Five injured in clash over dowry

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Bangladesh Telecommuni-cation Regulatory Commission (BTRC) now works on Saturdays to clear backlogs while the authorities have also provisioned extra allowances to stimulate its underpaid workforce, reports bdnews24.com.
"We have been working extended hours. Yet we cannot catch up," Chairman Manzurul Alam told the news agency while spending the second Saturday in his office.
After becoming BTRC chairman on April 19, the former general "bumped into piles of pending routine work."
Licence renewals, frequency allocations, equipment importing permissions and other day-to-day files were gathering dust.
"It has been hurting the industry, affecting consumers, impacting exchequer's earnings and above all eroding BTRC's reputation."
Alam said it is an uphill battle to train a specialised regulatory workforce and it is "hell broke loose" when such skilled officers migrate to the private sector for better salary.
"I don't blame them as everybody aspires for a decent living," said the new chairman who has recently injected extra cash into every BTRC official's monthly package.
They will receive housing allowance similar to the basic salary under new provision. "It has been done within the legal framework to motivate my colleagues," Alam said while simultaneously browsing the booklist for a newborn library.
BTRC is a member of the International Telecommuni-cation Union (ITU). "We get credit with 80 per cent discount for all ITU publications but nobody has ever placed any order," said the third chairman of more than five-year-old telecoms regulator.
"We have to have equal if not better human capital than the operators and that's why I have been hiring experts from the public and private sectors."
BTRC simultaneously serves the operators as well as the consumers, he said acknowledging the complexity.
"Legal, technical, economic, social and various other factors dominate the regulatory landscape and we have to conquer them.
"Throughout my career I believed in training and there will be no difference for anybody including myself in BTRC," said the signals officer turned by far the only infantry general before retiring from Bangladesh Army.
Referring to his recent visit to the Pakistani telecoms regulator, Alam said, "They have offered us hands on training in BTRC for free and we are building capacity to absorb that."
Alam will complete the first 100 days in BTRC Thursday. Unlike before, the regulator receives fewer "visitors" at its new office at Setu Bhaban that stands at the bottom of Mohakhali flyover.
"So-called visitors in any government office demonstrate utter inefficiency," Alam said.
He is simplifying regulatory approval processes that reduce "personal persuasion of the operator."
"Service providers should not even know what the BTRC office looks like let alone the officials," Alam said. He has planned to make web-based regulatory approval process without compromising the law.
"It is not at all a big deal," Alam said looking through the window at a zooming sports car climbing Mohakhali flyover. "And I will prove it, trust me."