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Poor state of preparedness to fight swine flu in N dists

Monday, August 31, 2009   Almost all private hospitals and clinics in frontier Rajshahi and other 15 northern districts are remaining out of the government's preparedness programme against H1N1 swine flu epidemic in terms of isolation capacity and clinical assessment. "Private hospitals and clinics are yet to be instructed for the preparedness. We expect them to respond to the common call for creating isolation wards in advance," said Dr AKM Nur Kutubul Alam, director of health for Rajshahi division. "In case of any steep rise of positive cases, we might need extra health infrastructure that the private hospitals can ensure," he said with an alert for flu outbreak in the country as its detection is increasing. Following the government directives, the authorities of all public hospitals in the region are creating separate isolation wards and making inventory of essential drugs and preventive equipment, but there is no arrangement for diagnostic

Rajshahi board boss faces mayor's fury

Monday, August 31, 2009   Rajshahi Education Board Chairman Dipakendranath Das left the city Saturday night for Dhaka after filing general diaries with two police stations following threats on his life allegedly from the city Mayor Khairuzzaman Liton. The Rajshahi mayor asked the board chairman repeatedly over the phone to upgrade his daughter's SSC results, Dipakendranath alleged. Khairuzzaman also acknowledged that he had requested Dipakendranath to look into the result of his daughter but denied the allegation of threatening the board chairman. The mayor, on the other hand, brought allegation against Dipakendranath of not observing the National Mourning Day in a befitting manner at the Rajshahi Education Board this year. In his identical GDs filed with Boalia and Rajpara police stations in Rajshahi the education board chairman alleged that he had been asked to leave Rajshahi forever over the phone since August 27. The callers also threatened him with death.

Rajshahi investors find new refuge in stocks

Sunday, August 30, 2009 Share trading is gaining popularity in Rajshahi as more people are now investing in stocks. State-owned Investment Corporation of Bangladesh (ICB) and its subsidiaries, which are providing brokerage services with an aim to help small investors, are now struggling to cope with pressure from a rising number of investors. Beginning in 1984, ICB roped in around 7,000 investors from northern districts until 2005. Then there was a big jump. The number of investors increased by 4,600 in only four years to 11,600 after ICB Securities Trading Company Ltd (STCL) and ICB Capital Management Ltd (CML) opened up IT-enabled brokerage services. The services enabled investors in Rajshahi and its surrounding areas to get direct access and trade on the Dhaka Stock Exchange and Chittagong Stock Exchange (CSE) through internet trading service modules. Investors -- mostly small and from remote areas -- transacted Tk 108 crore in turnover in the last one and a half

'Bangabandhu makes constitution unique'

Sunday, August 16, 2009   Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman made the country's constitution a unique one in the world by giving a new definition of secularism, said Shahriar Kabir, a noted journalist, in Rajshahi yesterday. "For him secularism did not mean abandonment of religion, but a separation of religion from state and politics," said Kabir, president of Ekatturer Ghatak Dalal Nirmul Committee, a forum for secular Bangladesh and trial of war criminals. He said Bangabandhu was a religious man and he believed in people's freedom of religion. Bangabandhu gave new definition of secularism to end Pakistani tradition of abusing religion for political gain, said Kabir. He said in the name of protecting Islam, Pakistani rulers and Jamaat-e-Islami men killed people, raped women and committed genocides during their 23-year regime and the liberation war. Kabir was addressing as chief guest at a discussion meeting organised on the occasion of the National