Oil- Gas body declares sit-in programmes

The National Committee to Protect Oil, Gas, Mineral Resources, Power and Port  declared Saturday the next course of programmes to shore up support for their movement on various issues, particularly stopping the Rampal Power Plant, to save the Sundarbans.
The Oil-Gas Committee will hold a protest rally at Phulbari on June 2, with demands that the government should fulfill all the points of the Phulbari agreement the then government signed with people on August 30, 2006.
The Oil-Gas Committee has also declared sit-in programmes in Khulna and Bagerhat on June 3 and 4 respectively, according to a news agency.
Speaking at a press conference at Bishwa Shahitya Kendro in the capital, leaders of the Oil-Gas Committee observed that the government is violating national interest and endangering the world’s largest mangrove forest, the Sundarbans, by implementing the Rampal power plant project.
They also condemned the government for allowing a company of the Orion Group to set up a power plant at a place more close to the Sundarbans compared to Rampal.
Speaking at the press conference, Oil-Gas Committee member secretary Prof Anu Muhammad also urged the government to scrap the contracts of high-cost rental power plants and go for larger scale gas-based power generation and renewable energy initiatives.