e_Paper, Friday, August 4, 2017

SECOND EDITION 

FRIDAY, AUGUST 4, 2017 | Shrabon 20, 1424, Zul-qadah 10, 1438 | Regd No DA 6238, Vol 5, No 88 | 24 pages plus 24-page weekend supplement | Price: Tk10 

AP 

Turkish nationals in Bangladesh 

living in fear › 2 

Trump 

blames 

Congress 

for all-time 

low in Russia 

ties › 3 

The inside 

story of 

Accenture’s 

departure 

from 

Bangladesh › 5 

Is a new 

govt-backed 

coalition 

forming? › 6 

WEEKEND SUPPLEMENT 

Six rainy day hacks for every 

students › 8 

The unofficial freshman 

survival guide › 16 

What seems to be troubling 

you? › 20

2 

FRIDAY, AUGUST 4, 2017 

DT 

News 

Turkish nationals in Bangladesh 

• Syed Zainul Abedin and 

Adil Sakhawat 

SPECIAL 

Turkish nationals who are longterm 

residents in Bangladesh are 

living in fear of persecution by 

their home country’s government. 

The Turkish ambassador has 

urged Sheik Hasina’s government 

to “take action” against Turkish 

nationals living here, who he says 

are linked to a “terrorist group” involved 

in last year’s attempt to topple 

the regime of president Recep 

Tayyip Erdogan in Ankara. 

Since the failed July 2016 coup, 

Turkey has been extracting its 

nationals from many countries 

around the world with the help of 

those governments, using various 

techniques. 

Recently, many Turkish nationals 

in Bangladesh have been forced 

to leave the country after the validity 

of their passports expired. 

A Turkish man, requesting anonymity, 

claimed that his embassy 

in Dhaka had “forcibly” confiscated 

his passport. 

He said that many Turkish children 

who were born in Bangladesh 

have no documented nationality as 

the Turkish consulate office denies 

to issue passports for them. 

In a recent press conference, 

Ambassador Devrim Öztürk 

claimed that some Turkish nationals 

in Dhaka, in particular 

those working at the Turkish Hope 

School, were involved with what 

he called the Gülenist Terror Organisation 

(FETÖ). 

He also accused Turkish-Bangladesh 

Chamber of Commerce and 

Industry (TBCCI) of associating 

with this group. He urged Bangladeshi 

authorities to “take action” 

International Turkish Hope School was established in Dhaka in 1996 as a project of Int’l Hope Company Ltd. The school in its 

six branches employs 396 people, including 33 Turkish and 210 local teachers 

RAJIB DHAR 

against these groups. 

Foreign Ministry officials who 

spoke to the Dhaka Tribune said 

they saw the ambassador’s request 

as a violation of diplomatic norms. 

The foreign secretary told the 

Dhaka Tribune that action has been 

taken against the Turkish Embassy 

for their conduct. 

‘We don’t even think about politics’ 

Turks in Dhaka gather daily at 

several Turkish restaurants in the 

capital’s upmarket areas. Our correspondents 

reached out to them 

at one such venue. 

A pregnant Turkish woman who 

came to the restaurant with her 

daughter, a student of class 2, said 

they are closely monitoring the 

government’s decisions. 

“We do not know the actual scenario 

in Turkey, but we have seen 

the news,” she said. 

The Turkish community in Dhaka 

was shocked after reading their 

ambassador’s statement in the media, 

she said. 

“From our relatives and friends 

we came to know that Turkish nationals 

are facing problems. Their 

passports are confiscated, newborns 

in Turkish families are not 

given birth registration, simply our 

human rights are being violated 

around the world,” she said. 

The woman has been in Bangladesh 

for five years. She said she 

was worried about her upcoming 

baby’s birth registration as a Turkish 

national. 

The owner of the Turkish restaurant- 

himself Turkish - said the 

government in Ankara is just blaming 

innocent Turkish nationals 

who are not even thinking about 

the country’s political situation. 

“Our family members in Turkey 

said people from all walks of life - 

such as doctors, engineers, teachers, 

and government employees - 

are being arrested,” he said. 

A website maintained by anonymous 

journalists, www.turkeypurge.com, 

has been keeping track 

of the crackdown in Turkey since 

the coup. 

It says that up to July 31, a total 

of 145,711 Turkish nationals 

have been sacked from their jobs, 

122,756 have been detained, and 

56,987 have been arrested including 

274 journalists. 

In addition, 8,573 academics and 

4,424 judges and prosecutors have 

been dismissed, while 2,099 educational 

institutions and 149 media 

outlets have been shut down. 

The restaurant owner pointed to 

a photo montage on his wall, illustrating 

so many aspects of Turkish 

cultures. 

“Now they are targeting the expatriates 

but we are here doing the 

business and also promoting our 

country’s culture,” he said. 

“The Turkish government is just 

blaming its own citizens, which 

is unlawful. All these people who 

are being arrested, all of this is being 

done on the basis of suspicion. 

The government has no reason, no 

proof of the blame made on the innocent 

citizens.” 

The businessman, who speaks 

fluent Bangla, has been living in 

Bangladesh for 13 years. He said 

he is not too worried since he is in 

Bangladesh. 

“Bangladesh is a democratic 

country, But I would be worried if I 

were in Turkey,” he said. “I visited my 

mother in Turkey during last Ramadan 

but now I am worried whether I 

will be able to come back to my family 

in Bangladesh if I go again.” 

He has two sons and a daughter, 

all of whom are living in Bangladesh 

and have Turkish passports. 

He stressed that said if the Turkish 

government needs to arrest any 

expatriate, they need to show proof 

of involvement in the insurgency. 

He also called on their ambassador 

to be very specific about on 

whom the government is trying to 

impose the FETÖ tag. 

“Most of the Turkish people 

who are doing business here in 

Bangladesh don’t know what happened, 

how the insurgency happened 

in last year,” he said. 

‘No politics at Turkish Hope School’ 

The chairman of the management 

committee of International Turkish 

Hope School (ITHS) in Dhaka has told 

the Dhaka Tribune that the school is 

an educational institution only and is 

not involved in politics. 

Bedrettin Suata described recent 

allegations by the Turkish ambassador 

to Bangladesh, Devrim Öztürk, 

that some staff members of the 

school are involved with a Turkish 

terrorist organisation as “their problem, 

not ours”. 

“Our position is very clear: we are 

educators, we not into politics,” the 

chairman said. “We are only dealing 

with education and culture. There 

are no harmful elements here.” 

Suata explained that there are 

many ITHS schools with the same 

name all over the world, but there is 

no chain or inter-connectivity among 

them. 

“We have no official connection 

with any of these schools. This is 

something like Chinese restaurants 

or Japanese martial art centres,” he 

said. “We have no idea about what 

was stated by the embassy against 

us. We are surprised.” 

Suata said the school has full confidence 

that Bangladesh is capable 

enough to find out and decide what 

is right and what is wrong. 

“We are following directions only 

from the Bangladeshi authority, because 

we are registered as a Bangladeshi 

educational institution,” he 

said. “We hope that the Bangladesh 

government will continue to act reasonably.” 

However, the chairman said the 

school management had decided to 

change the name of the school in the 

shortest possible time because the 

inclusion of the word ‘Turkish’ is creating 

confusion. 

International Turkish Hope 

School was established in Dhaka 

in 1996 as a project of Int’l Hope 

Company Ltd. The school in its six 

branches employs 396 people, including 

33 Turkish and 210 local 

teachers. • 

The Turkish government is just blaming its 

own citizens, which is unlawful. All these 

people who are being arrested, all of this is 

being done on the basis of suspicion. The 

government has no reason, no proof of the 

blame made on the innocent citizens

News 

FRIDAY, 

3 

AUGUST 4, 2017 

DT 

living in fear 

Global campaign of fear 

Turkish nationals in many countries 

around the world have reported facing 

denial of consular services, says the 

Netherlands-based Institute on Statelessness 

and Inclusion. 

This includes the cancellation and 

confiscation of passports, or the refusal 

to extend their validity, and the 

refusal to provide nationality identity 

cards or passports to children born to 

Turkish citizens abroad. 

It follows the publication in Turkey 

of decree no. 680, which provides for 

the withdrawing the citizenship of individuals 

who are suspected of crimes or 

rebellion against the government, or of 

membership of a terrorist organisation. 

This followed the failed coup attempt 

against the regime of President 

Recep Tayyip Erdogan in July 2016, 

since when several Turkish nationals 

have been deported from Myanmar, 

Thailand and Malaysia, allegedly at the 

request of Turkey. 

On May 24, 2017, Muhammet Furkan 

Sokmen, a former employee of an 

international school in Yangon, was 

reportedly arrested at Yangon International 

Airport in Myanmar over alleged 

links to exiled Turkish cleric and politician, 

Fethullah Gulen. 

Muhammet was sent to Thailand, 

where he was held at an immigration 

detention center before being deported 

to Turkey on May 26. 

In another incident on the same 

day, immigration police detained a Myanmar-based 

education professional 

Furkan Sökmen and his wife and their 

two-year-old daughter at Yangon airport 

while trying to board a flight to 

Bangkok. 

US-based basketball player Enes 

Kanter, an outspoken critic of Erdogan, 

was briefly detained on May 20 at 

an airport in Romania upon a request 

from the Turkish government, but 

hours later he was released. 

On another occasion in May, at 

least three Turkish nationals – a teacher, 

an academic, and a businessman 

– were abducted without warning in 

Malaysia and deported. 

Separately, a Turkish teacher was 

detained in Georgia at the request of 

the Turkish government. 

A recent report by the Sweden-based 

monitoring group Stockholm 

Center for Freedom (SCF) said 

that Turkish nationals perceived to be 

critical of the government are being 

denied consular services abroad. 

Members of the Gulen movement, 

which the government accuses of 

masterminding the July 15 coup attempt, 

are targeted most in discriminatory 

service denials. Kurds, Alevis, 

and leftist groups abroad are also being 

made to suffer, according to SCF. 

Instead of being able to renew their 

passports, many of the Turkish nationals 

abroad are offered a document to 

return to Turkey, where they are likely 

to be arrested. • 

Trump blames Congress for 

all-time low in Russia ties 

• Reuters, Washington, DC 

WORLD 

US President Donald Trump said on 

Thursday Washington’s relationship 

with Russia is at an “an alltime 

and very dangerous low,” and 

blamed Congress for the situation, 

a day after he grudgingly signed 

into law sanctions against Moscow. 

Congress overwhelmingly approved 

the sanctions last week, 

leaving Trump with little choice 

but to sign the legislation although 

he has long expressed a desire for 

better ties with Russia. 

He signed the bill on Wednesday 

but strongly criticised it. He complained 

that the measure, which 

allows Congress to stop him from 

easing sanctions on Russia, infringed 

on presidential powers to 

shape foreign policy. 

Russian Prime Minister Dmitry 

Medvedev called the sanctions tantamount 

to a “full-scale trade war,” 

adding in a Facebook post that they 

showed the Trump administration 

had demonstrated “utter powerlessness.” 

“The hope that our relations 

with the new American administration 

would improve is finished,” 

he wrote. 

“Our relationship with Russia 

is at an all-time & very dangerous 

low,” Trump said in a Twitter post 

on Thursday. 

“You can thank Congress, the 

same people that can’t even give 

us HCare!” added, referring to a 

bitter setback this month when his 

fellow Republicans, who control 

both chambers in Congress, failed 

to push healthcare legislation 

through the Senate. 

Trump’s desire for better ties with 

Moscow has been hamstrung by the 

findings of US intelligence agencies 

that President Vladimir Putin’s government 

meddled in the 2016 US 

presidential election campaign. US 

congressional panels and a special 

counsel are investigating. Moscow 

denies any meddling and Trump denies 

any collusion by his campaign. 

Congress passed the new sanctions 

to punish Russia over the election 

interference and the annexation 

of Ukraine’s Crimea in 2014. 

The legislation provoked countermeasures 

by Russian President 

Vladimir Putin, who said on Sunday 

that the US diplomatic mission 

in Russia must reduce its staff by 

755 people. Russia is also seizing 

two properties near Moscow used 

by American diplomats. • 

Foreign Ministry displeased 

Over the last few years, Turkey’s 

position against the prosecution 

of war crimes committed during 

the 1971 War of Liberation in Bangladesh, 

including support for war 

criminals Ghulam Azam and Motiur 

Rahman Nizami, has strained 

ties between the two nations. 

In May last year, when Nizami 

was hanged, Turkey withdrew its 

ambassador. Bangladesh nevertheless 

declared its support for its elected 

government during the failed 

coup in July, following which Ankara 

returned Öztürk to Dhaka in August. 

The ambassador offered words 

of concession after his arrival, condemning 

the murder of the Father 

of the Nation in 1975 and expressing 

gratitude to Prime Minister 

Sheikh Hasina for her support during 

the coup. 

But since the coup, the Islamist 

AK Party government has 

been pushing countries around 

the world to help it pinpoint Turkish 

nationals living abroad who it 

deems to be supporters of the exiled 

Turkish cleric and politician, 

Fethullah Gülen. The AK Party 

blames Gülen and his supporters, 

whom they call FETÖ, for the coup. 

A Foreign Ministry official said 

the ambassador’s statement urging 

Bangladesh to “take action” 

against people was a gross violation 

of diplomatic norms. 

“Personally, I did not like it,” a 

high-ranked official at the ministry, 

requesting anonymity, told the 

Dhaka Tribune on Wednesday. 

The official expressed grave disappointment 

when asked about 

the stance on recent remarks made 

by Öztürk at a press briefing on July 

15, on the occasion of the first anniversary 

of the thwarted coup attempt 

in Turkey. 

The official said a foreign office 

consultation (FoC) between Bangladesh 

and Turkey was scheduled to be 

held on June 4, but the Turkish side, 

without prior notice, postponed the 

meeting at the eleventh hour. 

The diplomat hoped that “the 

issue” would have been discussed 

in the FoC. 

“The FoC will be rescheduled 

soon,” the official added. 

Foreign Secretary Shahidul Islam 

said: “Since they have violated 

diplomatic norms, we have taken 

actions against them. But I do not 

want to say just now what action 

has been taken.” • 

From left, Brazilian Institutional Security Minister Sergio Etchegoyen, Indian National Security Advisor Ajit Doval, South 

African State Security Minister David Mahlobo and Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev meet with Chinese 

President Xi Jinping, center, in Beijing, China on Friday, July 28, 2017 

AP 

China-India border spat casts 

shadow ahead of BRICS summit 

• Reuters, Beijing 

WORLD 

China is taking an increasingly 

tough line on a border row with India 

amid a rising crescendo of 

nationalism in state media, and 

President Xi Jinping looks set for 

an awkward encounter with Prime 

Minister Narendra Modi at a multilateral 

summit next month. 

Diplomats say Beijing would like 

to resolve the border issue before a 

summit of the BRICS nations - that 

also groups Brazil, Russia and South 

Africa - in the Chinese city of Xiamen 

in early September, and ensure nothing 

dampens what China wants to be 

a show of cooperation and friendship 

among developing countries. 

But that could be tough. On 

Wednesday, China ramped up the 

rhetoric, accusing India of “concocting” 

excuses over the illegal 

entry of the South Asian nation’s 

military into Chinese territory. 

“China will take all necessary 

measures to safeguard its legitimate 

and lawful rights and interests,” 

the Foreign Ministry said. 

The two sides’ troops are confronting 

each other close to a 

valley controlled by China that 

separates India from its close ally, 

Bhutan, and gives China access to 

the so-called Chicken’s Neck, a thin 

strip of land connecting India and 

its remote northeastern regions. 

Most previous standoffs, such 

as one in 2014 just ahead of a rare 

trip to India for Xi, were resolved 

with both sides withdrawing their 

forces. There has been no shooting 

since a brief border war in 1962. 

Talks are happening behind the 

scenes, but with little apparent 

progress. Meantime, Chinese and 

India media have been taking a 

strident approach, with a Chinese 

state-run newspaper last week saying 

China could use force. 

An Indian magazine’s front cover 

last month showing a map of 

China shorn of Tibet and self-ruled 

Taiwan also ignited public anger on 

Chinese social media with thousands 

of angry posts. 

“The problem is the media on 

both sides are whipping things 

up. This makes it hard for China 

or India to back down,” said a Beijing-based 

source who is familiar 

with the discussions between the 

two sides. 

The Indian government has 

asked political parties to refrain 

from politicising the issue and allow 

diplomacy to work. •

4 


DT 

Advertisement

News 5 


Terminated: The inside story of Accenture’s 

departure from Bangladesh 

• Manik Miazee 

SPECIAL 

Late last year, the 500-odd employees 

of consulting and outsourcing 

giant Accenture PLC’s Bangladesh 

office grew worried at the company’s 

failure to attract fresh business. 

There were rumours flying around 

that if the Dhaka office didn’t see an 

upturn in fortunes soon, Accenture 

might pull out. In February this 

year, the employees’ union staged 

a protest against what they saw as 

the management’s inability to grow 

the Bangladesh business. 

Accenture, a Fortune 500 

company with global revenues 

in excess of $32 billion annually, 

launched its Bangladesh operation 

in 2013, paying a reported $10 million 

for a 51% stake in GPIT, a subsidiary 

of mobile phone operator 

Grameenphone. 

The plan was for the new company, 

Accenture Communications 

Infrastructure Solutions Limited, 

to provide information technology 

support to Grameenphone as well 

as function as an outsourcing hub 

for Telenor, the Norwegian telecommunications 

conglomerate which 

controls Grameenphone and several 

other mobile operators in the region. 

Accenture’s leadership thought 

the Bangladesh arm’s long term 

viability would be ensured by attracting 

new outsourcing contracts 

from North America and Europe, 

several people with knowledge of 

the deal with Telenor said. 

At the time, Bangladeshi experts 

welcomed the entry of a 

leading outsourcing company like 

Accenture, which they said would 

cement the country’s image as an 

emerging hub for business process 

outsourcing or BPO. 

Last month, Accenture Communications 

Infrastructure Solutions 

Limited informed all its 556 employees 

that their services would 

not be required after November, 

prompting the employees’ union 

to call an immediate strike. 

Interviews with several current 

and former Accenture employees 

reveal that the relationship between 

the management, almost 

entirely composed of Indian staff 

from the company’s Hyderabad 

office, and the Bangladeshi employees, 

most of whom had been 

brought over from GPIT, was troubled 

from almost the beginning. 

Tensions rose in 2014 after the 

management cut some employee 

benefits, including a 20,000 taka 

allowance to buy mobile phones, 

given every two years at GPIT. The 

Bangladeshi employees were also 

asked to work an extra hour, which 

the management said would help 

sync production with the Hyderabad 

office. 

The aggrieved employees decided 

to form a union to ensure collective 

bargaining rights. Eventually 

around 400 of the 556 staff members 

joined the union. 

The protest in February was 

quickly followed by another standoff 

in April when the management 

terminated Azizur Rahman, an 

analyst with the Workplace team. 

Protests on the floor, however, 

failed to sway the management. 

“I think they wanted to test the 

waters by sacking me,” Azizur Rahman 

said. “I was never given any 

reason for my termination. They 

made an example of me.” 

When Accenture took over 

GPIT and Grameenphone’s IT support 

contract in 2013, the 

mood was optimistic. 

Bob Sell, group chief 

executive of Accenture’s 

Communications, Media 

& Technology operating 

group, said in a statement: 

“We are excited to 

be investing in the largest 

IT services company in 

Bangladesh.” 

He added that the “strategic 

investment” would 

allow Accenture to tap 

into a robust pool of skills 

and capabilities in the country. 

However, Accenture’s GPIT deal 

was only a small part of a US$215 

million global contract with Telenor 

to provide services in areas including 

Finance & Accounting, HR, 

IT and transactional purchases. 

Under the global deal, Accenture’s 

Bangladesh office started 

working for several other Telenor 

subsidiaries including Telenor Pakistan, 

Thailand-based telecom 

operator Dtac, Malaysia’s Digi, and 

Telenor Global Shared Services 

(GSS), Telenor’s worldwide service 

center for Finance, HR & payroll, 

procurement and IT services. 

However, the ‘local contract’ 

deal with Grameenphone was seen 

as the mainstay of the Bangladesh 

operation, since the ‘global contract’ 

work was spread out over 

several Accenture offices. Several 

current and former Bangladeshi 

employees said Accenture never 

grew the Dhaka office into a proper 

hub. The management of Accenture 

Communications Infrastructure 

Solutions Limited always looked to 

the Hyderabad office for guidance. 

“The Dhaka office was a satellite,” 

a former employee said. 

The Bangladeshi employees felt 

the Indian bosses did not fully understand 

the local work culture and 

many hankered after the ‘old days’ 

of GPIT under Grameenphone 

management. The management 

was frustrated by the union’s demands 

and viewed the employees’ 

increasing activism as a problem, a 

source said. 

Tensions also grew between the 

sole senior Bangladeshi manager, 

CEO Raihan Shamsi and Chief Operating 

Officer (COO) Purushothama 

Kadambu. The friction between 

the two men led to the sidelining of 

Raihan who spent most of this year 

at Accenture’s Kuala Lumpur office, 

according to sources. 

Raihan Shamsi declined to comment. 

Purushothama Kadambu 

could not be reached for comment. 

The first real jolt to the Accenture 

Bangladesh business came last year 

RAJIB DHAR 

DT 

when Telenor Pakistan decided to 

withdraw its work. At roughly the 

same time, Accenture was locked in 

negotiations with Grameenphone 

to increase service charges. After 

the negotiations failed, Telenor 

opted for an open tender for services, 

leading to the GP contract 

to be awarded to Wipro, a Bangalore-based 

Indian BPO company. 

Grameenphone also reacted by 

creating an in-house unit to provide 

IT support, a move which 

analysts said reverted back to the 

‘GPIT model’. 

The loss of the GP contract was 

the final blow for Accenture. The 

management no longer saw the 

Bangladesh office as a viable business 

unit. 

“It was easy for them to distribute 

the remaining work to the India 

offices,” a source said. “The management 

had no commitment to 

Bangladesh.” 

Accenture PLC did not respond to 

requests for comment. A public relations 

firm working with the Bangladesh 

office, said in a statement: 

“Accenture, Telenor Group, and 

Grameenphone are working closely 

together to re-organise several engagements 

across Asia and Europe.” 

Shahin Ahmed, general secretary 

of Accenture Employees Union, 

Bangladesh, said this left the Bangladeshi 

employees in the lurch. 

“Many of us left Grameenphone 

to work for Accenture in 2013,” he 

said. “The future is uncertain for all 

of us now.” 

Shahin called on the government 

to intervene, saying Accenture’s 

departure would send the 

wrong signal to the international 

BPO industry. He said: “No one 

will remember that Accenture left 

because the management here fell 

out with Grameenphone. 

“All everyone will remember is 

that Accenture’s Bangladesh venture 

failed.” • 

TEMPERATURE FORECAST FOR TODAY 

LIGHT TO MODERATE 

RAIN LIKELY 


Dhaka 35 28 Chittagong 34 28 Rajshahi 33 28 Rangpur 32 27 Khulna 34 27 Barisal 34 27 Sylhet 33 26 

DHAKA 

TODAY 

TOMORROW 

SUN SETS 6:40PM 

SUN RISES 5:29AM 

YESTERDAY’S HIGH AND LOW 

35.5ºC 

23.8ºC 

Chandpur 

Rangamati 

Source: Accuweather/UNB 

PRAYER 

TIMES 

Cox’s Bazar 31 27 

Fajr: 4:55am | Jumma: 1:15pm 

Asr: 5:15pm | Magrib: 6:55pm 

Esha: 8:45pm 

Source: Islamic Foundation

6 


DT 

News 

BRAC UNIVERSITY PROTESTS 

Probe finally underway 

• Mahadi Al Hasnat 

CURRENT AFFAIRS 

The protesting students of Brac 

University accepted the probe 

committee formed by the authorities 

after the fifth member was announced 

as Maimuna Syed Ahmed, 

a student of law in her final year. 

The committee started working 

from Thursday. 

Sabbir Ahmed, an alumnus of the 

university told the Dhaka Tribune: 

“We have fixed three agendas to 

present before the vice-chancellor. 

The agendas are the registrar and 

two other officials should resign or 

be terminated, harassment or assault 

on students (calling up their 

parents and threatening to cancel 

their scholarships etc) to be addressed 

and the responsible individuals 

to be punished, and withdrawing 

all allegations against Farhaan.” 

Responding to the students’ 

demands, the university formed 

a five-member investigation committee 

on Tuesday. 

The committee includes Prof 

AFM Yusuf Haider, former pro 

vice-chancellor of Dhaka University, 

Prof Syed Manzoorul Islam, former 

head of DU English department, 

Prof Afsan Chowdhury of Brac and 

Tajdin Hasan, president of Brac University 

Alumni Association. 

Former teacher Farhaan Uddin 

Ahmed was allegedly assaulted by 

Registrar Maj Gen (retd) Muhammad 

Sahool Afzal, Assistant Registrar 

Md Mahi Uddin and Senior 

Officer of Co-Curricular Activities 

Jabed Rasel, according to a case 

filed with Banani police on July 30. 

The news of the assault sparked 

an outrage among Brac University 

students who have been protesting 

since Sunday. 

Nine hours of hunger strike 

withdrawn 

Six students of Brac University 

have withdrawn their hunger strike 

on Thursday evening. 

The students from the Brac 

School of Law, protesting against 

the university administration had 

sat down for hunger strike from 

11am Thursday. 

The strike was withdrawn after 

various teachers reassured them 

that all necessary steps would be 

taken to resolve the situation. 

The protesters demanded the 

registrar and two more BracU officials 

resign for allegedly assaulting 

a lecturer. They also demanded security 

personnel who clashed with 

the students and reportedly sexually 

harassed the female students 

also be punished. 

Is a new govt-backed coalition forming? 

• Fazlur Rahman Raju and 

Manik Miazee 

POLITICS 

Several prominent politicians have 

been meeting each other recently 

in an effort to form a shadow coalition 

for the upcoming elections, 

sources say. 

On Wednesday, JSD President 

ASM Abdur Rab, General Secretary 

Abdul Malek Ratan, Nagorik Oikya 

Convener Mahmudur Rahman 

Manna and Gano Forum’s Executive 

Presi-dent Subrata Chowdhury, Jatiya 

Party Co-Chairman GM Quader 

attended a meeting at Bikalpadhara 

Bangladesh President AQM Badruddoza 

Chowdhury’s home. 

A participant of the meeting, 

seeking anonymity, told the Dhaka 

Tribune: “If BNP decides to boycott 

the elections then this coalition 

can help win 20 seats.” 

“On July 13, when the police 

Protesting assault on them, several students of Brac University started an indefinite hunger strike yesterday, which they 

eventually withdrew in the evening after the university authorities assured them of looking into the matter MEHEDI HASAN 

barred their meeting at Rab’s 

house, it was actually a political 

ploy to show people that this coalition 

was happening,” he said. 

Sources said: “As the leaders 

of the newly formed coalition are 

well-known respectable people, 

the election results will be acceptable 

if they participate.” 

Jatiya Samajtantrik Dal (JSD-Rob) 

General Secretary Abdul Malek 

Ratan said: “This meeting was 

held to form a new political 

coalition.” 

Nagorik Oikya Convener and 

former AL organising secretary 

Mahmudur Rahman Manna told 

Ershad has plans to leave the Awami League 

alliance in all capacities and wants to participate 

in the upcoming election on his own 

According to the protesters, a 

group of teachers have assured 

them that they will form another 

probe committee within three 

working days to investigate the incident 

of students being harassed. 

They also issued an ultimatum, 

saying the hunger strike has been 

withdrawn for just three days to let 

the committee form. 

BracU VC Prof Syed Saad Andaleeb 

told the Dhaka Tribune that 

the authorities have almost come 

to a resolution over the problem. • 

the Dhaka Tribune: “We want to 

form a new political coalition beyond 

the two major political alliances 

led by Awami League and 

BNP. 

“We want a free and fair election 

where all parties can participate, 

and the results will be acceptable 

to everyone. If the Jatiya Party severs 

all ties with the Awami League 

then we will talk to them about 

joining this new coalition.” 

A source very close to HM Ershad 

told the Dhaka Tribune that 

Ershad has plans to leave the Awami 

League alliance in all capacities 

and wants to participate in the upcoming 

election on his own. The 

newly-formed coalition has come 

as a blessing to Ershad because 

now he can quit the Awami League 

alliance and join with the new coalition. 

Bikalpadhara Bangladesh President 

Badruddoza Chowdhury 

told the Dhaka Tribune that they 

discussed a new political alliance 

during the meeting on Wednesday, 

adding: “You will be notified if we 

have any news.” 

During a press briefing at HM Ershad’s 

office in Banani, he said: “I 

will leave my post as the prime minister’s 

special envoy after speaking 

with Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina. 

Four members of the cabinet from 

the Jatiya party will also leave.” 

Meanwhile, Awami League 

General Secretary Obaidul Quader 

and BNP Secretary General Mirza 

Fakhrul Islam Alamgir both welcomed 

the formation of the new 

coalition. • 

Interim Pakistan 

PM may stay 

put amid doubts 

over Sharif's 

brother 

• Reuters, Lahore 

WORLD 

Interim Pakistani leader Shahid 

Khaqan Abbasi took control of 

prime ministerial duties on Thursday 

after a guard of honour amid 

growing uncertainty that the 

brother of ousted leader Nawaz 

Sharif will eventually take over the 

job as planned. 

Sharif, disqualified by the Supreme 

Court last week, named Abbasi 

as temporary prime minister and 

outlined plans for brother Shahbaz 

Sharif to take over once he contests 

and wins a parliamentary by-election 

in less than two months. 

But doubts seem to have surfaced 

about those plans since 

Sharif's ruling Pakistan Muslim 

League-Nawaz (PML-N) party used 

its hefty majority in the National 

Assembly to elect Abbasi as prime 

minister on Tuesday. 

Three senior PML-N officials 

said that Shahbaz's eventual installation 

as prime minister was no 

longer a foregone conclusion, while 

two of Shahbaz's Lahore-based 

aides added that the chances of 

him taking over were receding. 

"Nawaz Sharif is in two minds 

about Shahbaz's premiership," said 

one of Shahbaz's aides in Lahore. 

Asif Khawaja, former defence 

minister and staunch Nawaz ally, 

told Geo TV late on Wednesday 

that the plan to make Shahbaz 

premier was "almost confirmed", 

but added Nawaz as the leader 

of the party "has the prerogative to 

revise (or) amend his decision - or 

stick to it". 

Opposition politicians have 

slammed Nawaz's plans as dynastic, 

with opposition party leader 

Imran Khan decrying Pakistani 

politics as a "form of monarchy". 

Still, analysts say the relatively 

smooth transition to Abbasi after 

Nawaz was disqualified has eased 

fears that nuclear-armed Pakistan 

could be plunged into a prolonged 

bout of political turmoil. 

2018 poll 

PML-N officials say the main reason 

why Shahbaz may not take 

over is linked to the 2018 general 

elections, and the party's fears that 

its grip on the vital Punjab province 

will weaken if he steps down 

as chief minister. 

The way Pakistan's political system 

is set up means any party that 

sweeps Punjab, which houses more 

than half of Pakistan's 190 million 

people, will most likely go on to 

form a government after the general 

elections in mid-2018. •

News 

FRIDAY, 

7 


DT 

Trump backs stiff curbs on legal immigration 

• Tribune Desk 

WORLD 

US President Donald Trump on 

Wednesday threw his weight behind 

efforts to give English-speakers 

priority for US residency cards 

and halving the number of legal 

migrants admitted to the country. 

Trump joined with Republican 

Senators David Perdue of Georgia 

and Tom Cotton of Arkansas to 

promote the bill, which so far has 

gained little traction in the Senate. 

“This legislation demonstrates 

our compassion for struggling 

American families who deserve 

an immigration system that puts 

their needs first and puts America 

first,” Trump said during an event 

Wednesday in the White House’s 

Roosevelt Room. 

It was the latest example of the 

president championing an issue 

that animated the core voters of 

his 2016 campaign, following decisions 

to pull out of the Paris climate 

treaty and ban transgender people 

from the military. 

Nationalist agenda 

Perdue and Cotton’s legislation 

would replace the current process for 

obtaining legal permanent residency, 

or green cards, creating a skillsbased 

point system for employment 

visas. The bill would also eliminate 

the preference for US residents’ extended 

and adult family members, 

while maintaining priority for their 

spouses and minor children. 

Overall, immigration would be 

slashed 41% in the legislation’s first 

year and 50% in its 10th, according 

to projection models cited by the 

bill’s sponsors. The bill would also 

aim to slash the number of refugees 

in half and eliminate a program 

that provides visas to people 

from countries with low rates of 

immigration. 

The rollout included a combative 

press briefing led by Trump 

policy aide Stephen Miller, who 

clashed with the media over the 

US President Donald Trump, centre, makes an announcement on immigration with US Senator Tom Cotton, left, R-Arkansas 

and US Senator David Perdue, right, at the White House in Washington, DC, on August 2, 2017 

AFP 

plan and accused one reporter of 

being “cosmopolitan” when he 

suggested it would only bring in 

English-speaking people from Britain 

and Australia. 

The president has made cracking 

down on illegal immigration a 

hallmark of his administration and 

has tried to slash federal grants for 

cities that refuse to comply with 

federal efforts to detain and deport 

those living in the country illegally. 

But he has also vowed to make 

changes to the legal immigration system, 

arguing that immigrants compete 

with Americans for much-needed 

jobs and drive wages down. 

The bill’s supporters, meanwhile, 

say it would make the US 

more competitive, raise wages and 

create jobs. • 

Organisation of Islamic Cooperation Secretary General Dr 

Yousef bin Ahmad Al-Othaimeen paid a courtesy call on Prime 

Minister Sheikh Hasina at her office yesterday COURTESY 

OIC secy gen praises 

Bangladesh’s success 

in curbing terrorism 

• Syed Zainul Abedin 

FOREIGN AFFAIRS 

Dr Yousef bin Ahmad Al-Othaimeen, secretary general 

of Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), has highly 

praised Bangladesh’s success in countering terrorism. 

He made the comment while talking to media after 

meeting Foreign Minister AH Mahmood Ali yesterday. 

Dr Yousef said: “There is no scope for terrorism in Islam. 

Bangladesh has successfully countered the terrorism 

which are carried out in the name of Islam. Bangladesh’s 

firm stance on this issue is certainly praiseworthy.” 

All OIC member countries will be with Bangladesh, 

he said, proposing an integrated road-map to resolve 

the Rohingya crisis in Bangladesh. 

He also urged the international community to be 

with Bangladesh in resolving the crisis. 

Appreciating Bangladesh’s step to move the Rohingya 

camp to Thengar Char Island he, said: “I do highly 

appreciate Bangladesh’s support to the Muslim community 

Rohingya while they were persecuted in their 

homeland.” 

The OIC secretary general, who is leading a 

five-member delegation, arrived in Dhaka on a four-day 

visit Wednesday night in his maiden tour to Bangladesh 

after assuming office in November last year. • 

IOJ to field 

candidates 

in all 300 

constituencies 

• Anwar Hussain, Chittagong 

POLITICS 

Islami Oikya Jote (IOJ) will field its 

candidates in all 300 constituencies 

in the next general elections. 

Mainuddin Ruhi, central joint 

secretary general of the IOJ, announced 

the matter during a meeting 

with the newly formed committee 

of the organisation’s Chittagong 

chapter in the port city yesterday. 

He, who is also the central joint 

secretary general of Hefazat-e-Islam, 

said the IOJ had already decided 

to run in the polls and nominate 

favourable aspirants for all the parliamentary 

seats. 

“The masses are expecting the 

Islamic parties to come to state 

power, bolstering Islamic ideology 

to help establish the rule of law 

in the country. So, we are keen to 

form a social Islamic government 

in Bangladesh to make their dream 

come true,” said Ruhi. 

“We believe in protecting the 

rights of the oppressed. Bangladesh 

will emerge as a modern ideal Islamic 

state if religious-minded people 

and Islamic scholars could come 

to the state power,” he further said. 

According to him, candidates endorsed 

by the Islamic scholars (Alem, 

Ulema and Mashayekh) should be 

voted to power in this case. 

He also issued a clarion call to all 

for joining the IOJ to help Bangladesh 

turn into a welfare state. •

8 


DT 

News 

BB orders changes to credit card guidelines 

• Shariful Islam 

BANKING 

Bangladesh Bank is updating the 

credit card operation guidelines of 

authorised banks to better manage 

the risks to their businesses and to 

protect the interest of customers. 

The central bank issued a circular 

yesterday directing the CEOs 

of all commercial banks across the 

country to implement the new 

measures with effect from January 

1, 2018. 

The new guidelines concern the 

issuance of supplementary credit 

cards, the terms of contracts, interest 

or profit rates, various charges, 

Thirty six million blind people globally, 

expected to triple by 2050 

• AFP, Paris 

WORLD 

and the billing process. 

According to the central bank’s 

circular, the card issuers will be 

allowed to issue foreign currency 

or dual currency supplementary 

credit cards. 

Also affected by the changes are 

the collection or recovery mechanisms, 

fraud control, and security 

of the cards. 

Bangladesh Bank wants a PIN 

code or biometric safety measure 

at every point of sale outlets 

(POS) for card security. In addition, 

a PIN code for all domestic 

face-to-face POS transactions, 

3D Secure Application for e-commerce 

transactions, SMS and email 

alert for credit card transaction 

The world’s blind will increase 

threefold from about 36 million 

today to 115 million in 2050 as populations 

expand and individuals 

grow ever older, researchers said 

Thursday. 

The number of people with a 

moderate to severe vision impairment 

– only those not corrected by 

glasses, contact lenses or an operation 

– will also near triple, from 

about 217 million to 588 million 

over the same period. 

Most of those affected live in Africa 

and Asia, a team wrote in The 

Lancet Global Health journal. 

Looking at data from 188 countries, 

the researchers concluded 

that the prevalence of blindness – 

the number of blind per population 

group – decreased from 0.75% in 

1990 to 0.48% in 2015. 

The rate of moderate to severe 

visual impairment declined from 

3.83% to 2.9% over the same time. 

“This is almost certainly because 

of improved health interventions,” 

such as cataract surgery, 

study co-author Rupert Bourne of 

the Anglia Ruskin University said. 

But the rough numbers have not 

stopped rising in step with population 

growth and ageing. Most visual 

problems occur in older people. 

The new forecast is based on 

UN population projections, even 

assuming that the prevalence continues 

to decline, said Bourne. 

Telephone calls and visits for recovery of 

unpaid dues should be limited to a 

convenient time as/to be defined in the 

published policy of the card issuer and 

communicated to customers at the time of 

issuance of credit card 

The research did not consider 

the impact of possible improvements 

in diagnosis, treatment, and 

access to healthcare, as “nobody 

can accurately estimate” what 

those will be, he added. 

Someone with moderate visual 

impairment is considered to be 

unable to legally drive, and would 

not recognise another person from 

across the street. 

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The number of blind people across the world is set to triple from about 36m to 115m by 2050, a study warned 

BIGSTOCK 

“With the number of people 

with vision impairment accelerating, 

we must take action to increase 

our current treatment efforts at 

global, regional and country levels,” 

said Bourne. 

“Investing in these treatments 

has previously reaped considerable 

benefits, including improved quality 

of life, and economic benefits as 

people remain in work.” • 

Dhaka Tribune 

shall also be ensured. 

The central bank’s circular said: 

“The enlisting of merchants shall 

be done on due diligence and evaluation. 

The card issuer shall educate 

the merchants about the use 

of POS machine, genuineness and 

security features of credit card, signature 

verification and their rights 

and responsibilities under the 

agreement.” 

The central bank also said the 

interest or profit rate on the outstanding 

amount on the credit card 

should not exceed 5% of the highest 

interest rate offered in any credit 

of the respective bank. “Interest 

or profit shall be charged on the 

unpaid amount due for payment,” 

the circular said. 

“In the event of a due date falling 

on a Friday, Saturday or any 

other public/bank holidays at the 

beginning of each year, the card 

issuer shall allow the grace period 

(holiday) as required for payment 

to be made on the next working 

day,” the circular said. 

Telephone calls and visits for 

recovery of unpaid dues should be 

limited to a convenient time as/to 

be defined in the published policy 

of the card issuer and communicated 

to customers at the time of 

issuance of credit card. • 

Bangladesh asks 

Chinese bank to 

fund $1bn-worth 

of development 

projects 

• Asif Showkat Kallol 

DEVELOPMENT 

Finance Minister AMA Muhith on 

Thursday announced that Bangladesh 

has asked for a loan of $1bn 

from China-based Asian Infrastructure 

Investment Bank. 

Minister Muhith met with AIIB 

Vice-President DJ Pandian at the 

Secretariat. 

DJ Pandian said Bangladesh is a 

rapidly growing country who needs 

to strengthen its infrastructure to 

provide for millions of citizens. He 

expressed his eagerness to foster a 

strong relationship between Bangladesh 

and AIIB. 

The AIIB established in 2016 

looks to infrastructure in the 

Asia-Pacific region. It has 80 

member countries and a capital of 

$100bn, which is two-thirds of the 

Asian Development Bank and half 

of the World Bank. 

The minister said the loan could 

sponsor seven infrastructure projects 

including power, rail and 

roads. 

The minister also said two of 

the projects have already been 

approved. The first project will 

connect 2.5m people in the rural 

areas to the national grid. It will 

also upgrade two sub-stations and 

convert 85km of overhead distribution 

lines in North Dhaka. It was 

approved on June 24, 2016. It also 

was the first AIIB project to be approved 

by a government. 

The second project is improving 

the natural gas infrastructure and 

efficiency of Titas Gas Field. It will 

also involve constructing 181kmlong 

gas pipeline from Bakhrabad 

to Chittagong. •

News 

9 


DT 

Islamic Foundation 

to launch Halal 

Diagnostic Lab 

• Tarek Mahmud 

HEALTH 

The Islamic Foundation Bangladesh 

is set to launch its Halal Diagnostic 

Laboratory in Dhaka’s Agargaon 

on August 4. 

The first of its kind in the country, 

this lab will test products for 

their compliance with Islamic rules 

and regulations before giving them 

Halal certificates. 

Islamic Foundation’s Director 

General Shamim Mohammed Afzal 

said: “The Secretary General of the 

Organisation of Islamic Cooperation 

(OIC) Dr Yousef bin Ahmad Al-Othaimeen 

will inaugrate the specialised 

lab after a meeting at the auditorium 

of the Islamic Foundation’s 

Head Office on Friday evening.” 

Dr Yousef bin Ahmad Al-Othaimeen 

will attend the meeting as the 

chief guest, while Religious Affairs 

Minister Principal Matior Rahman 

will preside over the meeting. Islamic 

scholars from around the country are 

also expected to be present. 

Islamic Foundation’s Assistant 

Director (Public Relations) Muhammad 

Nizam Uddin told the Dhaka 

Tribune: “Islamic Foundation usually 

certifies different organisations 

for their Halal products. The lab is 

set up to test the products before 

issuing the Halal certificate.” 

Around 50 companies had been 

issued Halal certificates by the Islamic 

Foundation already. • 

US asks Bangladesh for 

info on Syrian rebel group 

Yarmouk Martyrs Brigade 

• Asif Shawkat Kallol 

FOREIGN AFFAIRS 

The US embassy in Dhaka has requested 

the government to provide 

any information it has about 

the activities of Syrian rebel group 

Yarmouk Martyrs Brigade in Bangladesh 

or elsewhere, a Foreign Ministry 

official says. 

The group pledged allegiance 

to the IS after its formation in 2012 

and is responsible for a number of 

attacks throughout Southern Syria. 

In the letter dated July 23, the 

embassy informed the Foreign 

Ministry that the US amended the 

designation of the group as a Specially 

Designated Global Terrorist 

(SDGT) entity on July 21, to change 

its primary name to Khalid bin Al- 

Walid Army, and to add new aliases. 

The State Department classified 

the organisation as a SDGT entity 

on June 10 last year. Around the 

same time, the group changed its 

name to Khalid bin Al-Walid Army 

after merging with several groups 

operating in Southern Syria. 

IS announced the group’s name 

change and merger through its 

Amaq News Agency. 

A Foreign Ministry official, declining 

to be named, confirmed to 

the Dhaka Tribune on Wednesday 

that they had received the letter 

from the embassy. 

The United States 

welcomes … 

any information 

that Bangladesh 

would like to 

share regarding 

the activities of 

this organisation 

in Bangladesh or 

elsewhere 

“We have forwarded it to the Home 

Ministry who will now handle the 

matter,” added the official. 

Bangladesh has been denying the 

presence of IS or IS affiliated groups 

in the country. 

Designation, the letter said, is a 

tool in a comprehensive, multi-faceted 

approach to countering terrorist 

organisations. 

Amending the designation 

“sends a powerful signal to those 

that engage in violent activities 

and reaffirms the US government’s 

opposition to terrorism.” 

The embassy pointed out that 

when the designation is effective, 

any assets the group holds under 

US jurisdiction are frozen, and US 

individuals and entities are prohibited 

from engaging in any transaction 

with the group. 

Any US citizen who would engage 

in prohibited transactions 

with the group could face up to 20 

years’ imprisonment. 

The US requested Bangladesh 

to take similar actions against the 

group, if it had not already taken it. 

Besides, the US said it would welcome 

any information regarding actions 

that are undertaken to enforce 

sanctions against the organisation. 

“The United States welcomes … 

any information that Bangladesh 

would like to share regarding the activities 

of this organisation in Bangladesh 

or elsewhere,” the letter added. 

When the Dhaka Tribune contacted 

Home Secretary (Public Security 

Division) Kamal Uddin Ahmed about 

the letter on Wednesday, he said that 

he was not aware of it. • 

JU summons 

82 students for 

trolling teachers 

on Facebook 

• JU Correspondent 

CURRENT AFFAIRS 

Jahangirnagar University has 

formed an investigation committee 

over “offensive” posts on a Facebook 

page trolling the teachers of 

biotechnology and genetic engineering 

department. 

The probe body has summoned 

82 students of the department for 

interrogation. It has sent letters to 

the students asking them to meet 

its members at 10am Thursday. 

The letters stated that the “indecent”, 

“disrespectful”, and “offensive” 

trolling and comments on 

Facebook page “BGEians Democrat” 

have damaged the reputation 

of the department. 

Sources said several students of 

the department opened the Facebook 

page 18 months ago where 

they had been posting comments 

on their teachers’ behaviours, 

teaching styles, evening courses 

and other issues of the department. 

The page is currently shut down. 

Associate Professor Abdullah 

Mohammad Sohayel, convener 

of the investigation committee, 

said: “The students have not been 

served show cause notices yet.” 

Meanwhile, the biotechnology 

and genetic engineering department 

has postponed the final examinations 

of 2012-13 and 2013-14 sessions 

scheduled for August 3, 7, and 8. •

10 


DT 

Advertisement

Govt to form 

FSC to deal with 

financial crises 

• Asif Showkat Kallol 

BANKING 

BRAC Bank earns 

record profit in H1 

• Tribune Desk 

METRO 

BRAC Bank Limited has made 

a record profit of Tk2,421 million 

after tax during the first 

half (January-June) of 2017, 

said a press release issued 

yesterday. 

The year-on-year profit is 

39% higher than Tk1,746 million 

documented in the same 

period a year ago, the bank 

said in its formal earning disclosure 

at a programme held 

in the capital. Local and foreign 

Investment analysts and 

capital market experts participated 

in the programme. 

The bank’s Net Asset Value 

(NAV) per share stood at 

Tk27.86 compared to Tk26.15 

at the end of June 2016. 

The government will form 

an apex body – Financial Stability 

Council (FSC) – to deal 

with financial crises of banks 

and financial institutions and 

bail them out in need, officials 

have said. 

The decision to set up an 

FSC came at a meeting attended 

by Bangladesh Bank 

Deputy Governor SK Sur 

Chowdhury and Finance 

Minister AMA Muhith who 

was in the chair. 

Sur presented the concept 

paper on Financial Stability 

Council at the Finance Division 

meeting held yesterday. 

Officials that attended the 

meeting said the proposed 

council would work as a resolution 

authority to solve 

financial crises of banks and 

financial institutions. 

The FSC will include all financial 

sector regulators, Ministry 

of Finance, Bangladesh 

Bank, Bangladesh Security 

Exchange Commission, Micro-credit 

Regulatory Authority, 

Insurance Development 

Regulatory Authority and National 

Board of Revenue. 

Against the backdrop of 

global financial crisis, many 

countries have come up with 

large-scale government support 

and financial bailout for 

failed banks and other financial 

conglomerates in order to 

maintain financial stability. 

According to the presentation 

paper, bailout programmes 

may not bring an 

expected outcome if the loopholes 

in the existing resolution 

mechanism are not fixed. 

In the current resolution 

mechanism, many regulators 

come up with separate 

problem-solving ideas which 

ultimately fail to address the 

issues. 

There is a need to set up an 

apex body to deal with crisis 

resolution, especially when 

it comes to making decision 

on bailout for the banks and 

financial institutions (FIs) hit 

by cash crunch. 

Under the FSC, two working 

groups – Resolution 

Regime for Banks/FIs and 

Macro-financial Monitoring 

– have been proposed along 

with a coordination council 

headed by the governor of 

Bangladesh Bank. 

The framework and terms 

of references for the proposed 

FSC and two working 

groups have been extensively 

discussed at the meeting 

which will be finalised by the 

government after a critical 

review and feedback from 

participating regulators and 

think tanks. • 

The Earnings Per Share 

reached Tk2.66 during January-June 

period this year from 

Tk2.10 recorded during the 

same period last year. BRAC 

Bank Limited CEO and Managing 

Director Selim RF Hussain 

presented the financial results. 

In his address, Selim said: 

“We are pleased to deliver a 

good financial performance 

in the first half of the current 

year despite difficult market 

condition.” 

He affirms that the bank 

continues with the momentum 

from 2016 and is progressing 

well on its journey to become 

the best bank in the country. 

AK Joaddar, deputy managing 

director and CFO, and 

other senior officials of the 

bank were, among others, 

present at the event. • 

News 11 


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DT

DT 

12 

Editorial 


TODAY 

Can we have a 

greener city? 

We should be doing everything in our 

power to plant more trees to ensure our 

future environmental, ecological and 

climate security 

PAGE 13 

BIGSTOCK 

Please don’t abuse the law 

Escaping the trap 

Addressing inequality includes things 

like making vocational training 

accessible to the poorest 

PAGE 14 

Let’s face it: Section 57 of the ICT Act is 

an ill-conceived piece of legislation. 

There is simply too much scope 

for misuse and abuse, and it stands 

against the principles of free speech and 

promises of a Digital Bangladesh. 

Ideally, it should be scrapped, so it is good 

to see Roads, Transport, and Bridges Minister 

Obaidul Quader point out that misuse of the 

act was indeed taking place, which is indeed 

unfortunate and needs to be stopped. 

At the very least, we must have 

mechanisms in place to make sure the act is 

used judiciously. 

Without the proper safeguards in place, 

there may well be rampant abuse of the law, 

and nobody wants that. 

We must have 

mechanisms in place 

to make sure the act is 

used judiciously 

All is not OK 

in Pakistan 

If the army was to bring in Imran Khan 

to power, they would literally have to rig 

the entire election 

Be heard 

Write to Dhaka Tribune 

FR Tower, 8/C Panthapath, 

Shukrabad, Dhaka-1207 

Send us your Op-Ed articles: 

opinion.trib@gmail.com 

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DhakaTribune. 

The views expressed in opinion 

articles are those of the authors 

alone and they are not the 

official view of Dhaka Tribune 

or its publisher. 

PAGE 15 

We can’t lose our competitive edge 

Falling prices in the global RMG market -- due 

to falling global demand -- are squeezing our 

profit margin even as our share in the global 

market has increased 0.50%. 

If we cannot improve our competitive edge in the 

RMG market, we may be priced out eventually. 

That is because the market is constantly in flux -- 

what with the relentless march of globalisation -- and 

we have to keep adapting to the shifting dynamics. 

Our competitors are not sitting idle either: They are 

continuously investing to shore up their comparative 

advantage, which, in turn, makes us relatively less 

efficient. 

And the only way to keep efficiency up is to invest 

in our inadequate infrastructure -- the biggest barrier 

Bangladesh must overcome in order to thrive in the 

competitive world of international trade. 

Efficiency is the name of the game. 

We have to keep 

adapting to the shifting 

dynamics

Opinion 13 

Can we have a greener city? 

It’s impossible to estimate just how much trees do for us 

DT 


Forests protect the environment from pollution and contribute to biodiversity 

BIGSTOCK 

• Shishir Reza 

Every living being is 

dependent on trees in 

some way or the other. A 

lack of plants and forests 

can therefore threaten our very 

existence. 

Given the increasingly crowded 

concrete jungle we are now living 

in, planting more and more trees 

has become imperative. 

It would also save us a lot of 

unnecessary costs. 

A tree that lives for 50 years can 

generate $31,500 worth of oxygen, 

provide $ 62,000 worth of air 

pollution control, recycle $37,500 

worth of water, and prevent 

$31,500 worth of soil erosion. 

Moreover, forests contribute 

to about 1.74% of the total GDP of 

Bangladesh. 

The importance of trees and 

forests 

Trees play an important role in 

protecting irrigation and hydraulic 

structures, also in keeping the 

rivers and ports navigable. It also 

plays a key role in protecting 

coastal areas from natural 

calamities. 

Forests protect the 

environment from pollution and 

their contribution to biodiversity is 

immense. Forestry is a long-term 

production system. The multiple 

uses of forest resources have been 

recognised from the beginning of 

civilisation. 

Trees serve as a natural habitat, 

providing support to a wide 

variety of flora and fauna. They 

provide a sense of privacy and 

security to the wildlife, seeking 

shelter in the woods, apart from 

providing them with food and 

nutrients. 

Trees remove excess amounts 

of carbon dioxide and air 

pollutants in attendance in the 

atmosphere, including sulfur 

dioxide, ozone and nitrogen oxide. 

In return, they give us oxygen 

required for living life. 

Even the biodiversity gets 

enriched in turn. 

Trees regulate the climate by 

moderating the effects of the 

sun, wind and rain. While they 

moderate summer temperatures 

by providing shade, in winters, 

they act as windbreaks for home, 

thus helping save on heating costs. 

Trees reduce soil erosion and 

also help to improve the fertility of 

soil. Rich soil transfers nutrients to 

food, which contributes to human 

health. 

Other benefits 

The greenery of trees adds colour 

to the landscape and enhances its 

beauty. 

Trees and shrubs planted 

around homes also provide 

evaporative cooling benefits. 

They are great absorbers of 

noise. 

Noise pollution can be reduced 

to a great extent by planting more 

and more trees. Planting of trees 

facilitates better management of 

flood water. 

Trees also moderate flood 

hazards by allowing the rainwater 

to percolate into the soil, instead 

of running over it. 

The demand for clean drinking 

water can also be met by planting 

new trees. Forests and plants 

naturally slow the runoff of 

rainwater, thereby filtering it. Once 

slowed, rainwater seeps down to 

refill underground storage tanks or 

aquifers. 

Also, they prevent water from 

mixing with the salt water of 

oceans. This is of immense help, 

as salty water takes much longer to 

re-enter the fresh water portion of 

the hydrological cycle. 

Combat climate change 

Bangladesh is one of the countries 

most vulnerable to climate change. 

This is due to our geographic 

location, population explosion, 

floodplains, incidences of poverty 

and overwhelming dependence on 

natural resources. 

Global warming, as a result of 

climate change, will eventually 

reduce food productivity, 

availability of fresh water, 

increase environmental hazards, 

energy conflict, mass migration 

and increase diseases -- malaria, 

diarrhoea, and AIDS. 

Climate change not only 

affects human development and 

biodiversity conservation but also 

poses a threat to human security. 

We should be doing everything in our power to plant more trees both 

in rural and urban areas to ensure our future environmental, ecological, 

and climate security 

No country knows this better than 

Bangladesh, where millions of 

people are suffering as a result. 

Sudden, severe catastrophic floods 

and cyclones have increased in 

intensity and frequency in recent 

times, owing to increased rainfall 

in the monsoon. 

As the sea level rises, 

Bangladesh is experiencing the 

brutal after-effects of coastal 

inundation and erosion, cyclones, 

salinity intrusion, deforestation, 

loss of biodiversity, agricultural 

land shrinking and large scale 

migration. 

Scientists predict that, due 

to tropical cyclones and salinity 

intrusion into farming lands in 

coastal areas, environmental 

refugees will exceed 20 million in 

the coming future. 

Equipped with this 

foreknowledge, we should be 

doing everything in our power to 

plant more trees both in rural and 

urban areas to ensure our future 

environmental, ecological, and 

climate security. 

A concerted effort 

In Bangladesh, social forestry 

programs have to be introduced 

at grassroots levels with a view 

to meeting the forest product 

requirements of local population 

and to reverse the ecological and 

climatic degradation. 

Through such programs not 

only can we increase our capacity 

for conservation of soil and 

water resources but also improve 

socio-economic conditions for 

our population. In particular, 

they can provide much needed 

employment opportunities to the 

rural population 

Apart from that, we have to 

escalate plantation efforts to meet 

the demand for fuel wood, small 

timber, bamboo, fodder, and 

other minor forest produces on 

sustainable basis. 

A national focus on 

plantation efforts, supported by 

appropriate policy, will allow 

cottage industries to develop in 

rural areas; we can also utilise 

the available land to the best 

advantage according to its 

production capacity. • 

Shishir Reza is an environment analyst 

and associate member of Bangladesh 

Economic Association.

14 


DT 

Opinion 

Escaping the trap 

As we pull people out of poverty, let’s make sure more don’t fall in 

• Shazia Omar 

To be without a home 

Addressing inequality in human development includes things like 

making vocational training accessible to the poorest, abolishing of 

the dowry practice 

The extreme poor are not 

the same as the moderate 

poor. 

First, they cannot 

easily connect with the 

mainstream economy, because 

they lack assets (physical, 

financial, and human) or because 

they lack voice and/or social 

capital. 

Second, the trap-centric view 

of extreme poverty implies that 

certain threshold levels of assets 

are needed to overcome the 

chronic extreme poverty trap. 

Third, the real economic 

world of the extreme poor 

resembles more a game of 

“snakes and ladders,” whereby 

they periodically make efforts to 

climb up the income ladder and 

are periodically pushed back by 

various shocks originating in poor 

health, natural disasters, and 

personal insecurities. 

The state of the poor 

Most extreme poor households are 

landless. Majority of the heads of 

the extreme poor households are 

also illiterate. 

A large proportion of extreme 

poor households are female 

headed households. Housing 

conditions of a large proportion 

of extreme poor households are 

also very shabby, and about half of 

the extreme poor households still 

practise open defecation. 

They do not have any savings. 

Many of them have no or only one 

source of income, and suffer from 

food insecurity as well. 

Six major extreme poverty 

programs have been reviewed here 

to have an understanding of them: 

Target beneficiaries, and delivery 

of assets, transfers, and services. 

They include: Char 

Livelihoods Program (CLP), 

Rural Employment Generation 

for Public Assets (REOPA), 

Strengthening Household 

Abilities for Responding to 

Development Opportunities 

(SHOUHARDO), BRAC’s Targeting 

the Ultra-Poor (TUP) Program, 

Urban Partnerships for Poverty 

Reduction (UPPR), and Economic 

Empowerment of the Poorest 

Program (EEP/Shiree). 

Evidence shows all the 

programs have been successful 

in reaching out to respective 

target beneficiaries, and the lives 

and livelihoods of beneficiary 

households have been improved. 

A good proportion of them have 

been able to move themselves 

out of extreme poverty due to the 

interventions of the programs. 

We have estimated the total as 

well as average annual costs of 

the interventions per beneficiary 

household, which is found to be 

reasonable. 

Still, a question remains about 

how effective the extreme poverty 

programs are in making actual 

significant positive impact in 

the lives and livelihoods of the 

extreme poor beneficiaries, and 

helping them to graduate from 

extreme poverty in a sustainable 

manner. 

The ones not making it 

Three factors, among other, came 

up as correlates of non-graduation 

among the extreme poor 

beneficiary households: Elderly, 

female headedness, and illiteracy 

of the heads of the households. 

This is certainly not an 

exhaustive list, but this can give 

some ideas about the households 

that cannot make progress. 

The cost of graduating the 

extreme poor out of poverty based 

on these programs comes to less 

than an average of $500. If we plan 

to spend this amount over the 

period of five years, then it comes 

down to $100 per beneficiary 

household (each year) to achieve 

the desired target of “zero extreme 

poverty.” 

Financing “Zero Extreme 

Poverty” is thus feasible without 

jeopardising high growth. This 

is because the mobilisation of 

aggregate resources needed to 

eradicate extreme poverty is 

affordable, feasible, and doable. 

End to extreme poverty by 2021 

There are five ingredients in the 

making of a successful strategy for 

ending extreme poverty by 2021. 

First, the overall importance of 

the favourable macro context that 

DHAKA TRIBUNE 

underpinned decline in extreme 

and chronic poverty. It is “easier 

to pull a boat when wind is in your 

favour,” as any boat-puller in rural 

Bangladesh would corroborate. 

It is, therefore, crucial 

to maintain this favourable 

macroeconomic context for 

sustaining decline in extreme 

and chronic poverty in the next 

decade. 

This would mean sustaining 

the five major drivers of growth 

-- agriculture, rural non-farm 

sector, exports, remittances, and 

urbanisation -- in the days ahead. 

Micro successes need to be 

nationally replicated on a wider 

scale. Some have been in the area 

of poverty reduction, while others 

have taken place in the area of 

human development (as in the 

case of female stipend schemes 

and immunisation programs). 

A defining marker of many of 

these programs is that they aimed 

to provide consequential transfer 

of resources (assets or financial 

savings) to the extreme poor 

clients. 

Shocked into poverty 

Shocks play a decisive role in 

shaping the pace of extreme 

poverty reduction. For every two 

people that climb out of poverty, 

one falls in. If there were no 

slippages into poverty due to 

preventable shocks, Bangladesh 

would have experienced much 

faster decline in poverty and 

extreme poverty. 

Since health shock is found 

to be single most important 

explanatory factor underlying fall 

into extreme poverty, effective 

health protection for the poor and 

the poorest should be the given 

top policy priority. Other shocks 

include natural disasters, evictions 

and death, or disability in the 

family. 

Addressing inequality in human 

development includes things like 

making education and vocational 

skills training accessible to the 

poorest, reducing the incidence of 

child marriage, addressing child 

nutrition needs, and abolishing of 

the dowry practice. 

High prevalence of dowry, for 

instance, leads to early marriage 

“age at first marriage” for girls in 

70% of cases in rural Bangladesh 

tend to be below the legally 

permissible age of 18. 

This leads to a vicious cycle 

of early marriage, low maternal 

nutrition, low birth-weight, 

high stunting rates for children, 

affecting future schooling, 

occupational choice, and 

productivity. 

And finally, the renewed 

emphasis on social protection is 

a welcome move, but it needs to 

ensure that it is not side-lining 

the extreme and chronic poverty 

agenda. 

Not a dream 

The central message regarding 

financing “zero extreme poverty” 

is that eradicating extreme poverty 

is not only desirable, but also a 

fiscally feasible plan-target. 

However, financing is not just 

about finding the right amount of 

resources, it is also about fostering 

the right kind of institutions 

and approaches. The GoB-donor 

compact can lead to the replication 

of already successful pilots to 

deepen interventions designed to 

support the extreme poor. 

NGOs can play a crucial role. To 

prevent the poor from slipping into 

extreme poverty, the government 

must play a lead role to address 

health shocks, mitigate adverse 

effects of natural disasters, and 

improve governance conditions to 

reduce law-and-order shocks. 

Identifying the extreme poor 

and maintaining an extreme 

poor database is important, but 

it is equally important to install 

machinery for realtime data 

collection through a decentralised 

information system, given the 

fast-changing poverty dynamic in 

the country. 

Decentralisation is also needed 

for attaining other virtues of 

development – broad-based and 

timely access to service delivery, 

increased beneficiary satisfaction, 

and deepening local democracy. • 

Shazia Omar is a poverty activist and a 

writer, currently working as a consultant 

at the Social Security Policy Support 

Project.

All is not OK in Pakistan 

Is Imran Khan any better than the corrupt Nawaz Sharif? 

Opinion 15 

DT 


• Sharif Hasan 

Nawaz Sharif has been 

forced to step down 

as Pakistan’s Prime 

Minister. On July 28, five 

bench judges of Pakistan Supreme 

Court unanimously found Nawaz 

Sharif guilty and disqualified him 

from holding office in Pakistan. 

He came under the scanner 

along with his children when they 

were linked to offshore companies 

in the Panama papers. It has been 

alleged that Sharif’s family bought 

property in the UK with assets 

disproportionate to their known 

sources of income. 

He was less than a year away 

from becoming the first PM in 

Pakistan’s history to complete a 

full term in office. Sharif’s luck is a 

special one -- this is the third time 

he failed to complete an entire 

term. 

Pakistan’s first prime minister 

was murdered three years into 

his term. Four prime ministers 

have been overthrown by the 

army. A number of others have 

been dismissed without reason or 

without any major reason. 

So, Nawaz Sharif getting the 

short end of the stick thrice over 

is unfortunate, but not really 

unexpected. Had he been able to 

complete his term, it would have 

made history. 

A system beyond repair 

REUTERS 

Pakistan and its army 

Sharif was the one leader in 

Pakistan with local support, as he 

won a fair election. Now that he 

is gone, several questions arise. 

Firstly, with him gone, does the 

army become more important? 

I don’t think Nawaz Sharif ever 

really challenged the army in the 

past, although on some occasions 

he did try to push the envelope a 

bit. 

One has to remember how the 

army used Imran Khan in 2014 

to pull Nawaz Sharif down when 

he wanted to prosecute Pervez 

Musharraf, and after that, Sharif 

simply laid his arms before them -- 

he never challenged the army and 

he never tried to oppose them. 

So, frankly, whether Nawaz 

Sharif is there or not, the army will 

stay equally powerful -- no matter 

who comes in as a chief. The deep 

state continues to rule Pakistan. 

How would Imran Khan fare? 

Secondly, with Nawaz Sharif 

knocked out, given the fact that 

he did well in the last elections, 

will Imran Khan do even better or 

possibly become the next prime 

minister of Pakistan? 

The charges on which Sharif 

was dismissed are articles 62 and 

63 -- which say that one has to be 

truthful and honest to become a 

member of the parliament. 

Imran Khan certainly doesn’t 

fit the clause of articles 62 and 63. 

There are offshore companies that 

he never declared, there are assets 

which are dodgy. Maybe because 

he never had public office, he can’t 

be classified as corrupt. 

But tax evasion is a crime, 

hiding your assets is a crime, 

which means you are not truthful. 

So, ideally, Imran Khan and all 

his other cronies should also be 

disqualified. But if they aren’t, 

then it would be very clear that 

Imran Khan is somebody whom 

the army favours. He might be a 

good cricketer but that’s where it 

ends. He is a maverick, and not 

quite right in the head. 

Will the army want somebody 

like him coming and running the 

country? He has never even run a 

municipality -- he now wants to 

run the whole country. 

Truth be told, if elections were 

held today, despite Supreme 

Court’s, verdict Nawaz Sharif 

would win. Imran Khan may be 

an attractive person on television 

and many do speak against 

Nawaz Sharif -- but Khan has no 

substance. 

Also, Supreme Court may have 

disqualified Sharif from holding 

a public office, but it has not 

disqualified him from election 

campaigning. And if Nawaz Sharif 

is able to run a campaign in his full 

strength, Imran Khan stands no 

chance. And that would be better 

for Pakistan and it’s welfare. 

Because Imran Khan has close 

ties with terrorist organisations, 

his election cannot be good 

for Pakistan, nor for Pakistan’s 

relationship with any of its 

neighbouring countries. 

Thirdly, Imran Khan is one of 

those characters whose presence 

on TV is disproportionate to his 

electoral presence. Could that 

change in the next election? 

If the army were to bring in a 

guy like Imran Khan to power, 

they would literally have to rig 

the entire election. Because Khan 

just does not have the party 

machinery, the perseverance, 

or the political sense to actually 

marshal the kind of support you 

need, especially in Punjab. 

His party is virtually nonexistent 

in Sindh, and Baluchistan 

doesn’t count anyway. So, 

If the army were to bring in Imran Khan to 

power, they would literally have to rig the 

entire election. Khan just does not have the 

party machinery 

if Punjab is going to be the 

battleground, Nawaz Sharif has 

the politics of patronage in place 

and he has the party machinery. 

Even if Nawaz Sharif is 

disqualified, he can become the 

Bal Thakre of Pakistan and become 

the puppeteer behind the guy who 

becomes the next PM. 

What this judgement does is it 

infects a virus in Pakistan’s already 

unstable political system, whereby 

now you’ll have the judiciary being 

a significant player, trying to run 

the country on its own. And, if this 

now is going to become a template, 

no member of parliament, and 

much less any prime minister, is 

going to be safe. • 

Sharif Hasan is currently working as a 

field researcher on behalf of Centre for 

Genocide Studies (CGS), University of 

Dhaka.

16 


DT 

Downtime 

CROSSWORD 

CODE-CRACKER 

ACROSS 

1 Fish (3) 

3 Salad item (6) 

8 Be adjacent to (4) 

9 Born (3) 

10 Comfort in sorrow 

(6) 

11 Cross out (6) 

14 English city (5) 

17 Oozes (5) 

20 Powerful (6) 

24 Entertained (6) 

26 Fishing pole (3) 

27 Bound (4) 

28 Puffs up (6) 

29 Tree (3) 

DOWN 

1 Stylish (4) 

2 Daybreak (4) 

3 Trick (4) 

4 Coral isle (5) 

5 Silly (5) 

6 Dry, of champagne (3) 

7 Pays attention (5) 

12 Mature (3) 

13 Headwear (3) 

15 Consume (3) 

16 Clamour (3) 

17 Heavenly bodies (5) 

18 Emit through pores (5) 

19 Hex (5) 

21 Lyric poems (4) 

22 Catch sight of (4) 

23 Melt, as snow (4) 

25 Cut grass (3) 

How to solve: Each number in our 

CODE-CRACKER grid represents a 

different letter of the alphabet. For 

example, today 21 represents R so fill R 

every time the figure 21 appears. 

You have two letters in the control 

grid to start you off. Enter them in the 

appropriate squares in the main grid, then 

use your knowledge of words to work out 

which letters go in the missing squares. 

Some letters of the alphabet may not be 

used. 

As you get the letters, fill in the other 

squares with the same number in the 

main grid, and the control grid. Check 

off the list of alphabetical letters as you 

identify them. 

ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ 

CALVIN AND HOBBES 

SUDOKU 

How to solve: Fill in the blank spaces with the 

numbers 1 – 9. Every row, column and 3 x 3 box must 

contain all nine digits with no number repeating. 

PEANUTS 

YESTERDAY’S SOLUTIONS 

CODE-CRACKER 

CROSSWORD 

DILBERT 

SUDOKU

What’s on 

17 


DT 

EVENTS AROUND TOWN TODAY 

THEATRE 

FESTIVAL 

MOVIE 

THEATRE 

WORKSHOP 

STAR CINEPLEX 

Where Bashundhara city, Dhaka 

What Movie Showtime (Aug 4) 

3RD DUSS NATIONAL SCIENCE FESTIVAL 2017 

When 8am-8pm 

Where TSC, University of Dhaka, Nilkhet Road, Dhaka 

What Science festival by Dhaka University Science Society. 

CDS PRESENTS - 2ND DEBATERS’ CARNIVAL 2K17 

When 10am 

Where Cambrian Campus-6, Dhaka, Bangladesh 

What Debate league final in which 8 teams will be fighting 

face to face for the ultimate championship. For more 

information: 01770335709. 

CULTURAL EVENT 

BORSHAMONGOL 

When 6:30pm 

Where Chhayanaut Cultural Center, house 72, road 15A, 

Dhanmondi, Dhaka 

What A cultural event to commemorate the rainy season. 

Voyankor Sundor (2D): 11:10am, 

1:50pm, 4:20pm, 7pm 

Dunkirk (2D): 2pm, 7:10pm 

Kidnap (2D): 11:30am, 2:20pm, 

4:40pm, 6:50pm 

War for the Planet of the Apes (2D): 

11:10am, 4:10pm 

Spiderman Homecoming (3D): 

10:50am, 1:45pm, 4:40pm, 7:30pm 

The Dark Tower (2D): 10:50am, 

1pm, 3:10pm, 5:20pm, 7:30pm 

Valerian and the City of a TP (3D): 

11am, 1:45pm, 4:30pm, 7:20pm 

BLOCKBUSTER CINEMAS 

Where Jamuna Future Park, Dhaka 

What Movie Showtime (Aug 4) 

Transformers: The Last Knight 

(3D): 11:30am, 2:30pm, 4:20pm, 

7:25pm 

Spider-Man: Homecoming (3D): 

11:30am, 1:45pm, 4:30pm, 7:20pm 

The Mummy (3D): 5:05pm, 7:30pm 

Baywatch (2D): 2:30pm, 5pm 

Despicable Me 3 (3D): 11:40am, 

5:30pm 

Dunkirk (2D): 12:30pm, 2:50pm, 

5:10pm, 7:30pm, 7:55pm 

Voyankor Sundor (2D): 12pm, 

2:30pm, 5pm, 7:30pm 

The Dark Tower (2D): 12:20pm, 

2:10pm, 7:30pm 

Valerian (2D): 11:30am, 2:20pm, 

7:25pm 

GRAPHIC DESIGN FREE CLASS 

When 10am-12pm 

Where UYS Lab, 31 Mohakhali Commercial Area, Colombia 

Super Market, 4th floor, Banani, Dhaka 

What A free class on graphic design by UYS Lab. 

WOMEN SELF DEFENSE SEMINAR 

When 5pm-7pm 

Where Gulshan Karate Dojo, 50 Gulshan Avenue, Circle-1, 

Dhaka 

What A two-hour long intensive self defense seminar for 

women by Gulshan Karate Dojo. For more information: 

01822365179. 

EXHIBITION 

1ST NATIONAL CHILDREN’S PHOTOGRAPHY 

FESTIVAL 2017 

When 10am 

Where Bishwo Shahitto Kendro, Kazi Nazrul Islam Avenue, 

Dhaka 

What A two-day long exhibition of children’s photography by 

Kashful Factory. 

Radisson Blu Dhaka wins The Luxury Restaurant 

Awards 

Radisson Blu Dhaka Water 

Garden celebrated the accolade 

of The Luxury Restaurant Awards 

for its restaurants. For the first 

time in the History of ‘The World 

Luxury Restaurant Awards’, a 

restaurant based in Bangladesh 

has won this prestigious award. 

Radisson Blu Dhaka Water 

Garden has achieved this feat not 

for just one restaurant but for two 

restaurants at the same time in 

winning two separate categories. 

Sublime won the ‘Best Restaurant 

for European Cuisine’ in the 

South West Asia Region and Spice 

& Rice won the ‘Best Restaurant 

for Asian Cuisine’ in the same 

region beating all other countries 

and entrants. 

World Luxury Restaurant 

Awards inspires excellence and 

ignites healthy competition in 

the Luxury Restaurant Industry. 

The awards further promote 

the nominated restaurants 

based on culinary excellence 

and memorable experiences 

from outstanding atmosphere 

and service. World Luxury 

Restaurant Awards highlights 

those categories for which the 

restaurant should be renowned, 

further attracting more attention, 

not only from food experts, 

journalists and gourmands, but 

to a host of visitors from around 

the globe. 

“We are extremely proud of 

our professional, talented and 

hard working food and beverage 

team which under the guidance 

of director of F&B Ramani 

Shanmugam and Executive Chef 

Jed Archdeacon has become 

the leading F&B in Bangladesh 

in 2017. We thank all our loyal 

customers and owners for being 

with us and supporting us,” 

Christoph Voegeli, the general 

manager of Radisson Blu Dhaka 

Water Garden, said in a press 

release.• 

CSE Day celebrated at Northern 

University 

• Features Desk 

The Department of Computer 

Science and Engineering (CSE) of 

Northern University Bangladesh 

(NUB) celebrated “CSE DAY 2017” 

on August 1, at the Banani campus. 

A programming contest, 

showcasing of hardware and 

software projects and a gaming 

contest took place as part of the 

program. Students of the CSE 

department participated in these 

events. 

The program was presided 

over by Md Raihan-ul-Masood, 

the Department Head of CSE. 

Professor Dr Abu Yousuf Md 

Abdullah, Chairman of NUB 

Trust graced the program as the 

chief guest. Professor Dr Anwar 

Hossain, Vice-Chancellor of NUB, 

Professor Dr M Kaykobad BUET 

CSE department and Professor Dr 

Anwarul Karim, ProViceChancellor 

also attended the program as 

special guests. 

The program started with the 

programming contest in which 

16 teams participated. About 45 

students participated in gaming 

contest. There were 13 hardware 

and software projects displayed 

in the program. Hardware and 

software projects were judged by 

Professor M Kaykobad.•

DT 

18 

Sports 


Australia all set to visit Bangladesh 

• AFP, Melbourne 

Australia’s bruising and protracted 

cricket pay dispute was finally 

resolved yesterday with players 

and management agreeing on 

a new “in-principle” deal, ensuring 

upcoming series against 

Bangladesh, India and England 

can go ahead. 

The players appeared to be the 

winners in the five-year agreement, 

worth an estimated Aus- 

$500m ($396m), as they retained 

the revenue-sharing model they 

had been fighting for - with women 

cricketers also included for 

the first time. 

The bad-tempered stand-off 

had been rumbling for months, 

rattling the game and badly 

straining the players’ relationship 

with governing body Cricket 

Australia. 

Some 230 cricketers had been 

unemployed since the end of 

June when their contracts expired, 

putting this month’s Test 

tour to Bangladesh under serious 

threat. 

“Yesterday’s agreement is 

the result of sensible compromises 

by both parties,” said CA 

chief James Sutherland, adding 

that the “core issues” had been 

worked out. 

He said the five-year deal 

would “restore much certainty to 

the game of cricket”. 

“It will allow all players - state 

and international players - to be 

contracted immediately and it 

will also allow the all-important 

tour of Bangladesh to proceed as 

planned.” 

Captain Steve Smith welcomed 

the deal on Twitter, adding: 

“It’s been a long and challenging 

process and it’s great that 

we can now get on with playing 

the game that we all love. 

“I’m excited that we can all 

start working together again 

to continue to grow our great 

game.” 

At the heart of the dispute had 

been the divisive issue of revenue-sharing. 

CA wanted to scrap the model 

that has governed players’ salaries 

since their first memorandum 

of understanding was brokered 

20 years ago. 

Players have been paid a percentage 

of gross revenue for the 

past two decades, and they argued 

that changing the system 

would make them employees 

rather than partners with incentives 

to grow the game. 

CA wanted to pay them from 

a set pool instead, with only surplus 

revenue shared, to give it 

more cash to invest in grassroots 

programs and facilities. 

In the end, it was the players 

who came out on top, with the 

revenue-sharing model retained. 

Under the new deal, they will 

share up to 30% of agreed revenue 

- 27.5% of forecast revenue 

streams, and a 2.5% performance 

pool. 

This is estimated to be worth 

Aus$500m over the next five 

years. 

Under the previous system, 

male players had been sharing up 

to 26% of revenues. 

In a significant move, the format 

will also apply to female 

players in what the Australian 

Cricketers’ Association said was 

“the biggest pay rise in the history 

of women’s sport in Australia”. 

Players also won a greater say 

on scheduling. 

“The new MOU is a great 

achievement for the players and 

the game,” said ACA president 

Greg Dyer. 

“Like anything worthwhile it’s 

been hard to achieve. But what 

has been agreed is ground-breaking 

for Australian sport. 

“One MOU for men and women, 

the maintenance of the partnership 

model, and record investments 

for grassroots cricket 

is what we wanted and it’s what 

has been achieved.” 

Smith can now lead his team 

to Dhaka on August 18 with their 

futures secured. 

It also ensures that a one-day 

tour to India in September and 

October and the showpiece home 

Ashes series against England, 

beginning in November, are now 

safe. 

An Australian A tour to South 

Africa last month was called off 

after players announced a boycott, 

and Sutherland admitted relationships 

within the game had 

been “tested”. 

“Both parties acknowledge 

and regret that,” he said. 

“We are restoring certainty 

and beginning to repair relationships, 

especially with the fans. 

We want the focus to be back 

on the cricket.” Sutherland had 

warned that unless negotiations 

produced a compromise this 

week, he would take the matter 

to arbitration and let the industrial 

umpire sort out the mess. • 

BCB elated with 

Australia Tests 

confirmation 

• Tribune Report 

The BCB expressed delight after Cricket Australia 

confirmed their tour of Bangladesh later 

this month, bringing an end to the dispute with 

its players over payment. 

The BCB’s media and communications committee 

chairman Jalal Younus spoke to the 

media following CA’s confirmation of the tour 

going ahead as per schedule. 

Jalal said the BCB was always confident of 

CA and its cricketers reaching a solution over 

their dispute and arrive in Dhaka as per schedule 

for the two-match Test series. 

Australia are scheduled to reach Dhaka on 

August 18. 

The cricket community in the country was 

anxious as doubts loomed over Bangladesh’s 

first Test series against Australia in 11 years. 

All the speculation was erased yesterday 

morning after news broke out of CA reaching a 

deal to resolve Australian cricket’s protracted 

pay dispute. 

The deal has made the way for the nation’s 

professional cricketers to be re-contracted and 

for this month’s scheduled Test tour to Bangladesh 

to proceed as planned. 

The in-principle agreement was signed after 

a final round of face-to-face negotiations 

between CA CEO James Sutherland and his 

Australian Cricketers’ Association counterpart 

Alistair Nicholson in Melbourne yesterday 

morning, reported an Australia-based news 

website. 

Details of the deal and the new five-year 

Memorandum of Understanding that it underpins 

are expected be revealed at a formal media 

announcement, to be held at the MCG. 

“We were always confident of the tour going 

ahead as planned because it was totally their 

internal issue this time, between the board and 

the cricketers’ association,” Jalal told the media 

yesterday. 

The last scheduled Australia tour of Bangladesh, 

in 2016, was called off due to security 

concern. 

“We were confident that they will reach a 

solution. However we (BCB) were always prepared 

to face all kinds of situations, we were 

ready to host even if the series got confirmed 

within a day’s notice,” the BCB director added. 

Jalal said the BCB is happy with the series 

going ahead as planned. 

“It is a very important series for us as we do 

not get to play Test matches. Bangladesh have a 

month-long tour of South Africa in September 

so the Australia series will be a good opportunity,” 

he explained. 

The Aussies will play a two-day warm-up 

game before taking on host Bangladesh in the 

two-Test series. 

The first Test will be played in Mirpur’s Shere-Bangla 

National Stadium from August 27-31 

while the second Test in Chittagong’s Zahur 

Ahmed Chowdhury Stadium is scheduled to be 

held from September 4-8. 

Venue for the two-day warm-up game is 

however, yet to be decided. 

The initial plan of having the game in Fatullah’s 

Khan Shaheb Osman Ali Stadium got ruled 

out due to severe drainage problem. 

According to Jalal, the BCB is planning to 

hold the tour game in BKSP. •

Spanish league stall 

Neymar move 

Sports 19 

DT 


• AFP, Barcelona 

Spain’s football league refused to 

accept a 222m euro ($260m) cheque 

today in a new twist to Neymar’s 

“transfer of the century” from Barcelona 

to Paris Saint-Germain. 

Representatives of the 25-yearold 

Brazilian were turned away from 

the Madrid headquarters of La Liga 

after their payment to meet Barca’s 

buyout clause was refused by officials 

who have accused the French 

club of breaching transfer rules. 

“We can confirm that the legal 

representatives of the player attended 

La Liga to pay the clause 

and this has been rejected,” a 

spokesperson told AFP. 

The move may delay Neymar’s 

transfer but is unlikely to derail it, 

according to experts. 

However, the player, initially 

expected in Paris later yesterday, 

is now due to arrive a day later, 

according to airport sources in the 

French capital. 

The transfer dominated front 

pages across the world with many 

commentators aghast at the rampant 

inflation in football transfer 

fees with Neymar’s new mark more 

than doubling the previous record 

set by Manchester United’s capture 

of Paul Pogba last year. 

However, in the French capital 

there is huge excitement at PSG’s 

Qatari-backed project landing a star 

name to finally make them feared 

among European football’s elite. 

“Neymar to PSG - the transfer of 

the century”, splashed Le Parisien’s 

front page with 

the first five pages 

devoted to his impending 

arrival. 

“Neymar could be 

wearing the parisian shirt from this 

week,” added Le Parisien with a 

possible presentation to take place 

at PSG’s Ligue 1 opener at home to 

Amiens on Saturday. 

French President Emmanuel 

Macron added to the anticipation, 

saying the move was “good news.” 

The mood was understandably 

more somber in Spain. 

Madrid-based sports daily AS 

ran with “pay and go” alongside a 

smiling Neymar, whilst Marca described 

the move as “the signing 

that changes the history of football. 

In Barca, attention turned to 

who the Catalans can sign to replace 

Neymar in the month before 

the transfer window closes with 

Liverpool’s Philippe Coutinho and 

Borussia Dortmund’s Ousmane 

Dembele both linked. 

There was also scepticism at 

the role played by PSG’s owners 

Oryx Qatar Sports Investments at 

a time of political crisis for the oil 

rich state emirate which has been 

boycotted by its Gulf neighbours in 

recent months and will play host to 

the World Cup in 2022. 

Spanish newspaper El Mundo 

described the move as a “state 

signing.” 

Whilst coaches, 

including United manager 

Jose Mourinho, have lamented 

that the move could 

cause even greater inflation 

in transfer fees and player 

wages, France’s Budget Minister 

claimed to be “delighted” 

Neymar will earn a reported 

30m euros after tax. 

“If in fact Neymar does come to 

a French club, the budget minister 

will be delighted at the tax that 

he will be able to pay in France,” 

Darmanin told France Inter radio. 

PSG’s finances will come under 

heavy scrutiny in the years to come 

with both La Liga and Barcelona 

threatening to report the French 

giants to European football’s 

governing body for breaches of 

financial fair play regulations. 

Clubs can be sanctioned by Uefa 

for making a loss of more than 30m 

euros over a three-year period. 

According to reports Neymar 

underwent a medical in Porto on 

Wednesday after say- i n g 

his goodbyes to 

his Barcelona 

teammates before 

returning 

to the Catalan 

capital late 

on Wednesday 

night. • 

Mourinho, Klopp split over Neymar transfer 

• Reuters 

Portuguese manager Jose Mourinho 

and German tactician Juergen 

Klopp’s conflicting views on Neymar’s 

imminent move from Barcelona 

to Paris St Germain offer 

an insight into how the 222m euro 

($263m) deal has divided opinion 

across football. 

News of a transfer that will 

smash the existing world record 

broke on Wednesday when Barcelona 

confirmed they had given 

the Brazilian forward permission 

to speak to the French club, who 

are prepared to trigger his release 

clause. 

Mourinho, who sanctioned 

Frenchman Paul Pogba’s world record 

105m euro move from Juventus 

to Manchester United last year, 

said PSG were not paying over the 

odds given Neymar’s quality, but 

he is concerned by the financial 

“consequences”. 

“When we paid that amount for 

Paul, I said that it was not expensive,” 

United manager Mourinho 

told British media. 

“Expensive are the ones who 

get into a certain level without a 

certain quality...For 200m pounds 

($264.46m), I don’t think (Neymar) 

is expensive. 

“I think he’s expensive in the 

fact that now you are going to have 

more players at 100m pounds, you 

are going have more players at 80m 

and more players at 60m. And I 

think that’s the problem. 

“Neymar is one of the best players 

in the world, commercially 

he is very strong and for sure PSG 

thought about it. So I think the 

problem is not Neymar, I think the 

problem is the consequences of 

Neymar.” 

Liverpool manager Klopp criticised 

the deal and questioned the 

effectiveness of Uefa’s Financial 

Fair Play rules, which stipulate that 

a club’s wage bill must not exceed 

70% of its revenue. 

“There are clubs that can pay 

fees like that - Manchester City 

and PSG. Everyone knows that,” 

Klopp told reporters in Munich on 

Wednesday. 

City are owned by United Arab 

Emirates billionaire Sheikh Mansour 

bin Zayed Al Nahyan, while 

PSG were taken over in 2012 by Qatar 

Sports Investments, an arm of 

Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund. 

“I thought fair play was made so 

that situations like that can’t happen. 

That’s more of a suggestion 

than a real rule. I don’t understand 

that. I don’t know how it happens,” 

Klopp added. 

Uefa told Reuters on Wednesday 

that no complaint had been 

received about PSG, adding that it 

would not block any potential deal 

in advance. • 

Spanish media 

hail ‘transfer of 

the century’ 

• AFP 

Neymar’s imminent record-shattering 

move from Barcelona to Paris 

Saint-Germain was hailed as “the 

signing that changes the history 

of football” by French and Spanish 

media yesterday. 

Papers in both cities went to 

town on the Brazilian striker’s forecast 

222m euro ($260m) transfer 

from the Catalan giants to PSG. 

With Neymar expected in the 

French capital later yesterday Le 

Parisien devoted three-quarters 

of its front page to the man set to 

become the world’s most valuable 

player. Under the headline 

“Neymar to PSG - the transfer of 

the century” was a photograph of 

the 25-year-old “photo-shopped” 

sporting a PSG jersey. 

“Neymar could be wearing the 

Parisian shirt from this week” read 

the caption, with the paper devoting 

its first five pages to his expected 

arrival. 

French sports daily L’Equipe 

devoted their entire front page to 

a picture of Neymar behind the 

wheel of his car turning up to say 

goodbye to Lionel Messi and his 

Barcelona teammates on Wednesday 

morning, under the headline, 

“He’s arriving”. In Spain, the coverage 

was sobre and reflective. 

“The signing that changes the 

history of football,” wrote Marca, 

while for AS, with a nod to the extraordinary 

buy-out clause PSG’s 

Qatari-owners are set to settle, 

Neymar’s transfer was a case of 

“Pay and go”. La Vanguardia dwelt 

on what his departure meant for 

Bacelona - “Neymar’s escape obliges 

Barca to reinvent themselves”. 

In a dramatic 24 hours Neymar 

paid his farewell to Barca on 

Wednesday morning, before jumping 

on a private jet to Porto to reportedly 

undergo a medical before 

his expected arrival in the French 

capital on Thursday afternoon. 

Neymar could be unveiled to 

fans tomorrow evening when PSG 

open their new Ligue 1 season 

against Amiens. •

20 


DT 

Green University 

clinch Faraaz 

Challenge Cup 


Green University emerged as the 

unbeaten champion in the Walton 

Inter University Football Tournament 

(Faraaz Challenge Cup) after 

beating Far East University comfortably 

2-0 in the grand finale at 

Birsreshtha Sepahi Mustafa Kamal 

Stadium in Kamalapur yesterday. 

The champion went ahead in 

the 13th minute when Mohammad 

Rubel Islam headed home a Suman 

Reza cross. 

Rubel netted his second of the 

day in the 26th minute. 

They could have extended the 

lead after resumption but missed 

from the penalty spot. 

Green University goalkeeper 

Subho was adjudged player of the 

final for his brilliant display. Alamgir 

Rana from the champion side 

became the best player of the tournament. 

Green University’s Suman finished 

as the top-scorer of the tournament. 

The champion side received Tk 

two lakh as prize money while the 

runners-up team pocketed Tk one 

lakh. • 

Sports 

Respected Klitschko 

announces retirement 

• Reuters 

Wladimir Klitschko ruled the heavyweight 

scene with a steel glove 

for more than a decade yet it was 

a defeat by Anthony Joshua which 

ensured the Ukrainian retired yesterday 

with the universal respect 

that eluded him for so long. 

Often denigrated for a robotic 

style, short on flair, Klitschko reigned 

supreme in a heavyweight era suffering 

from a dearth of box office 

names. The 41-year-old dispatched a 

regular supply of average fighters to 

reach 64 career victories yet few, if 

any of them, will feature in a showreel 

of the sport’s greatest contests. 

Instead it will be his final fight, 

against Britain’s Joshua, that will 

be define Klitschko’s legacy. 

Despite a 14-year age gap and 

fighting in front of a partisan 90,000 

Wembley Stadium crowd, Klitschko 

produced arguably his best performance 

before being stopped in the 

11th round of a sensational fight. 

Had he finished off a wobbling 

Joshua in the sixth round Klitschko 

would have become only the second 

fighter after George Foreman 

to win a recognised version of the 

world title as a 40-something. 

Yet, even in defeat, a global 

audience finally gave the Germany-based 

fighter the acclaim he 

Sk Jamal, Ctg Abahani 

keep winning 

• Shishir Hoque 

Sheikh Jamal Dhanmondi Club registered 

their second consecutive 

victory in the Bangladesh Premier 

Football League after edging Team 

BJMC 1-0 at the water-logged Bangabandhu 

National Stadium yesterday. 

Sheikh Jamal made changed 

their foreign recruits in the starting 

XI with Raphael Odoyin and Solomon 

King getting the nod ahead of 

Gambian attacker Momodou Ba. 

Raphael created the first scoring 

chance of the game seven minutes 

into the clock but Team BJMC 

goalkeeper Shohag Hossain Palash 

denied the Nigerian striker with a 

decent save. 

In the 20th minute, Team BJMC 

forward Mohammad Shariful 

danced down the left flank to enter 

the penalty area before taking a low 

left-footer that went straight into 

the hands of Sheikh Jamal keeper 

Mitul. 

Team BJMC custodian Palash 

continued his fine display between 

the posts as he produced another 

outstanding save in the 39th minute 

and this time, Raphael was 

again on the other side. 

Solomon set up Raphael with a 

defence-splitting through pass, the 

latter broke into the penalty area 

leaving his markers behind but Palash 

dived to his right to deny the 

Nigerian’s effort. 

Nurul Absar gave the Dhanmondi 

outfit the deserved lead nine 

minutes into the second half. 

A low cross from Ali Hossain 

found the unmarked Nurul at the 

edge of the six-yard box. 

Nurul then placed home with a 

left-footed side volley. 

Palash made another amazing 

save in the 83rd minute. 

Substitute winger Momodou’s 

intial strike changed its direction 

towards goal after a deflection 

from Cameroonian defender Bayback 

Esaie but the Team BJMC netminder 

stretched to his top right to 

tip away for a corner. 

Meanwhile, big-spending Chittagong 

Abahani Limited also continued 

their winning streak as they 

defeated traditional crowd-puller 

Mohammedan Sporting Club Limited 

with the same margin of 1-0 in 

the day’s second match at the same 

venue. • 

deserved for a career in which he 

carried the a sport so often dragged 

into the gutter with professionalism 

and dignity. 

An eagerly anticipated Las Vegas 

re-match with Joshua was in the 

pipeline, yet Klitschko, who had 

lost his WBA, IBF and WBO heavyweight 

belts in a disappointing defeat 

by Britain’s Tyson Fury in 2015, 

has decided enough is enough. 

Klitschko’s manager Bernd 

Boente said his man had not lost 

his powers, but was no longer prepared 

to put himself though the 

10-week training camps needed to 

prepare for big fights. 

Klitschko turned professional 

in 1996 shortly after winning super-heavyweight 

gold at the Atlanta 

Olympics. 

He won his first 24 fights before 

losing to American Ross Puritty in 

1998 - his only fight in his native 

Ukraine. Klitschko won his first 

world title in 2000, beating American 

Chris Byrd to claim the WBO title. 

He suffered defeats at the hands 

of South Africa’s Corrie Sanders 

and American Lamon Brewster in 

2003 and 2004. 

After teaming up with trainer 

Emanuel Steward, Klitschko became 

a far greater all-round fighter 

and went 11 years unbeaten before 

losing to Fury. • 

FACTBOX 

• Reuters 

Factbox on former heavyweight 

world champion Wladimir 

Klitschko, who announced his 

retirement from boxing yesterday. 

Born: March 25, 1976 Semipalatinsk, 

Kazakhstan (Age 41) 

Win-loss record: 64-5 (53 

knockouts) 

EARLY YEARS 

t Won gold medal at junior 

European championships in 

Thessaloniki as a heavyweight in 

1993. Claimed silver at the junior 

world championships in Istanbul 

a year later. 

t Won gold medal at the 1996 

Olympics in the super-heavyweight 

division as an amateur. 

PROFESSIONAL CAREER 

t Built an undefeated record of 

24-0 with 22 knockouts before 

suffering his first loss to Ross 

Puritty in Klitschko’s only professional 

bout in Ukraine. 

t Defeated American Chris Byrd 

in 2000 to win the WBO heavyweight 

title. His reign ended 

with a defeat to Corrie Sanders 

in 2003. 

t Regained the IBF and IBO titles 

in a rematch with Byrd in 2006. 

t Won the WBO title for the second 

time by defeating Russian 

Sultan Ibragimov in 2008. 

Action from the BPL match between Mohammedan and Ctg Abahani at 

Bangabandhu National Stadium yesterday 

MD MANIK

Sports 

21 


DT 

India's Cheteshwar Pujara plays a shot during the opening day of their second Test against Sri Lanka yesterday 

DAY’S WATCH 

CRICKET 

STAR SPORTS SELECT 1 

4:00PM 

South Africa Tour of England 

4th Test, Day 1 

12:00AM 

Natwest T20 Blast 2017 

Birmingham Bears v Worcestershire 

SONY SIX 

10:30AM 

India Tour of Sri Lanka 

2nd Test, Day 2 

FOOTBALL 

SONY TEN 2 

12:30AM 

French Ligue 1 2017/18 

Monaco v Toulouse 

REUTERS 

Pujara, Rahane tons put 

India on top in Colombo 

• Reuters, Colombo 

Real Madrid top MLS All-Stars in shootout 

• AFP, Chicago 

Marcelo scored on the decisive penalty 

kick as La Liga and Champions 

League title holder Real Madrid 

took a shootout victory Wednesday 

over the Major League Soccer All- 

Stars. 

Real played to a 1-1 draw in regulation 

time in the MLS All-Star 

Game before taking the shootout 

4-2 before a sellout crowd of 61,000 

at Soldier Field, the home stadium 

of the NFL’s Chicago Bears. 

Borja Mayoral opened the scoring 

in the 59th minute for Real, 

which controlled possession of the 

ball throughout the contest. 

Mayoral found open space in 

front of the goal before taking a 

short pass. 

His well-timed shot deflected 

off the leg of a diving defender 

and into the back of the net for the 

Spanish giant, who were playing 

without superstar Cristiano Ronaldo. 

Dom Dwyer, an England-born 

member of the US national team, 

equalized for the MLS squad in the 

87th minute with a header from in 

close. 

Dwyer was in the right place for 

the rebound after Dax McCarty’s 

header off a corner kick bounced 

off the post, winning a foot race 

‘Genius Matic needs time to get ready’ 

• Reuters 

Manchester United’s newest recruit 

Nemanja Matic is a “genius” 

in his understanding of the game 

but needs time to settle in, manager 

Jose Mourinho said, following 

the midfielder’s debut in the team’s 

2-1 pre-season win over Sampdoria. 

Matic completed his move to 

United from Premier League champion 

Chelsea on Monday, reuniting 

with Mourinho who coached the 

London side from 2013 to 2015. 

Mourinho said Matic “needs 

time” but that he would be helped 

by his “experience, intelligence, 

a genius in the way he thinks - he 

with Real’s 19-year-old goalkeeper 

Luca Zidane, who entered late in 

the second half. 

Real will now return to Europe 

to meet Manchester United in the 

Uefa Super Cup in Macedonia on 

Tuesday, then take on Barcelona in 

the two-legged Spanish Super Cup 

on August 13 and 16 before opening 

the La Liga season on August 20. 

Real coach Zinedine Zidane rotated 

his squad liberally during the 

contest. 

The stars made their appearances 

but he also inserted several 

youngsters and fringe players who 

are trying to make the club. 

At times when the stars were on 

thinks football.” 

“We will help him to be ready 

sooner rather than later,” the manager 

told reporters during Wednesday’s 

post-match press conference 

the field it was a humbling affair for 

the MLS. 

Left back Greg Garza had to 

leave the game in the first half with 

a possible separated shoulder that 

will cost him some time with Atlanta 

United. 

The All-Star match marks 

the end of a four-match, 11-day 

pre-season US tour for Real that included 

a 3-2 loss to rival Barcelona 

in a Clasico matchup at Miami on 

Sunday. 

Real also drew United before 

falling in penalties to the English 

side in San Francisco on July 23 

and lost to Manchester City in Los 

Angeles on July 26. • 

Mourinho said he was pleased 

for getting three of his four transfer 

targets in the current window, with 

29-year-old Matic joining striker 

Romelu Lukaku and defender Victor 

Lindelof in the club’s ranks. 

“To get three out of four - I 

thank the club for that. I will be 

happier if they get me four of four 

but they did a great effort for me,” 

Mourinho said. 

United’s victory over Sampdoria 

marked the end of United’s 

pre-season fixtures as the Europa 

League champion prepare to face 

Champions League winner Real 

Madrid in the Uefa Super Cup on 

Tuesday. • 

2ND TEST, DAY 1 

INDIA 1ST INNINGS R B 

Rahul run out (Chandimal) 57 82 

Pujara not out 128 225 

Kohli c Mathews b Herath 13 29 

Rahane not out 103 168 

Extras (b 4, nb 1, lb 3) 8 

Total (90/3 overs) 344 

Fall Of Wickets 

1-56 (Dhawan), 2-109 (Rahul), 3-133 (Kohli) 

Bowling 

Fernando 17.4-2-63-0, Herath 24-3-83-1, 

Karunaratne 3-0-10-0, Perera 18-2-68- 

1, Pushpakumara 19.2-0-82-0, De Silva 

8-0-31-0 

Toss: India 

Cheteshwar Pujara registered his 

second century of the series while 

Ajinkya Rahane also notched up a 

hundred as two of India’s most dependable 

batsmen laid the foundation 

for a massive first innings total 

in the second Test against Sri Lanka 

yesterday. 

Pujara’s 50th Test turned out to 

be an eventful one as India’s No 3 

nearly perished in the slip early in 

his innings and ran out partner KL 

Rahul before making amends with 

his burgeoning 211-run stand with 

Rahane. 

Pujara, who also completed 

4,000 Test runs in the process, was 

batting on 128 at stumps, his 13th 

Test century containing 10 boundaries 

and a pulled six off debutant 

spinner Malinda Pushpakumara. 

Rahane, who survived a couple 

of reviews, hit 12 boundaries in his 

fluent 103 not out, as India utterly 

dominated the opening day of the 

contest to reach 344 for three. 

Alarmingly for Sri Lanka, still 

smarting from their comprehensive 

defeat in the series opener in 

Galle, lone frontline paceman Nuwan 

Pradeep left the field in the 

final session clutching his left hamstring. 

India got off to a brisk start after 

skipper Virat Kohli opted to bat 

on a dry surface with Rahul, who 

missed India’s victory in Galle with 

high-fever, and Shikhar Dhawan 

scoring freely against a spin-heavy 

Sri Lankan attack. • 

Average start 

for Siddikur at 

TAKE Solutions 

Masters 


Premier Bangladesh golfer Siddikur 

Rahman, who finished an incredible 

third in the recently concluded 

Porsche European Open, started 

off in disappointing fashion in the 

inaugural edition of the TAKE Solutions 

Masters at Karnataka Golf Association 

Golf Course in Bengaluru, 

India yesterday. 

Siddikur carded two-over-par 73 

in the first round of the $300,000 

tournament to find himself tied for 

70th position, alongside 18 others. 

The 32-year old golfer from Madaripur 

hit three bogeys against a 

single birdie and trails early leader 

Poom Saksansin of Thailand by 

nine shots. 

TAKE Solutions is a globally recognised 

knowledge intensive player, 

delivering comprehensive and 

niche solutions in Life Sciences. 

TAKE Solutions will title sponsor 

the new Asian Tour tournament 

in India for the next three years until 

2019. 

Through this new collaboration 

between TAKE Solutions, Asian Tour 

and PGTI, at least 40 Indian golfers 

will have the opportunity to compete 

against the region’s leading golfers 

where a win will be rewarded with 

full playing rights on the Asian Tour 

until the end of the 2018 season. •

22 


DT 

Showtime 

Star Cineplex to release three anticipated flicks 

• Showtime Desk 

Much to the delight of the 

local movie enthusiasts, Star 

Cineplex is set to release three 

contemporary anticipated flicks 

on August 4 - Kidnap, The Dark 

Tower and Valerian and The City 

of Thousand Planets. Star Cineplex 

is releasing Kidnap and The Dark 

Tower on the same day of the 

films’ international opening, while 

Valerian and The City of Thousand 

Planets was released recently on 

July 21. 

Oscar winner, Halle Berry 

starrer Kidnap is an American 

action-thriller film which is 

directed by Luis Prieto and 

penned by Knate Gwaltney, The 

film follows a mother who tries 

to rescue her abducted son from 

dangerous kidnappers. Kidnap also 

features the likes of Lew Temple, 

Sage Correa and Chris McGinn in 

different roles. 

The Dark Tower, on the other 

hand, is an American sci-fi which 

has been directed and co-written 

by Nikolaj Arcel. The film is a 

continuation of Stephen King’s 

novel series of the same name 

which narrates the story of the 

last Gunslinger, Roland Deschain, 

who has been locked in an eternal 

battle with Walter O’Dim, also 

known as the Man in Black, who is 

determined to prevent him from 

toppling the Dark Tower, which 

holds the universe together. With 

the fate of the world at stake, good 

and evil will collide in the ultimate 

battle since only Roland can defend 

the Tower from the Man in Black. 

The film stars Idris Elba in the 

role of Roland Deschain while 

Matthew McConaughey plays the 

role of the Man in Black. Jackie 

Earle Haley and Katheryn Winnick 

are also cast members in the film. 

The third film, Valerian and 

the City of a Thousand Planets 

is a French sci-fi-slash-actionadventure 

film. Written and 

directed by Luc Besson and coproduced 

by Besson and his wife, 

Virginie Besson-Silla, the film 

is based on the popular French 

sci-fi comics series Valérian and 

Laureline. 

In the film, a dark force 

threatens Alpha, a vast metropolis 

and home to species from 

a thousand planets. Special 

operatives Valerian and Laureline 

must race to identify the 

marauding menace and safeguard 

not just Alpha, but the future of 

the universe. 

The film stars Dane DeHaan 

as Valerian and Cara Delevingne 

as Laureline, with Clive Owen, 

Rihanna, Ethan Hawke, Herbie 

Hancock, Kris Wu, and Rutger 

Hauer in supporting roles. Besson 

independently crowd-sourced and 

personally funded Valerian and, 

with a production budget between 

$177–210 million, it is both the 

most expensive European and 

independent film ever made. 

The film was released by STX 

Entertainment on July 21 in the 

United States and on July 26 in 

France by EuropaCorp. After it’s 

release, Valerian received mixed 

reviews from critics, some of 

whom criticised the writing and 

plot of the film but praised the 

visuals. • 

Arfin Rumey to debut in film 


More commonly known as a 

singer and music composer, 

Arfin Rumey has been 

occasionally seen in a number 

of music videos previously. But 

the popular cricketer turned pop 

singer is now ready to further 

his on-screen journey and has 

already signed a deal to appear 

in an upcoming film titled 

Jannat. 

Interestingly, he will be seen 

performing his own track in the 

film. Titled “Papi Tapi Mon,” the 

singer composed the song with 

lyrics from Sudip Kumar Dip. 

“The story demands a 

concert scene in the film which 

will feature a singer, singing 

at a Pahela Boishakh concert. 

The scene may be short but 

it is very important, which is 

why I’ve decided to cast a real 

singer in the scene and Rumey 

was onboard,” said Musatifzur 

Rahman, director of Jannat. 

The shooting of the film has 

started since Ramadan but was 

hindered due to rain and the 

director looks forward to finish 

the remaining bits as soon as 

possible. 

However, two popular actors 

of Dhallywood, Mahiya Mahi 

and Saimon Sadik will play the 

lead roles of the film. The film 

will also feature Aliraz, Misha 

Sowdagar, Shimul Khan in 

different roles. Produced by SS 

Multimedia, Sudipto Saeed Khan 

penned the story, while Asad 

Zaman wrote the screenplay of 

Jannat. •

Showtime 

FRIDAY, 

Liberation War based film 

to get an international 

release 

23 


Emma Roberts 

confirmed for American 

Horror Story 

DT 


A feature film based on the 

unknown history of the 1971 

Bangladesh Liberation War is set 

to have a worldwide release in 

December this year. Titled Tumi 

Bahir Theke, the film has been 

directed by Sajal Ahmed and Ujjal 

Chakraborty, 

Tumi Bahir Theke will get a 

simultaneous release in London, 

Paris, Rome, Berlin, Stockholm, 

New York, Los Angeles and 

Montreal, among others. 

The political thriller is a 

tribute to the freedom fighters 

that fought for Bangladesh’s 

liberation. 

“The decision to showcase 

the film in the aforementioned 

cities is due to the influence the 

Bengali community wields in 

those regions,” Chakraborty said. 

The film is expected to release 

the occasion of the Victory Day of 

Photo: Amiya Tarafdar/Liberation War E-Archive Trust 

Bangladesh on December 16. 

The respective Bengali 

Associations will help the team 

in the release process, added 

Chakraborty. 

“Tumi Bahir Theke captured 

the atmosphere in the year 

1971, when some people resided 

outside Bangladesh - in cities like 

Kolkata, London and New York,” 

he said while talking about the 

story line of the film. • 


For the upcoming Cult season, 

Emma Roberts is confirmed to 

return to the American Horror 

Story franchise. 

The anthology horror 

series creator Ryan Murphy 

confirmed the news by posting 

a picture of her on Instagram 

on Tuesday, in which the 

26-year-old actress is holding 

up a knife with a very sinister 

smile. 

Murphy captioned the 

picture, “Look who showed 

up on the set of Cult looking 

glamorous and ready for 

action.” 

It’s yet to be revealed on 

which character she’ll be 

playing, or how many episodes 

she’ll appear in. 

Meanwhile, the Scream 

Queens actress also shared a 

behind-the-scenes picture, 

saying, “I’ve joined #ahscult 

will you?” 

Previously, she appeared in 

season 3, Coven, and season 

4, Freak Show, during she 

played Madison and Maggie, 

respectively. 

The latest instalment of 

the anthology series also stars 

Roberts’ real-life boyfriend 

Evan Peters, as well as other 

franchise favourites like Sarah 

Paulson, Cheyenne Jackson, 

Adina Porter, Frances Conroy 

and Mare Winningham. The 

season cast also includes Billie 

Lourd, Colton Haynes, Billy 

Eichner, Leslie Grossman, 

Alison Pill and the most recent 

addition, Lena Dunham. 

The seventh series of 

the anthology horror show 

will air on TV screens on 

September 5. • 

A song featuring 

Bangabandhu 


Kamalika Chakraborty grew 

up listening to the story of 

Bangabandhu from his father in 

her childhood. Since then, she 

develops immense admiration 

towards Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. 

Later, she gets the idea about 

level of feeling and adoration 

of the people of Bangladesh 

towards the founding father 

of the country when she came 

here. In fact, the feeling by the 

masses towards Bangabandhu 

overwhelms her. Then, she 

started pondering she has to do 

something for Bangabandhu, for 

the people of this land. 

With this thought, she started 

working on the song in March 

this year. This is her first original 

track, which she wrapped up in 

the meantime. 

Shawkat Islam penned its 

lyrics and 

composed 

its music. 

From early 

August, a 

music video 

of the song 

slated to air 

on Ekushey 

TV and some 

other channels 

as well. 

The singer 

said, “I wanted to 

portray a father figure 

of Bangabandhu in the eyes 

of the Prime Minister Sheikh 

Hasina. Especially, her mental 

state during the period when 

Bangabandhu was held in 

prison.” 

The singer has also revealed 

that the Prime Minister listened 

to the song, and it had an impact 

on her. 

Born in India, Kamalika is 

currently living in Bangladesh. 

She is the daughter-in-law of 

the late journalist and member 

of parli ament Baby Maudud. An 

avid singer from her childhood, 

Kamalika has garnered attention 

after performing in some stage 

shows in Bangladesh and India. •

24 


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Meet the porn king of Bangladesh 

• Tarek Mahmud 

CRIME 

A man, aspiring to make big bucks 

in a short time with his escort service 

and pornographic websites, 

was arrested from his Uttara residence 

in Dhaka early Wednesday 

by a team of Rapid Action Battalion 

(RAB). 

When taken into custody, the 

arrestee, Md Fuad Bin Sultan, 33, 

termed himself an artist of the 

world of pornography, said RAB 

1 Commanding Officer Lt Col Md 

Sarwar-Bin-Quasem. 

The RAB team also seized some 

pirated CDs, a laptop allegedly 

used to run Fuad’s porn sites, 

masks, equipment to run the sites, 

and some yaba pills. 

Son of former deputy inspector 

general Sultan Ahmed, Fuad, 

an English literature graduate, 

left a lucrative job in a multinational 

company in 2011 to establish 

his business, the RAB official 

said. 

He rented two flats in a building 

owned by his parents in Uttara 

for which he paid Tk45,000 to his 

mother every month. He also rented 

flats in Gulshan. 

Fuad started his business with 

porn. He started in 2014 and by 

2016 had two porn sites up and 

running. Eventually he launched 

his escort service, RAB said. 

“He provided naked pictures 

and contact details of female escorts 

on his websites. Access to 

those websites is not open to all; 

one has to register and get a unique 

password in exchange of money,” 

said RAB 1 Commanding Officer 

Sarwar. 

After a client chose an escort, 

Fuad would arrange for their “date” 

at one of his flats and would make 

videos of their sexual acts, which 

he would later use to blackmail the 

women into having sex with other 

clients. He also provided drugs 

such as yaba to his clients, the RAB 

official said. 

Fuad also posted these videos 

on his porn websites and sold them 

to porn sites abroad, he added. 

When he was arrested, Fuad had 

eight porn sites running. RAB is now 

working to shut all of them down, as 

well as preparing to take legal action 

against Fuad, Sarwar said. 

Md Fuad Bin Sultan 

PHOTO: RAB 

CTTC arrests fake Pir for using sex 

videos for extortion 

Meanwhile, a Cyber Security and 

Crime Prevention team of police’s 

Counter-Terrorism and Transnational 

Crimes (CTTC) unit arrested 

a fraud Pir in Dhaka who forcefully 

had sex with women in the name 

of “treatment,” made secret videos 

of the act and used those videos to 

extort money from the women. 

He tortured 

women supposedly 

possessed by Jinns 

as an exorcism ritual, 

and sometimes he 

forced them to have 

sex with him 

Ahsan Habib Pear, 25, was arrested 

from his Khilgaon residence on 

Tuesday after CTTC received complaints 

from two of his victims. The 

law enforcement team also seized a 

computer and a mobile phone from 

his possession. 

Posing as a Pir, Ahsan used both 

charm and intimidation to get close 

to his female followers, said CTTC 

Additional Deputy Commissioner 

Md Nazmul Islam. 

A former student of Dawra-e-Hadith, 

Ahsan gained popularity 

with his religious preaching 

on his YouTube channel. 

He also had fan clubs on Facebook, 

WhatsApp, Twitter and Viber, 

said the CTTC official. 

“He tortured women supposedly 

possessed by Jinns as an exorcism 

ritual, and sometimes he 

forced them to have sex with him, 

convincing the women that it was 

also a ritual,” he added. 

Ahsan also used his fan clubs 

to connect with female followers. 

He would have lewd conversations 

with them and sometimes met 

with them. During those meetings, 

he would convince them to have 

sex with him. 

He made videos of his sexual encounters 

with his followers and later 

used them to extort the women. 

“He extorted Tk500,000 from 

one woman and Tk300,000 from another. 

We found 20 such videos on 

his computer,” said a CTTC official. 

ADC Md Nazmul Islam said a case 

had been filed against Ahsan with 

Khilgaon police station under the 

ICT Act and the Pornography Act. • 

Most Indian languages 

may die out in 50 years 

• Reuters 

WORLD 

More than half of the languages 

spoken by India’s 1.3 

billion people may die out 

over the next 50 years, scholars 

said on Thursday, calling 

for a concerted effort to preserve 

the tongues spoken by 

the nation’s endangered tribal 

communities. 

The People’s Linguistic 

Survey of India (PSLI) raised 

the alarm during the launch 

of the latest 11 volumes in its 

planned 50 volume survey of 

the country’s languages. India’s 

people speak as many as 

780 different languages, the 

PSLI said. 

“At least 400 Indian languages 

are at the risk of dying 

in coming 50 years,” GN Devy, 

the chairman of PSLI, said. 

Each time a language is lost, 

the corresponding culture is 

killed, Devy said, adding that 

India had already lost 250 languages 

in last five decades. 

The group of scholars and 

teachers at PSLI documents 

Indian regional languages in 

order to conserve cultural 

heritage and diversity. 

Most at risk are marginal 

tribal communities whose 

children receive no education 

or, if they do go to 

school, are taught in one of 

India’s 22 officially recognised 

languages. 

“Maithili, which is spoken 

in the eastern state of Bihar, 

is at least 1,000 years old. 

Similarly there are several 

old languages which are surviving 

somehow in India, but 

we are hardly passing them 

on,” said political psychologist 

Ashis Nandy. 

Devy said the PSLI will 

start work on a project to 

document about 6,000 living 

languages spoken around the 

world. The report is scheduled 

to come out by 2025. • 

Editor: Zafar Sobhan, Published and Printed by Kazi Anis Ahmed on behalf of 2A Media Limited at Dainik Shakaler Khabar Publications Limited, 153/7, Tejgaon Industrial Area, Dhaka-1208. Editorial, News & Commercial Office: FR Tower, 

8/C Panthapath, Shukrabad, Dhaka 1207. Phone: 9132093-94, Advertising: 9132155, Circulation: 9132282, Fax: News-9132192, e-mail: news@dhakatribune.com, info@dhakatribune.com, Website: www.dhakatribune.com

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