procrastination in the implementation of the High Court’s 12-point directive and for distorting its orders on the separation of the judiciary.
   Submitting the resolution of the meeting of the national implementation committee for administrative reorganisation, held on August 19, attorney general Fida M Kamal told the court that the NICAR had approved the organogram of the judicial magistracy.
   The structure includes 655 posts of judicial magistrates and 3,554 posts of the class II, class III and class IV employees, and other logistic supports.
   The appeal court pointed out that posts were created and logistics approved for magistracy in 57 districts, according to the NICAR’s resolution.
   ‘What about the seven other districts of the country?’ the court posed a question to the attorney general.
   Earlier on May 7, the court issued a fresh three-point directive to the government for the creation and sanction of a particular number of posts of judicial magistrates across the country along with supporting staffers and logistics, allotment of courtrooms and chambers, and necessary budgetary allocations.
   The Supreme Court detailed the 12-point directive to the government on December 2, 1999 for eventual separation of the judiciary from the executive. Since then, the successive governments took repeated extensions of time for implementation of the directives.
   Finally the BNP-Jamaat government, at the fag end of its tenure, framed four sets of rules on judicial service. The Supreme Court, however, on January 10 ordered the government to frame fresh rules, and repealed the earlier ones because they were not framed in accordance with its directives.
   Accordingly, the present interim government framed four sets of new rules on January 16 and promulgated the Code of Criminal Procedure (Amendment) Ordinance on February 11 and gave effect to the rules and amended CrPC on July 1.

The government has withdrawn curfew on all six divisional cities, including capital Dhaka, from Monday midnight, said an official announcement.
   The curfew was imposed on all major cities at 8:00pm on August 22 following violent student protests sparked by assault of a Dhaka University student by an army man at the university playground on August 20.
   The main cities remained under curfew for a total of 51 hours in full enforcement in the last six days.
   The official handout said, ‘The law and order has improved following all-out efforts of law enforcement agencies and sincere support and cooperation of the countrymen.’
   ‘As a stable environment has returned to the country, curfew on six divisional cities, including Dhaka, has been withdrawn completely from midnight August 27’, it said.
   ‘Legal action is being taken against those who created instability and indiscipline in the country and the government will take appropriate steps in future to protect life and property of people,’ the handout said.
   The government sought continued and sincere cooperation of peace-loving people to keep the overall situation stable.

The High Court will today rule on the petition filed by Rokanuddin Mollah, a director and shareholder of the Dinkal Publications Limited, to wind up the company.
   A single member High Court bench of Justice Syed Refat Ahmed set the date after hearing the petition filed with the bench on July 23.
   Rokanuddin Mollah was a co-accused with BNP chairperson Khaleda Zia in a case filed by the Joint Stock Company for not submitting return on the income and expenses to the Registrar of Joint Stock Companies.
   Twelve others, including Khaleda’s detained son Tarique Rahman, have also been implicated in the case on the same charges.
   Moving the petition TK Khan, counsel for Rakanuddin, told the court, ‘Khaleda Zia, a director of Dinkal, could not come out of her house. Besides, two directors already died and several other directors, accused in the case, have joined different parties. So, how can we run the company in the present situation?’
   Earlier on July 23, the same court issued a rule on the directors of Dinkal Publications Limited asking them to explain why they wanted to wind up the company when Khaleda Zia, Tarique Rahman and other directors of the company were facing a case involving the company.
   Deputy registrar of Joint Stock Companies on June 11 sued Khaldea Zia, Tarique Rahman and 12 other directors of the company for non-submission of service return of the company for last several years.
   Khaleda Zia has been summoned by the Chief Metropolitan Magistrate’s Court of Dhaka on July 26 in connection with the case. The appearance was later posted for September 27 after she had sought time.

Hindu nationalists staged a strike Monday in protest at twin bombings linked to Islamic militants that killed 42 people here, accusing the Indian government of a ‘soft approach on terrorism’.
   The strike led by the main opposition Bharatiya Janata Party in the southern city of Hyderabad kept many people from work and school in the mixed Hindu-Muslim city, still reeling from Saturday’s carnage.
   India’s home secretary Madhukar Gupta on Monday pointed the finger at foreign-based Islamic militant groups, echoing accusations made earlier by the government of Andhra Pradesh state, of which Hyderabad is the capital.
   ‘We are probing all angles. It may be that Lashkar-e-Toiba, Jaish-e-Muhammad could be involved,’ Gupta said on news channel NDTV, naming two Pakistan-based militant groups fighting an Islamic separatist insurgency in Indian Kashmir.
   Indian officials and analysts have blamed Islamic extremist groups for stoking Hindu-Muslim tensions to derail an India-Pakistan peace process and damage the country’s booming economy.
   ‘The important thing is to find out who was involved both in the planning and the preparation as well as in the execution’ of the blasts at a packed outdoor auditorium and a nearby food stall, Gupta added.
   But the BJP, pointing to the failure to find those behind a string of deadly blasts around the country in the past year, said the government in New Delhi had not done enough to ensure security within India’s borders.
   ‘We have been constantly warning the centre (federal government) that it should take adequate measures to strengthen internal security, but the Congress-led government has never bothered to rein in terror,’ said senior BJP leader Vijay Kumar Malhotra.
   The strike kept Hyderabad, a normally teeming city of 6.5 million people, quiet Monday, with about 2,500 state-run buses off the roads after 10 of them came under attack in the wake of the blasts.
   State-run and private schools declared a holiday after the BJP called the state-wide strike. Police received several telephone bomb threats, all of them apparently hoaxes.
   Forensic experts were Monday studying the material used in the bombs which were set off by timers and left more than 50 wounded.
   ‘Yes, it is a timer-based explosive and one bomb that we defused, it also had a quartz clock timer,’ investigating officer Ram Mohan told NDTV.
   The police recovered and defused one bomb found in a cinema a few hours after the twin blasts.
   Initial reports said the police had recovered several more unexploded bombs across the city, but the claims were later denied.
   The state’s chief minister, YS Rajshekhar Reddy, said that ‘available information’ pointed to the involvement of terrorist organisations based in neighbouring Pakistan and Bangladesh.
   He rejected any intelligence failure on the part of his government amid calls for his resignation in the wake of the second major terror attack in the city in less than six months.
   No one has claimed responsibility for Saturday’s attacks and no arrests have been made, but Indian newspapers quoted unnamed police officials as saying the Bangladesh-based militant outfit Harkatul Jihad Al-Islami was the main suspect.
   Security services received intelligence reports five months ago warning that extremists were preparing to carry out bombings, The Hindu newspaper reported Monday.

Thailand has set December 23 as the date for its first general election since the coup that toppled premier Thaksin Shinawatra last year, the nation’s top electoral official said Monday.
   The election commission’s head, Apichart Sukhagganond, announced the date after meeting with prime minister Surayud Chulanont, saying it was chosen because ‘this will give political parties enough time to run their campaigns.’
   Intense political jockeying was already underway before the announcement, as Thaksin’s allies regroup under a new political party and junta leader Sonthi Boonyaratglin considers whether he will run for the premiership.
   The date meets army-installed Surayud’s oft-repeated promise to hold elections to restore democracy before the end of the year.
   ‘The government promises to hold free and fair elections,’ Surayud told reporters.
   The election date will only become official once Thailand’s king signs off on it.
   News of the election date came just one week after Thai voters approved an army-backed constitution in the nation’s first-ever referendum.
   Nearly 57 per cent of voters approved the charter, but both the margin of victory and the turnout were lower than the junta had expected.
   The junta is particularly concerned that voters in northeastern Thailand, a pillar of support for Thaksin, rejected the charter.
   Analysts say that indicates that Thaksin’s allies, who have rallied under the banner of the People Power Party, still enjoy a strong base of support.
   Thaksin is living in exile in Britain, where he has bought the Manchester City football club.
   His Thai Rak Thai party has been disbanded by a military-appointed court, which also barred Thaksin from politics for five years.
   Thaksin has vowed to stay out of politics, but has said he was ready to ‘advise’ People Power.
   The party was previously unknown and has never held a seat in parliament.
   But about 270 former parliamentarians from Thaksin’s Thai Rak Thai party have joined People Power, which they hope will be a vehicle for their comeback.
   ‘The most important thing in this election is to give power back to the people,’ said the party’s secretary general Surapong Suebwonglee.
   Their main rival in the race so far is the Democrat Party, Thailand’s oldest party, which led the opposition when Thaksin was in power.
   ‘We will be ready when the new election is held,’ Democrat spokesman Sathit Pitudecha said.
   But the dynamics of the race will change dramatically if Sonthi decides to contest the election with a pro-military party.
   So far he has refused to rule out the possibility that he would seek the premiership after he retires from the army at the end of September.

The Executive Committee of National Economic Council is scheduled to take decision today about five Power Division project proposals including the ones for setting up a 360MW power plant at Haripur and a 150MW plant at Shikalbaha.
   The three other projects proposed by the division are for expanding the pre-paid metering in greater Chittagong and Comilla regions, withdrawing the ban on expansion of power transmission lines in rural areas, and establishing an electricity infrastructure hub in Sirajganj.
   The cost of the Haripur power plant project has been estimated at Tk 3,507 crore, more than three-fourth of which will be provided by the Japan Bank for International Cooperation as a soft loan.
   The Power Division has proposed that the government will provide around Tk 1,000 crore for the plant, sources in the division said, adding that a large part of the amount would be paid back to the government in customs duty and VAT. The JBIC will supply the rest of the required fund.
   If approved, the combined-cycle power plant is expected to come into operation by 2011.
   The cost of setting up the Shikalbaha power plant has been estimated at around Tk 625 crore and the division has proposed that the government should provide the fund.
   If ECNEC, headed by chief adviser Fakhruddin Ahmed, approves the Shikalbaha power plant project, the division will table before the advisory council committee on public purchase a proposal of a Chinese company for setting up the plant.
   The Power Development Board has selected the company, Sino Hydro Power, through a tender to install the plant, which is expected to come into operation by 2010, if the project is approved.
   The cost of expanding the pre-paid metering system in urban areas of Chittagong, Noakhali, and Comilla has been estimated at around Tk 360 crore.
   Power Division sources said pre-paid electricity meters had already been introduced in some areas of Chittagong city.
   ‘Under the latest project, prepaid meters will be introduced in all urban areas in the south-eastern part of the country that are under the jurisdiction of PDB. This project will be implemented in five to six years,’ said one of them.
   The division also has planned two more projects for expansion of pre-paid metering in northern districts and some central and eastern districts like Mymensingh and Sylhet, he added.
   The ECNEC is also likely to take a decision on the division’s proposal to withdraw the ban on expanding power distribution network in Rural Electrification Board areas.
   The government imposed the ban about six months ago following allegations of irregularities in installation of electricity lines and poles during the previous BNP-led coalition government.

Nine development partners have agreed to give Tk 345 crore to Election Commission for its project to prepare electoral roll with photographs and facilitate the issuance of national identity cards.
   The amount would cover 63 per cent of the project cost estimated at Tk 547 crore, while the rest Tk 202 crore would be financed by the government.
   European Commission, UK department for international development, the Netherlands, UNDP, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, Denmark and Korea jointly pledged the amount in an agreement signed with the government Monday, says a press release.
   The fund will be channelled through the United Nations Development Programme for the EC’s project, styled ‘Preparation of Electoral Roll with Photograph.’
   It will be spent for building the required technical infrastructure, including procurement of telecommunications equipment such as laptop computers, webcams and fingerprint scanners.
   The project will also establish and strengthen the system to update the voters’ roll after the next parliamentary elections.
   UNDP country director Manoj Basnyat said a credible and widely acceptable voters’ list is the foundation for a free and fair election.
   ‘The support of nine major development partners indicates strong international commitment to assist the government in its effort to hold a peaceful and successful election,’ he added.
   The ECNEC on August 20 approved the Tk 547 crore project, expecting Tk 345 crore from external sources.

Both extremists and mainstream political parties use terrorism as a weapon to gain political control jeopardising national life and the economy, a national strategy paper on fighting terrorism in Bangladesh has observed.
   ‘For the extremist political groups terrorism is a weapon to gain control of the polity and for the mainstream political parties terrorism has become a tool for political competition either to gain or to retain political power,’ says the paper.
   It identified terrorism as a growing threat to national life and observed the country needed to adopt a national strategy to fight terrorism.
   ‘There are no … certain causes in the country for terrorism to pose a serious threat. But there is need for us to be vigilant mainly against terrorism coming from outside,’ said law adviser Mainul Hosein while addressing as chief guest the launch of the strategy paper at the Bangladesh Enterprise Institute on Monday.
   The institute prepared the strategy paper, the first of its kind in the country, analysing the causes, nature and extent of terrorism in Bangladesh and suggesting a number of measures to deal with the growing threat of terrorism.
   Shahab Enam Khan of the institute presented the paper while diplomats, former army officials, bureaucrats, academics and legal experts took part in discussion.
   ‘The Bangladesh government recognises the importance of counter-terrorism and is working with the United Nations to combat it,’ said cabinet secretary Ali Imam Majumder.
   Lt Gen (Retd) Mahbubur Rahman said social injustice, corruption and poverty were some of the main causes of terrorism in Bangladesh.
   Barrister Tanya Amir stressed the need for a legal framework for formulating the strategy to curb terrorism.
   Former inspector general of police Nurul Huda said the next elected government should enact a legislation to give the strategy paper a legal frame.
   But the law adviser said the country had necessary laws to deal with the kind of terrorism it was facing.
   The paper says the recent trend in terrorism in Bangladesh rejects any significant correlation between Madrassah education and its linkages with terrorism.
   ‘Only 19 per cent of those arrested for terrorism were from Madrassah,’ it noted.
   The paper suggested that the strategy should be implemented within the next two years.
   British high commissioner Anwar Choudhury praised the government for tracking down militant leaders by legal measures. He stressed the need for establishing an equitable society to curb terrorism.
   Anwar Choudhury underscored coordination among various intelligence and law enforcing agencies to fight terrorism.
   Ambassador Mostofa Farooq, Prof Dalim Chandra Barman, former police chief, Nurul Huda and Brig Gen (retd) Syed Muhammad Ibrahim also addressed the meeting, moderated by the president of the institute, former diplomat Farooq Sobhan.

Pakistan’s embattled president Pervez Musharraf has sent representatives to London to negotiate with former prime minister Benazir Bhutto on a power-sharing pact, an official and newspapers said on Monday.
   Pakistan is facing weeks of uncertainty and the risk of turmoil as army chief Musharraf prepares to secure another term as president, while his opponents vow to end military rule.
   The United States and other western countries are likely to watch developments closely in a nuclear-armed ally seen as vital to efforts to end terrorism and bring peace to Afghanistan.
   ‘We are in contact with Benazir Bhutto, that’s true,’ said the information minister, Mohammad Ali Durrani, referring to newspaper reports that three senior Musharraf confidants were in London for talks. He declined to elaborate.
   Musharraf, who analysts say is at his weakest since he seized power in a 1999 coup, met self-exiled Benazir in Abu Dhabi last month.
   Liberal-minded Benazir is seen as a natural ally of Musharraf’s who promotes a vision of ‘enlightened moderation’ for his country. Both oppose Islamist militancy.
   Her Pakistan People’s Party is generally seen as the country’s most popular party, and a pact with her would broaden his support base.
   Benazir, a two-time prime minister who still has corruption charges hanging over her, later said any deal would depend on Musharraf taking confidence-building steps by the end of August.
   She wants immunity for the actions of civilian governments from when she first came to power in 1988 and the lifting of a ban on a prime minister serving a third term.
   She is also demanding that Musharraf resign from the army.
   Last week, Musharraf issued a call for reconciliation with everyone and some Pakistani newspapers reported that Musharraf had also sent representatives to talk to another former prime minister in exile in London, Nawaz Sharif. But Durrani denied that.
   ‘There has been no contact by the government with Nawaz Sharif nor is there any plan to for now,’ he said.

Heavy downpour in north-eastern districts of India surged the Surma river, which overflowed at Kanaighat, posing threat of flash floods in some upazilas in Sylhet region, flood forecasters said.
   The Surma at Kanaighat and the Kushiyara at Amalshid flowed 73cm and 90cm above their respective danger levels Monday evening and may continue to rise further in next two days.
   The flood situation in country’s north and central parts improved although the Padma was still flowing above its danger mark, a bulletin of the Flood Forecasting Centre said.
   Water level in the other rivers continued to fall on Monday, it added.

A British member of parliament has called on Bangladesh’s interim government to open dialogues with political parties, student groups and lawyers for carrying out political and other reforms and restoring civil rights.
   Eric Avebury, vice chair of the UK parliamentary human rights group and chair of the Bangladesh International Foundation, said in a statement on Saturday that the recent student protests and violence indicated volatility of a situation in which the government and its military backers were pitted against large sections of the civil society and the political parties.
   ‘The indefinite curfew may have produced a temporary lull, but over the medium term may serve to fuel the resentment of the students and their supporters,’ he cautioned.
   The British lawmaker echoed a plea made five months ago by the Commonwealth secretary general, Don McKinnon of New Zealand, for lifting the state of emergency in Bangladesh and restoration of basic human and political rights.
   He also said that selective use of ban on political activities against critics of the government was the main cause of discontent and made it impossible for political leaders, who wished to see free and fair elections in accordance with the Electoral Commission’s roadmap, to play a constructive role in the restoration of democracy and the rule of law.
   Terming the arrest of former prime minister Sheikh Hasina a blatant example of misuse and harassment of the Emergency Power Rules, Avebury called for a review of the cases against her as a prerequisite for accomplishing political reforms.
   ‘We believe it is not too late for this [reform] to be achieved by the government in cooperation with the politicians and civil society, but as a prerequisite we suggest that the government review the evidence in the cases against Sheikh Hasina and others, and enter into a dialogue,’ he said.

The home ministry formed a one-member committee on Monday to investigate the assault on a government official by Rapid Action Battalion members during the curfew hours on Thursday.
   Official sources said the committee led by a deputy secretary of the ministry, Sujayet Ullah, was asked to submit its probe report within three days.
   Abdul Aziz, a personnel officer of the establishment ministry, was reportedly beaten up by RAB members near the Central Shaheed Minar when he was going to the secretariat. He was admitted to the secretariat clinic with critical injuries.
   The home ministry on Monday also asked all the 23 RAB men who were on duty at the Shaheed Minar on Thursday to appear before the committee for hearing.