The arrears of the employees of Beximco will be paid by February by selling mortgaged shares of two Beximco companies, Labor and Employment Adviser Brigadier General (Retd) Dr. Sakhawat Hossain said.

He was speaking to reporters after the sixth meeting on Beximco at the conference room of the Ministry of Shipping on Tuesday (January 28) afternoon.

The labor adviser said, "We believe that a bigger incident than reserve fraud has occurred in the case of lending to Beximco."

He said that the arrears of Beximco employees, who have not received their salaries for five months, will be paid by February by selling mortgaged shares of Beximco Pharma and Shahinpukur Ceramic.

Dr. Sakhawat said that the total debt of Beximco Limited is Tk. 40,000 crore. Of this, Tk. 12,000 crore has been taken against 16 non-existent companies.

We have fulfilled the reasonable demands of the railway employees as much as possible. Still, why are they protesting, Finance Adviser Salehuddin Ahmed has questioned.

He said this while talking to reporters after the meeting of the Advisery Committee on Government Procurement at the Secretariat on Tuesday (January 28).

The Finance Adviser said that we have done as much as is necessary for the railway employees for humanitarian reasons. The overtime issue has been resolved. It is not possible to meet the demands beyond this. The economic situation of the country has to be considered.

He also said that no decision has been made to give dearness allowance to government employees. However, no decision has been made yet on whether it will be given or not. The decision to increase the allowance of those in foreign missions was made long ago. He also said that rice and wheat stocks will be ensured so that there is no shortage during Ramadan.

All independent Ebtedayia Madrasas in Bangladesh will be nationalized in phases, said Joint Secretary of the Technical Madrasa Department S.M. Masudul Haque.

He made this known after returning from a meeting with a delegation of teachers on Tuesday (January 28).

S.M. Masudul Haque said, we have started working on several additional issues, including the six-point demands you had.

Agreeing with your first demand to nationalize all institutions, we have decided to nationalize all Ebtedayia Madrasas in Bangladesh in phases.

You had several other demands, such as academic recognition being suspended, which we will start this June. We have taken a new decision that we will start MPO registration of all your Ebtedayia Madrasas from 2025. In the initial stage, we will nationalize all other madrasas, including the 1519 primary independent Ebtedayia Madrasas that are under grant.

The European Union has assured all kinds of support for organizing elections in the democratic journey, said Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) AMM Nasir Uddin.

The Chief Election Commissioner told reporters after a meeting of the Election Commission with the European Union (EU) delegation at the Election Building in Agargaon in the capital on Tuesday (January 28).

He said that all kinds of preparations will be made to ensure the smooth conduct of the upcoming elections. We have objected to anything that undermines the independence of the EC.

Stating that the EU agrees to maintain the independence of the Election Commission, the Chief Election Commissioner said that the EU has given importance to reforms. However, the EU believes that the time for reforms has been short.

EU Ambassador Michael Miller said that there was talk about the upcoming national elections. The EU will support Bangladesh in holding international-standard election