Interim government portfolios allocated

Portfolios of the interim government of Bangladesh were allocated Friday by Chief Adviser Prof Muhammad Yunus, keeping his hold on 27 important ministries and divisions for now.
The portfolios were distributed to 13 of the advisers of the post-uprising government as three were yet to take oath.
A 17-member interim government, headed by Nobel-laureate economist Prof Yunus as Chief Adviser, was sworn in on Thursday evening, following the fall of Sheikh Hasina government on August 5 in the face of a student-mass uprising.
The distribution of charges of ministries for the advisers was announced in a circular issued Friday by the cabinet division.
Prof Yunus has taken charge of 27 ministries while Dr Salehuddin Ahmed, former Bangladesh Bank governor, gets two ministries: the ministry of finance and the ministry of planning. Each of the12 others takes the helm of single ministry.
Retired army officer Brigadier-Gen Dr M Sakhawat Hossain will head the Ministry of Home Affairs.
Of the two young uprising veterans inducted in the interim cabinet, Md Nahid Islam has got the responsibility of the Ministry of Posts, Telecommunications and ICT while Asif Mahmud Sajib Bhuiya the Ministry of Youth and Sports.
Dr Yunus will look after the Cabinet Division and the Armed Forces Division, the Ministries of Defence, Education, Road Transport and Bridges, Food, Housing and Public Works, Land, Textiles and Jute, Agriculture, Science and Technology, Railways, Public Administration, Power, Energy and Mineral Resources, Shipping, Water Resources, Women and Children Affairs, Disaster Management and Relief, Information and Broadcasting, Expatriates' Welfare and Overseas Employment, Commerce, Labour and Employment, Cultural Affairs, Civil Aviation and Tourism, Liberation War Affairs, Chittagong Hill Tracts Affairs, and Primary and Mass Education.
Dhaka University law teacher Prof Dr Asif Nazrul has been assigned to the Ministry of Law, Justice and Parliamentary Affairs.
Former Attorney-General A.F. Hassan Ariff will look after the Ministry of Local Government, Rural Development and Cooperatives, while former foreign secretary Md Touhid Hossain has been assigned to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Environment-protection activist and lawyer Syeda Rizwana Hasan has been appointed adviser for the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, and NGO activist Sharmin S Murshid for the Ministry of Social Welfare.
Dr AFM Khalid Hossain holds the Ministry of Religious Affairs.
Women-rights activist Farida Akhtar has been assigned as adviser for the Ministry of Fisheries and Livestock and Nurjahan Begum for the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.
Meanwhile, the new advisory council sat for its maiden meeting at State Guesthouse Jamuna on Friday afternoon to chalk out way forward through the deserted arena of governance.

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