Address of Welcome by the FE Editor, Moazzem Hossain

On behalf of the Financial Express, I welcome you all to this event. We are, indeed, very happy that you could spare some of your valuable time to join us here, despite your busy schedule. Your presence is a source of great inspiration for us. This is a joyous moment for us. This event to-day commemorates the 18th year of the FE's publication. This is a pleasant occasion. We are privileged to extend you a hearty welcome. Your presence will, indeed, embolden us to look forward with new optimum, about our future. This is not the occasion for speech-making. I do fully understand this and appreciate it well. Having said that, I would like to note that the Financial Express remains strongly committed to upholding the cause of objective journalism. Unbiased news and unprejudiced views are our prime journalistic objective. We have been upholding this objective since our inception. On this occasion, we reiterate our commitment to making continuing efforts to purse this objective. As a financial daily, our focus has always been on news covering economic activities at national, regional and international levels. And our editorial policy stands firmly for an open, market-oriented economy in a liberal socio-political environment, with the state playing a pro-active role for inclusive growth. Our readers, patrons and well-wishers have appreciated our role as a financial daily. We will continue to make efforts to maintain this character of FE. As you all would appreciate, the economy of Bangladesh witnessed some notable developments over the past two decades. However, it has still to go a long way to unlock its full potential. As the economic activities have expanded and continue to do so, we, in the FE, take note of this development. We have been trying to expand our news content in the fitness of things in to-day's situation. And we have expanded our regular edition from an eight-page format at its inception to 20-page one now, to meet the needs of the time. Furthermore, we would like to assure you that we will go for more enlarged regular edition in the future, as and when the need arises. Being distinctive as a financial or economic daily does not mean that the FE can afford to ignore the general news topics concerning socio-political and other activities. We do not do this as a matter of deliberate choice, as we understand it that the broad societal developments do impact the economy. The FE believes that the media can be one of the catalysts for changes -- the changes that can help Bangladesh move forward steadily ahead. For such changes to take place, a two-way objective flow of information is critically important. We are committed to ensuring such a flow of information, despite many exogenous and endogenous constraints to doing this, under the given circumstances in our country. Information, as you all know it well, is vital in to-day's world. Informed decision-making, having conceptual and contextual clarities, at both macro- and micro-level, be it for businesses or public organisations or any others, can lead to successful outcomes. And it is needless to say that nothing succeeds like success. Having said this, perhaps, taxing your patience much beyond what I stated at the outset, I would like to conclude here. And before I do that, I must acknowledge here the valuable support and unstinted cooperation that we, in the FE, have always received from the equity-holders of our owning company, IPL, in general and the esteemed members of its board of directors. I thank you all, once again, for your gracious presence here.