Dhaka: Bangladesh's finance minister has downplayed the impact of last week's factory-building collapse on his country's garment industry, saying he didn't think it was "really serious" hours after the 500th body was pulled from the debris. Finance Minister Abul Maal Abdul Muhith spoke today as the government cracked down on those it blamed for the disaster in the Dhaka suburb of Savar. It suspended Savar's mayor and arrested an engineer who had called for the building's evacuation last week, but was also accused of helping the owner add three illegal floors to the eight-story structure.
The building owner was arrested earlier. The government appears to be attempting to fend off accusations that it is in part to blame for the tragedy because of weak oversight of the building's construction. During a visit to the Indian capital, New Delhi, Muhith said the disaster would not harm Bangladesh's garment industry, which is by far the country's biggest source of export income. "The present difficulties... well, I don't think it is really serious; it's an accident," he said. "And the steps that we have taken in order to make sure that it doesn't happen, they are quite elaborate and I believe that it will be appreciated by all."
The government made similar promises after a garment factory fire five months ago claimed more than a hundred lives, saying it would inspect factories for safety and pull the licenses of those that failed. However, that plan is yet to
12:47 AM, May 04, 2013
The National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) was set up with the express mandate to chalk out a response strategy to large-scale natural or man-made disasters. But with the abnormal growth of the cities, with rampant unplanned construction, are India's metro cities sitting ducks in case a large earthquake struck one of them? Maj. Gen. Raj Kaushal, Senior specialist, policy and plans, National Disaster Management Authority, joined IBNLive readers for an...
06:47 PM, Apr 17, 2013
Mumbai: The Chinese Government is ready to pump in up to USD 3 billion into the proposed metro project connecting Colaba in south Mumbai to Santacruz in the northern fringe of the megapolis, a top official said on Friday. The Chinese are also keen on participating in other infrastructure projects apart from those in the farm sector in the country, the official said. "We are keen to bring our technology...
03:30 AM, Apr 06, 2013
The government on Tuesday rejected the demand of some states of extending RTE deadline on meeting infrastructure norms but asked them to act tough on schools which are lagging far behind in implementing them. Amid concerns over schools which have failed to meet the RTE obligations by the March 31, 2013 deadline, HRD Minister MM Pallam Raju said the states have the rights to decide on such schools as well...
04:30 AM, Apr 03, 2013
It has not been a smooth take-off for the new airport terminal in Kolkata. A part of the building crumbled days after it was inaugurated, putting a huge question mark on the quality of construction. ...
09:30 AM, Mar 28, 2013
Russia wants the BRICS group of major emerging economies to broaden its role and get more involved in geopolitics, President Vladimir Putin said in an interview published on Friday. ...
05:20 AM, Mar 22, 2013
Himachal Pradesh's loan liability by the end of this fiscal (2012-13) is likely to be over Rs.28,513 crore, and the government plans to fix it by cutting "wasteful expenditure", Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh has said. "We will improve the financial health of the state by cutting wasteful expenditure," the chief minister told IANS. ...
05:09 AM, Mar 18, 2013
India with its robust legal structure, banking system and skilled manpower is the new economic icon of emerging powers and is sure to be on track again for 7 per cent growth, External Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid said on Sunday. ...
03:13 AM, Mar 11, 2013
Seeking to provide a close-to-real battlefield situation for its troops to train, the Indian Army is working on a Rs 40-crore plan towards modernising infrastructure at two of its main field firing ranges in Pokharan in Rajasthan and Babina in Madhya Pradesh. ...
06:43 AM, Mar 08, 2013
India has made substantial progress in building health infrastructure but the progress achieved has not been uniform across the country, Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad said on Tuesday. ...
01:06 AM, Mar 06, 2013
DLF, India's biggest property developer, said its board of directors will meet on Wednesday to consider the sale of shares to institutional and retail investors to comply with the minimum public shareholding rules. ...
12:20 PM, Mar 05, 2013
The Government plans to take possession of the server and other infrastructure placed by BlackBerry in Mumbai to test the solution offered by the smartphone maker for legal interception of Internet communication. ...
10:35 AM, Mar 04, 2013
Delhi's Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit's ambition is to make the capital an electronically-run city with open and transparent governance and better and more modern infrastructure, a place "which everybody loves and feels happy in". ...
02:27 AM, Mar 04, 2013
Infrastructure got a major thrust in Budget 2013-14 with Finance Minister P Chidambaram on Thursday announcing a slew of measures to boost sector's growth, like raising Rs 50,000 crore through tax-free bonds, setting up of major ports and a road regulator. ...
05:33 PM, Feb 28, 2013
Vinayak Chatterjee, chairman, Feedback Infrastructure says the infrastructure sector is expected to be government's priority in this Budget and the key expectation is the removal of the infrastructure sector from the ambit of MAT. "The government must increase the limit on tax-free bonds for retail investors and build infrastructure funds from PSU cash reserves," he told CNBC-TV18. ...
06:08 PM, Feb 25, 2013
Airports developer and operator GMR Infrastructure, a part of GMR Group, on Wednesday said it received Rs 415 crore from national carrier Air India on account of airport charges for both Delhi and Hyderabad. ...
03:06 AM, Feb 07, 2013
Emphasising that India has seen large number of reforms in recent years, Urban Development Minister Kamal Nath on January 24 said that even a lull in activities is taken as paralysis since expectations from investors are too high. Nath, who is leading the Indian delegation at the annual World Economic Forum (WEF) meeting here, also said that even the US or Europe would not have seen as many reforms that...
04:13 PM, Jan 24, 2013
Reliance Infrastructure-led Delhi Airport Metro Express has increased fares on the high-speed corridor at a time when the train speed has been drastically reduced to 50 km per hour. The 50 per cent fare hike came into effect on Wednesday just a day after commercial operations on the 23-km corridor resumed after a gap of six months. ...
07:49 PM, Jan 23, 2013
French experts are being roped in by Pune civic body to restore about 250 heritage structures in the city. A decision to this effect was recently taken at the conclusion of a seminar held here on "Economics of Heritage Conservation" organised by Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) and UNESCO-led Indian Heritage Cities Network (IHCN) and the French embassy. ...
12:46 PM, Jan 12, 2013
Astronomers have discovered the largest known structure in the universe - a group of quasars so large it would take 4 billion years to cross it while traveling at speed of light. The immense scale also challenges Albert Einstein's Cosmological Principle, the assumption that the universe looks the same from every point of view, researchers said. ...
12:01 PM, Jan 12, 2013
