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At least eleven persons were killed, scores injured, large tracts of cropland damaged and several thousand houses totally or partially damaged when cyclone Aila made landfall on the India-Bangladesh coast near Sagardwip at a speed of 100 km per hour on Monday afternoon.
   Tidal surges as high as seven-eight feet struck the coastal districts of Bangladesh, accompanied by heavy showers and winds blowing at 100kmph, and battering the villages and destroying a significant amount of crops.
   The authorities shifted the people from the vulnerable areas to cyclone shelters after a deep depression turned into a cyclone on Sunday night.
   Fifty-two fishing trawlers, with 1,200 fishermen on board, which had ventured into deep sea earlier, are yet to reach the coast, said the trawler owners’ association in Patuakhali and Barguna.
   Eight trawlers were capsized in Bhola and Khulna and 25 of the passengers went missing.
   The private television channels, meanwhile, said at least 20 people died in cyclone hit.
   Standing Rabi crops in large tracts of cropland have been damaged in Khulna, Barisal, and Noakhali. Seasonal crops on 500 hectares of land were damaged in Noakhali. At Bakerganj in Barisal crops on 25,000 acres of land were damaged, along with chilli on 400 acres.
   Disaster management minister Abdur Razzaq, at a briefing in Dhaka, confirmed the death of five persons. He said PM Sheikh Hasina has already directed the lawmakers to visit the affected areas and launch relief operations.
   The minister said the armed forces will also be deployed for relief operations along with 42,000 volunteers of the ministry. He said the government has allocated about 1,000 tonnes of rice and Tk 12 lakh in cash for relief operations.
   Abdul Aziz Mallik, of Karpurkathi in Bauphal, died after a tree fell on him on Monday morning. Razzaq Gazi of village Hosnabad died from cardiac arrest at Bauphal cyclone shelter. Two year old girl Sumaiya drowned in Galachipa. Minor boy Rabbi, son of Rabiul Molla of Char Lakshmi Bardhan of Bakerganj, drowned on Monday noon. Maruf, 7, son of Saiful, and Rajib, 15, son of Abdul Mannan Majhi, were killed at Boyarchar in Hatiya, and Najma Akhtar, 7, of Nijhum Dwip died in the storm. Nazimuddin died as a trawler capsized at Char Kachchapia of Charfashon, and a minor girl, Rozina, died at Char Kalatali as their house collapsed on her. Amena Begum, 48, wife of Ayub Ali, and Shahida Begum,11, of Chargazaria in Ramgati of Laksmipur died as their
   houses collapsed on them.
   Aila, the second of the North Indian Ocean cyclones this season, hit the West Bengal coast near Sagardwip at about 2:00pm, and the eye of the storm crossed the coast, near Diamond Harbour, at around 3:00pm. It was moving northwards and weakening gradually.
   Work at the maritime ports of Chittagong and Mongla were suspended from Monday morning. The district headquarters of Patuakhali and Barguna, and most upazila towns along coast, went under seven to eight feet of high water as Aila advanced towards the coast.
   Mongla Port was asked to hoist Danger Signal No 7 and Chittagong and Cox’s Bazar ports were asked to show Danger Signal No 6.
   The Chittagong Port’s secretary, Farhad Uddin, said they had moved 23 ships anchored in the jetties to the Outer Anchorage and had made all the preparations to protect the port. The Mongla Port authorities also moved all the vessels to safer places.
   River transportation in the southern region remained suspended as the authorities restricted the plying of vessels less than 65 feet in length. No vessel left Dhaka on 39 routes to the southern districts on Monday. Ferry services in the Paturia-Daulatdia and Mawa-Char Janazat routes were also suspended.
   Several hundred villages in Satkhira, Bagerhat, Patuakhali, Barguna and Bhola went under water as the protective embankments were breached at least at 100 points in the coastal districts.
   The Kalapara Met Office recorded 126 millimetres of rainfall in the past 24 hours, ending on Monday noon. A trawler sank at Char Kachchhapia of Char Fassion in Bhola because of gusty winds.
   The wind was blowing at 60-80kmph in gusts or squalls in the coastal areas since Monday morning, and it sometimes reached the speed of more than 100kmph.
   In the Barisal region the power supply lines snapped, leading to prolonged black-outs. Rezaul Alam, executive engineer of Barisal Electric Supply Division-2, said power supply was disrupted after a newly erected 11 kilovolt pole fell on a 33KV line.
   The most affected upazilas in Khulna were Koyra, Paikgachha, Dakop and Batiaghata where about 20,000 people were marooned and at least 500 thatched houses collapsed. The tidal surge hit the dams of the Water Development Board and washed away about 700 shrimp enclosures.
   The district administrations opened emergency control rooms in nine upazilas and asked people over loudspeakers to take shelter in safer places.
   In Satkhira the tidal surge damaged a cross-dam and submerged many villages in Gabura and Padmapukur unions in Shyamnagar upazila on Monday morning. Locals said the cross-dam was damaged at eight points in the two unions. The district administration has already opened 285 cyclone shelters.
   It has also asked the people of Shyamnagar and Ashashuni upazilas to take shelter in the centres.
   The Bauphal upazila nirbahi officer, SM Ansaruzzman, told New Age that the administration had tried to shift the people from the remote chars as there is only a single cyclone shelter in Char Miajan. He said embankments were breached in many places in the coastal region and said that a 100-metre stretch of the Kalaiya-Nazirpur road was washed by high water.
   The officer in charge of Galachipa police station, Nasir Mallick, said five persons had gone missing at Char Motahar and the administration was trying to rescue the people stranded in the chars but had failed so far due to the eight-ten feet high waves on the river’s estuary.
   The New Age correspondent in Cox’s Bazar said hundreds of houses were washed away by the three to four feet high tidal surge in the coastal areas of the district.
   The coastal embankment was also seriously damaged at several places from Teknaf to Kutubdia. The Cox’s Bazar-Teknaf Marine Drive became vulnerable at Himchhari point.
   According to information gathered from the coastal areas of the district, at least 200 houses in Cox’s Bazar town, Kutubdia, Pekoua, Sha Parir Dwip and St Martin’s Island in Teknaf have been washed away in the short period between 10:00am and noon.
   St Martin’s Union Parishad’s chairman, Firoz Ahmad Khan, said tidal surges had hit the island three times since the morning
   Sarwar Kamal, acting mayor of the Cox’s Bazar municipality, said at least 5,000 houses adjacent to Cox’s Bazar airport were hit by tidal surges as high as three to five feet in the morning.
   Md Shamsul Karim, executive engineer of the Cox’s Bazar Water Development Board, said that more than a hundred kilometres of coastal embankments were badly damaged by the tidal surge.
   In Bhola over 300 houses in Doulatkhan upazila were damaged and a large area was inundated in Char Fasson, and Monpura upazila’s protection dam collapsed.
   The low-lying areas of Nijhum Dwip in Noakhali went under 6-7 feet water and most of its inhabitants have been removed to cyclone shelters. The forest department officers fear that a number of deer living in the wildlife sanctuary have died due to the tidal surge.
   Reports from Noakhali said 7km of embankments in Tamaraddi Bazaar in Hatiya upazila collapsed because of the surging water’s pressure.

The Bangladesh Nationalist Party chairperson, Khaleda Zia, on Monday alleged that the government was going to give ‘corridor’ to a country on the plea of Asian Highway to fulfil its commitments to the foreigners.
   She called on all ‘patriotic forces’ to be united as, according to her, foreign quarters were preparing to ‘grab’ the country.
   Urging the people to raise their voice against the alleged move to give ‘corridor’ and the government’s silence about the Tipaimukh Dam, she said, ‘It is time for all, especially the members of the civil society, to prove their patriotism.’
   Adressing a discussion marking the 110th anniversary of birth of national poet Kazi Nazrul Islam, the BNP chief said, ‘Efforts are on to grab the country by destroying its institutions. The BDR [Bangladesh Rifles] has already been destroyed. Moves are on to destroy the army. The border is open. They are constructing Tipaimukh Dam although the country [Bangladesh] is still suffering the adverse impacts of Farakka barrage opened during Awami League’s rule,’ Khaleda, also the leader of the opposition in the parliament, said.
   Jatiyatabadi Samajik Sangskritik Sangstha, associate organisation on social and cultural affairs of the party, organised the discussion at Mahanagar Natyamancha in Dhaka.
   ‘Vultures are hovering menacingly in the skies of Bangladesh. WE must avoid division, sink hatred and narrow interests to keep the patriotic forces united at this juncture,’ she said.
   Khaleda said the country was ‘chained’ by the 2007-2008 caretaker government, which was an outcome of the movement of Awami League, and the last general election was a part of the ploy to establish a ‘puppet’ government here to ‘perpetuate the slavery.’
   She said the ‘conspirators’ had tried to ‘destroy’ the BNP as they knew that it was impossible to use the party against the people.
   She said all knew that the Election Commission was not performing its duty neutrally. ‘The Chief Election Commissioner had said that he would hold an election similar to the 1970 polls. He kept his word.’
   Asking the BNP men to remain united, Khaleda said there were ‘deep conspiracies’ against the nationalist forces.
   The BNP chief described Kazi Nazrul Islam as the conscience of the nation.
   BNP standing committee member Khandakar Mosharraf Hossain, former Dhaka University vice-chancellor Emajuddin Ahmed and professors of the university SM Lutfor Rahman and Mahbub Ullah and poets Al Mujahidee and Abdul Hye Sikdar participated in the discussion. JASAS acting president Abdul Malek presided over the discussion followed by a cultural programme.

The prime minister, Sheikh Hasina, on Monday warned the opposition that the government would not tolerate violation of law and anarchy in the name of political agitations, sources said.
   Addressing a weekly cabinet meeting at the Prime Minister’s Office, Hasina called on the opposition to refrain from ‘destructive’ activities in the name of politics.
   ‘We cannot accept activities that cause people’s sufferings and violate the law. Peaceful political activities will be accepted,’ Hasina was quoted by a minister as saying.
   ‘Of course, the opposition can carry on their political activities as it is their democratic right, but they must hold their programmes with permission from the authorities concerned and without causing sufferings to the common people,’ the minister quoted Hasina as saying.
   Hasina recalled the harassment and repression the Awami League leaders and activists had been subjected to by the BNP-led alliance government, sources said.
   ‘The BNP-led alliance government oppressed our leaders and activists in the streets but we will not obstruct their peaceful political programmes,’ Hasina was quoted to have said.
   About cyclone Aila, Hasina directed her cabinet colleagues to remain alert about the storm and asked them to visit the affected areas in groups and to stand by victims, the sources added.

The government has decided to set up a tribunal at the old High Court building, which now houses the Law Commission, for conducting the much-awaited war crimes trial and allocate funds for the purpose in the next budget.
   The home ministry responsible for constituting an agency to investigate the war crimes committed in 1971 is also looking for a safe place for the body, said an official.
   ‘We have decided to make a block allocation in the fiscal 2009-10 budget to meet the expenses for conducting the trial of war crimes as the process to set up an investigation agency, appoint prosecutors and constitute a tribunal has already begun…All the three offices will have a lot to do,’ finance minister AMA Muhith told reporters Monday after an inter-ministerial meeting on the trial of war crimes.
   He said the meeting had chosen the place for setting up the tribunal and that the decision would be announced later on. The trial will be conducted under the International Crimes (Tribunal) Act 1973 in keeping with international standard, the finance minister added.
   ‘The proposal for a block allocation in the budget for the trial of war crimes will be placed in the cabinet soon for its approval,’ Muhith said, adding that the fund would be allocated according to need. ‘Adequate fund will be made available in the next budget for the trial.’
   He said the investigation committee would have to explore sources at home and abroad for evidence of war crimes committed in 1971.
   Law minister Shafique Ahmed, home affairs minister Sahara Khatun, planning minister and president of the Sector Commanders’ Forum AK Khandker, state minister for law Quamrul Islam and state minister for foreign affairs Hasan Mahmud attended the meeting, also participated by the representatives from a number of non-government organisations, including Ghatak Dalal Nirmul Committee, Citizens’ Commission on War Crimes Trial, Citizens’ Commission on Prevention of Fundamentalism, Prajanma ’71 and Peshajibi Nari Samaj.
   The meeting has apprised the organisations working on war crimes and pushing for trial of the perpetrators of the crimes against humanity of the government’s initiatives for the trial.
   ‘There should be no doubt about the trial of the war crimes after the government’s latest move…The confusion created by some quarters about whether the government would be able to conduct the trial, should now be removed,’ the law minister said.
   AK Khandker said the (administrative) process for the trial had been completed with [the decision] to allocate funds and that this had removed all doubts and confusion over the issue.
   The Chairman of the Citizens’ Commission on War Crimes Trial, retired justice Golam Rabbani said they were convinced that the government was going to hold trial of the 1971 war crimes as, he mentioned, there were no other barriers.
   The meeting decided that everyone in the government should not speak in public about the war crimes trial and asked the state minister for foreign affairs for maintaining a liaison with the foreign missions in Dhaka on the matter, said a meeting source.
   Meanwhile, the law ministry has sent a copy of the International Crimes (Tribunal) Act 1973 seeking opinions for necessary changes in the law and to make sure whether war crimes charges could be brought against any individual.
   Bangladesh Sector Commanders’ Forum, a platform of 1971 war heroes, revealed last year that 11,000 people, indicted in war crimes, had been released from jail a few months after the assassination the country’s founding president Sheikh Mujibur Rahman in August 1975.
   Crimes against humanity, including murder, extermination, enslavement, deportation, imprisonment, abduction, confinement, torture, rape or other inhuman acts committed against any civilian population or persecution on political, racial, ethnic or religious grounds, whether or not in violation of the domestic law, shall also come under the tribunal’s jurisdiction, according to the law.
   Earlier on January 29, the parliament had approved unanimously, in the absence of the opposition lawmakers, a resolution seeking speedy prosecution of the 1971 war criminals. The proposal was moved by Mahmud us Samad Chowdhury, a ruling Awami League lawmaker for Sylhet 3 constituency.

The law minister, Shafique Ahmed, on Monday said the government would take legal action against Khaleda Zia if she fails to vacate her house at Dhaka Cantonment, while the High Court has deferred till 2:00pm today the hearing of the writ petition filed by the opposition leader regarding the house.
   ‘According to law, the government can sue a person and take legal action to evict him/her, if the person does not leave a house or property even after being served with three notices,’ the law minister told reporters after a meeting held at the finance ministry on trial of the 1971 war criminals.
   Replying to queries from the press, Shafique said Khaleda Zia has already been served with the third notice to hand over the house to the military estate officer by June 30… If she fails to go by the notice, legal action will be taken against her.’
   The law minister came up with the statement a few hours after the High Court had deferred till 2:00pm today the hearing of the writ petition filed by Khaleda, also the Bangladesh Nationalist Party chairperson, challenging the notice.
   A High Court bench of Justice Syed Refaat Ahmed and Justice Moyeenul Islam Chowdhury deferred the hearing as Khaleda’s counsels sought time, saying they would file a supplementary petition challenging the third notice issued on Sunday.
   After the court order, Khaleda’s counsel Moudud Ahmed, also a former law minister, told reporters the Directorate of Military Land and Cantonments served the third notice in violation of the High Court’s order that had asked the government not to harass her in any way regarding the house.
   The third notice reminded Khaleda that the directorate had issued a notice on April 20 asking her to vacate the house in 15 days and a supplementary notice on May 7 asking her to explain in 15 days why she should not be directed to hand over the house to the military estate officer.
   It stated that Khaleda had served the directorate a notice on May 10 through her lawyer stating that the supplementary notice had no application in respect of the property [house] on lease.
   ‘But, you [Khaleda] did not mention why the supplementary notice had no application in respect of the leased property.’
   Khaleda’s possessing or staying in the house has no legal basis, as she did not reply to the supplementary notice, the third notice said.
   The prime minister, Sheikh Hasina, told parliament in the first week of April that she would ask the opposition leader to vacate the house claiming that the cantonment authorities had allotted the premises to Khaleda in violation of the laws.
   The cabinet on April 8 decided to cancel Khaleda’s leasehold of the house she went to live in after her husband, former president Ziaur Rahman, was killed in a military putsch on May 30, 1981.
   The Directorate of Military Land and Cantonments issued the first notice on April 20 asking her to vacate the 6 Moinul Road house in Dhaka cantonment within 15 days. She filed a writ petition on May 3 challenging the notice.
   She filed a supplementary petition on May 17 challenging the second notice served by the directorate on May 7 asking her to explain in 15 days why she should not be directed to return the house to the authorities concerned.
   The Zia family has been living in the house since the 1970s. The 2.72-acre bunglow was originally the official home of the army chief, a position held by the then Lieutenant General Ziaur Rahman.

persisting in the Dhaka city for months together, have deepened again after briefly showing signs of easing, making life almost unbearable for people in blistering summer heat.
   Residents in most neighbourhoods of the city complained that they were facing the agonies of four to seven hours of load shedding a day again after it had come down to two to three hours in early May.
   Residents in different areas of Mirpur, Mohammadpur, Rampura, Goran, Gulshan, Uttara and Rajabazar said the water crisis in the areas had turned acute again in the last few days.
   ‘Load shedding, which was around eight to 10 hours a day in April, came down to two to three hours in the first week of May. But we have been facing around seven hours of outages again for the past few days,’ said Ujjal Mostafa, a resident of Rajabazar in the heart of the city.
   Sweltering heat and humidity have added to the sufferings caused by frequent power outages coupled with acute water crisis over the last 10 to 12 days, he said.
   ‘Supply shortage forces us to buy drinking water and walk miles to a relative’s house to have bath,’ he said.
   Abul Kalam Azad, a resident of Khilgaon neighbourhood, said that they had been experiencing four to five hours of load shedding a day for the last few days.
   Besides, he said, water crisis in the area had turned acute again. ‘We spend all night in agonising wait for water which is supplied only for one or two hours, which is too inadequate for household work,’ he said.
   Dwellers in the city’s east Goran, Fakirerpul and west Rampura have been experiencing severe water crisis for over two weeks now and the little water the WASA supplies is dirty and stinky.
   The Dhaka Water Supply and Sewerage Authority managing director, Shahjahan Ali Mollah, however, denied there was severe water crisis in the city.
   When his attention was drawn to complaints from residents of some specific places, he termed them stray incidents and said the WASA was going to take steps to solve the water crisis in the areas.
   Officials of the Dhaka Power Distribution Company and the Dhaka Electric Supply Company attributed the frequent outages to a rise in demand for electricity in hot summer.
   They said although power supply in the city had increased to around 1,400-1,500MW in May from 1,250MW in April, they were forced to go for load shedding to cope with the demand. The demand for electricity in the city is around 2,000MW at present.
   Though the Dhaka WASA has a capacity for withdrawing water up to 205 crore litres per day against a demand for 215 crore litres, production has fallen to 180 to 185 crore litres owing to power outages and fall in the groundwater level, sources said.
   DWASA at present has only 233 fixed generators and 41 mobile generators for its 514 deep tube-wells with at least 270 tube-wells left unproductive during the power outages.
   WASA has, however, decided to procure more 200 generators to tackle the power crisis. But it will take the agency at least a year to procure and set up the generators.

The BNP secretary general, Khandaker Delwar Hossain, and three Supreme Court lawyers on Monday filed two petitions with the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court seeking permission to appeal against the High Court ruling that had declared illegal the 5th amendment to the constitution.
   The full court of all seven Appellate Division judges, headed by chief justice MM Ruhul Amin, on May 4 allowed Delwar, and three Supreme Court lawyers – Munshi Ahsan Kabir, Tajul Islam and Kamruzzaman Bhuiyan, to file the leave petitions in four weeks as they had preferred to contest the High Court verdict.
   The full court, however on the day, kept pending its order on the government’s plea for withdrawal of the petition, filed by the then BNP-led coalition government in 2005, seeking permission to appeal against the judgement.
   Earlier, Delwar filed a petition seeking permission to contest the verdict as the present government on May 3 had quit the legal battle accepting the verdict.
   As the petition, filed by the then government in 2005 seeking permission to appeal against the High Court verdict, came up for hearing in the full court on May 3, the attorney general, Mahbubey Alam, told the court the government would not carry on the case as it had accepted the ruling.
   After filing the petition on Monday, Delwar’s counsel TH Khan told reporters that the former had to file the petition as the government had quit the legal battle despite the fact that the case involved a crucial question of interpretation of the constitution.
   Asked when the hearing would be held, TH Khan said the chief justice would set the date adding it could be June 21.
   The High Court bench of Justice ABM Khairul Haque and Justice ATM Fazley Kabir on August 29, 2005 declared illegal and void the 5th amendment and the martial law regulations issued between August 15, 1975 and April 1979.
   The court delivered the judgement after hearing a writ petition filed over a dispute over Moon cinema, an abandoned property, in the Old Town of Dhaka.
   The court, however, ‘condoned’ the work done for social development, action that was past and closed, the orders cancelling the 4th amendment to the constitution and other acts that were not unconstitutional.
   According to the verdict, such matters will not be deemed illegal or void under the declaration the court has made.
   The court also observed that usurpation of state power through martial law proclamations, particularly by Khondoker Moshtaque Ahmed, Justice Abu Sadaat Mohammad Sayem and major general Ziaur Rahman was unconstitutional.
   Proclamation of martial law is unconstitutional and those who have done it are liable to sedition charges, the court said in its 22-point observation.
   ‘Taking over the powers of the People’s Republic of Bangladesh with effect from the morning of August 15, 1975 by Khondoker Moshtaque Ahmed, the usurper, placing Bangladesh under Martial Law and his [Moshtaque’s] assumption of the office of the President of Bangladesh by Proclamation of August 20, 1975 were, in clear violation of the constitution and as such without lawful authority and without jurisdiction,’ the court observed.
   ‘Consequently, all his subsequent actions as the President of Bangladesh were illegitimate and void.’
   The judgement also observed that ‘… taking over the office of the President of Bangladesh and such entering into the office on November 6, 1975 by Justice Abu Sadat Mohammad Sayem and his assumption of the powers of Chief Martial Law Administrator and appointment of Deputy Martial Law Administrator and the proclamation on November 8, 1975 were all in violation of the Constitution, and consequently all such functions, actions as President or CMLA were illegal.
   ‘The handing over of office of Martial Law authority to Maj Gen Ziaur Rahman, by Abu Sadat Mohammad Sayem by the third proclamation on November 29, 1976, enabling Ziaur Rahman to exercise all powers of the CMLA, being beyond the ambit of the Constitution was illegal, without lawful authority and without jurisdiction and consequently all his subsequent functions and actions as CMLA were illegal.’
   The court also referred to the takeover of the presidency by Zia on April 21, 1977, and observed that it was also ‘beyond the ambit of the Constitution and as such illegal.’
   About the referendum of 1977 on Zia’s presidency during the martial law, the court observed that it was ‘unknown to the Constitution.’

Two protesters were killed in India’s Punjab state on Monday in fierce rioting sparked by the shooting dead of a guru in fighting between rival Sikh communities in Austria, the police said.
   The two men were killed in separate incidents when the police opened fire to disperse angry crowds who rioted in cities and towns across the northwestern state.
   They were protesting against the death of Sant Rama Nand, who was killed by fellow Sikhs in a temple in the Austrian capital of Vienna on Sunday as he addressed 200 worshippers.
   Demonstrators in Punjab torched four train carriages in the city of Jalandhar, the police said, despite a curfew imposed to halt the violence.
   Curfews were also in place in the cities of Phagwara and Hoshiarpur, with more than 900 troops deployed to control the situation.
   In Amritsar, Sikhism’s holiest city and home to the Golden Temple, the police fired tear gas to control crowds after protesters torched dozens of buses and smashed windows. About 12 people were injured.
   ‘One person was killed at Lambra village by the army bullet and another one was shot dead at Jalandhar by the police in order to control the mob,’ a police officer who declined to be named told AFP.
   Train services throughout the state were also severely disrupted.
   Indian prime minister Manmohan Singh, himself a Sikh, said he was ‘deeply distressed’ by the attack on the guru and issued an appeal for calm.
   ‘Whatever the provocation, it is important to maintain peace and harmony among different sections of the people,’ he said in a statement.
   Sant Rama Nand, 56, died and 16 other people were injured in Vienna during the temple attack, which was reportedly over a dispute about the role of castes in the Sikh religion.
   A second guru, or ‘teacher,’ Sant Niranjan Dass, 66, was among those wounded as Sikhs fought each other with guns and knives inside the temple.
   The two gurus, who belong to a group representing low-caste Sikhs, were visiting Vienna to meet worshippers.
   Leaders at the temple, which opened in 2005, have campaigned against the caste system, but their stance has angered other Sikhs in Austria.
   Guru Nanak, who founded the Sikh religion in the early 16th century, denounced the Hindu hierarchy of castes and taught that all people were equal regardless of caste or gender.
   Indian foreign minister SM Krishna blamed the attack on clan rivalry.
   ‘Two groups of people owing allegiance to different families have set up confrontation amongst themselves and let the gurdwara be made the place where attacks and counter-attacks have taken place,’ he said.
   The Vienna police said on Monday that six Indian men who lived in Austria had been arrested over the pre-planned assault.
   Four of the alleged attackers were in a critical state in hospital, but the remaining two have been questioned, the police said.
   In Jalandhar, the Indian city where many low-caste Sikhs live, the army was out in force as protesters furious at the guru’s death obstructed trains and erected road blocks on national highways.
   ‘Officers have been deployed at sensitive points to check any untoward incidents,’ said police superintendent RK Jaiswal.
   The Sikh religious community has about 2,800 followers in Austria and 25 million worldwide, most of them in northern India.

The regular cabinet meeting on Monday formed a seven-member high-powered committee, headed by the cabinet secretary, to review the recommendations made by the National Pay Commission on increasing the salaries of the government officials and employees.
   The meeting at the PMO, presided over by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, asked the committee to submit its report to the cabinet within one and a half month after carefully examining the proposed salaries, allowances and benefits, said the PM’s press secretary, Abul Kalam Azad.
   The seventh National Pay Commission, which was formed on August 31, 2008 and submitted its report on April 23 to the
   finance ministry, recommended that the highest salary should be Tk 45,000 and the lowest Tk 4,000.
   ‘There should not be too great a disparity between the highest and lowest salaries,’ Sheikh Hasina was quoted by a minister as saying.
   ‘The PM asked the committee to implement the Pay Commission’s recommendations in phases so that the prices of essentials remain within the purchasing capacity of the common people,’ the minister told New Age.
   She also said it needs time to implement the recommendations, said sources.
   ‘Increase of inflation will not be welcomed,’ the PM was quoted by her press secretary.
   The other members of the committee are secretaries of the finance division, defence division, the Prime Minister’s Office, law ministry, establishment ministry and planning ministry.
   Hasina told the meeting that the proposals of the Pay Commission must be implemented in a way that does not put an extra burden on the common people.
   The Pay Commission’s report recommends that the government officials and employees should assess their own income taxes and should be given the opportunity to buy cars within five to seven years in phases.
   The Pay Commission proposed a separate pay structure for the officers and employees of the Bangladesh Bank, incorporating new salaries and allowances.
   The Cabinet gave the final approval to the Jamuna Multipurpose Bridge Authority (Amendment) Act 2009 under which the ‘Jamuna Multipurpose Bridge Authority’ was renamed the ‘Bangladesh Bridge Authority’.
   It also approved in principle the proposal to amend ‘The Real Estate Development and Management Act 2009’ after changing the term ‘bailable’ to ‘non-bailable’, said Azad.
   The Act has a provision of awarding two years of imprisonment and fine of up to Tk 20 lakh for the unscrupulous acts of the developers, or both, he said.
   The Act says that any owner or director or official of any development company, who will be found directly or indirectly involved in any violation of the Act’s provisions, will be held personally responsible.
   The cabinet also held a discussion on the cyclonic storm and tidal surge that hit the country’s coastal belt on Monday.
   The meeting was told that a number of areas of the southern region were inundated by the tidal surge and three persons were killed when a boat capsized.
   The PM directed the MPs, leaders and workers of Awami League, as well as the local administrators, to rescue the affected people and distribute relief materials among them.
   She also ordered the Navy and Coast Guard to conduct rescue operations wherever necessary.

North Korea on Monday tested a nuclear bomb many times more powerful than its first in 2006, angering enemies and allies alike and prompting UN Security Council members to call an emergency session.
   The hardline communist state, which stunned the world with its first atomic bomb test in October 2006, made good on its threat to stage another test after the Security Council censured it for an April rocket launch.
   The North ‘successfully conducted one more underground nuclear test on May 25 as part of the measures to bolster up its nuclear deterrent for self-defence in every way,’ the official Korean Central News Agency said.
   ‘The current nuclear test was safely conducted on a new higher level in terms of its explosive power and technology,’ it said.
   The foreign ministry in China, the North’s most important ally, said it was ‘resolutely opposed’ to the test.
   ‘China strongly demands that North Korea keeps its promise of denuclearisation and ceases all actions that could further worsen the situation,’ it said in a statement.
   Russia’s foreign ministry said the test threatened regional stability, violated the Security Council’s will and impeded non-proliferation efforts.
   China and Russia — both part of a six-nation forum working to persuade the North to give up its nuclear programmes — had in the past resisted efforts at the UN to punish the North harshly over its nuclear activities.
   The force of Monday’s blast was between 10 and 20 kilotons, according to Russia’s defence ministry, vastly more than the estimated one-kiloton blast three years ago.
   Japan’s Meteorological Agency said based on recorded seismic activity, the energy level of the test was four times bigger than the last one.
   Baek Seung-Joo of the Korea Institute for Defence Analyses told AFP that if rough estimates by some private analysts are right, ‘the power of the second blast is comparable to the bombs which hit Hiroshima and Nagasaki.’
   The Security Council, which sanctioned the North for its previous test, planned to meet Monday afternoon in New York.
   The North also test-fired three short-range missiles on Monday, South Korea’s military said.
   ‘North Korea’s attempts to develop nuclear weapons, as well as its ballistic missile programme, constitute a threat to international peace and security,’ US president Barack Obama said in a statement.
   ‘The danger posed by North Korea’s threatening activities warrants action by the international community.’
   The North informed the United States and China in advance of the test, a South Korean official said on condition of anonymity.
   South Korea called its neighbour’s atomic test an ‘intolerable provocation’ and a serious threat to regional peace and put its military on heightened alert.
   Japan’s foreign minister Hirofumi Nakasone said his country, as the only ‘atomic-bombed nation’, needed to take stern action.
   Japan asked UN Security Council chair Russia to call an emergency meeting.
   The KCNA report did not say where the nuclear test was conducted. South Korean officials said a tremor was detected around the northeastern town of Kilju, near where the first test was staged.
   Japan, South Korea and the US — along with China and Russia — have been negotiating since 2003 to persuade the North to abandon its nuclear programmes in exchange for energy aid and security guarantees.
   In a 2007 pact the North agreed to dismantle its nuclear plants. The deal bogged down last December over ways to verify its declared nuclear activities.
   In April the North fired a long-range rocket for what it called a satellite launch. Many nations saw it as a disguised ballistic missile test, while the Security Council condemned the launch and tightened sanctions.
   A defiant North vowed to conduct a second nuclear test as well as more ballistic missile launches unless the world body apologised.
   It also announced it was quitting the six-way talks and would restart its plutonium-making programme.
   Analysts believe the North has currently stockpiled enough plutonium for six to 12 small nuclear bombs. The first test was seen as only partially successful.
   KCNA said Monday’s test had resolved ‘scientific and technological problems arising in further increasing the power of nuclear weapons and steadily developing nuclear technology.’
   North Korea said Monday’s test would help defend the country and ‘ensure peace and security on the Korean peninsula and the region.’
   In remarks made at the White House before heading to a Memorial Day ceremony, Obama said North Korea’s actions were ‘deepening its own isolation and inviting stronger international pressure.’
   Pyongyang has expressed disappointment at the Obama administration, calling it no better than its predecessor.
   ‘The second test was earlier than expected and reflects the North’s growing anger at Washington,’ said Kim Yong-Hyun of Seoul’s Dongguk University.
   ‘Or some internal problems may be forcing Pyongyang to take a strong attitude.’
   North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il, 67, was widely reported to have suffered a stroke last August, prompting speculation overseas about the succession. The North’s position has noticeably hardened since then.

Cyclone Aila spawned from a deep depression in the Bay of Bengal to hit West Bengal on Monday leaving 21 people dead and 1.10 lakh affected, before gradually weakening.
   The highest number of 14 deaths, according to official sources, was reported from South 24 Parganas district, followed by five in the metropolis and one each in Bankura and Howrah.
   ‘The cyclone hit the West Bengal coast at 1:30pm near Sagar Island,’ Regional Meteorological Centre director GC Debnath told PTI.
   A severe storm with a wind speed of 110km per hour accompanied by heavy rainfall preceded the cyclone ripping through Kolkata, North and South 24 Parganas, Howrah, Hooghly, Burdwan and East Midnapore districts at 110 kmph.
   Unofficial reports, however, put the toll at 26 and the number of affected at over two lakh.

There has been an alarming rise in the use of telephones by criminals to extort tolls from industries and businesses in capital Dhaka in recent times despite the law enforcers’ repeated assurance that they would curb such crime.
   Victims of telephone threats by criminal underworld pass through agonizing trauma and often end up paying the toll money in fear for their life, sources who have undergone such trauma said.
   ‘It’s easy to demand extortion money over telephone as there is a risk to appear physically to collect the tolls,’ a senior police officer said, adding that even extortioners sometimes work out from abroad and operate through their proxy henchmen.
   An engineer of a real estate developing company, working on a project at Kafrul, alleged that no one can construct a building in the locality without paying tolls to the extortioners.
   The extortioners first demand a handsome amount over telephone and send their agents to realise the money. If the money is not paid, they fire shots at the construction workers, injuring them or even killing them at the site, said the engineer who did not want to be identified.
   On May 10, toll collectors shot dead a teenage boy and injured his elder brother at an under-construction building at north Kafrul after they failed to realise their demand money of Tk 10 lakh.
   The injured man was a construction worker at the site while his younger brother had only came to Dhaka to see him on the previous day.
   Another site engineer said that the men belonging to a so-called ‘Raja Bahini’ had been demanding Tk 20 lakh from his company for the last one week.
   On May 12, the extortioners shot dead Mobarak Ali, 65, and terrorised his three minor school-going grandchildren, shooting at their vehicle indiscriminately at Merul Badda after they failed to realise the money they had demanded from his son-in-law Delwar Hossain, who is managing director Toba Group.
   Delwar said that the criminals had demanded the money through a telephone call from Dubai before the general election in December 2008. He had lodged a general diary with the Badda police station, but did not pursue the complaint in fear.
   Police later arrested six members of ‘Zeeshan Bahini’ from different places in Moghbazar and Khilgaon in connection with the killing of Mobarak Ali. They reportedly admitted that they had killed the man upon instruction from their ‘boss’.
   On May 13, criminals fired gunshots while storming into the office of Sirajul Islam Tapan, a businessman, at Pisciculture Housing Society in Mohammadpur to terrorise him.
   Tapan said that one Ashik had called him over phone on April 22 and demanded Tk 20 lakh as toll at a time and also asked him to pay Tk 50,000 every month to run his business in surgical equipment.
   The caller, introducing himself as a younger brother of notorious criminal Nabi, also asked Tapan to contact Nabi. As Tapan did not respond to the call, the caller again phoned him the following day and threatened him of dire consequences.
   Tapan had filed a general diary with Mohammadpur police station on April 22 but no action was taken.
   Scores of incidents of extortion occur in the city everyday, though most of the cases are not reported to the police stations for fear of criminal reprisals.
   ‘We are receiving at least six complaints daily at our control room from different parts of city and we try to take action against the alleged criminals,’ said Walid Hossain, additional deputy commissioner of police detective branch.
   Some 169 complaints of telephone threats for extracting tolls were received form April 27 till date and the control room took steps through blocking 329 mobile SIM cards during the period, he said.
   Every case of telephone threats is being investigated by DB police, he added.