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Minister for legal action

Tk 4.5cr phone bills overdue with MPs

By Staff Correspondent
Post and Telecommunications Minister Tariqul Islam told the latiya Sangsad yesterday that legal action should be taken against the political leaders who did not clear their telephone bills despite repeated requests.
"The politicians lead the nation but they are not above law,” lie said while replying to a question from Advocate Khairul Enam and supplemen-taries from others.
Many members of the 1986, 1988 and the present parliaments did not pay their overdue telephone bills the minister said. "I personally requested them. Some of them paid their bills but most of them did not," he regretted.
Tariqul also informed the House that steps have been taken to check ghost billing for digital lines through introduction of call-check system'.
He also said three more post offices will be set up at lurain in the capital, Kohla-hati cantonment in Dinajpur and Balaghata in Bandarban in the current fiscal year.
Earlier addressing press conference in the city the minister said MPs from both the Treasury and Opposition benches have overdue telephone bills of Tk 4.50 crore.
"Almost 90 per cent members of the present parliament did not pay their telephone bills, although they get a monthly telephone allowance of Tk 4000," ne said.
Of the total overdue bills, members of the present par liament share Tk 3.49 crore.
About 80 to 85 members of the third and fourth par liaments did not pay their telephone bills, he added.
"They (the MPs) are re spectable and conscious politicians. As a colleague, I warned them about the over due bills, but so far there had been no response. I have not yet disconnected their lines," the Minister said.
He said, an MP of the Treasury bench has overdue telephone bills of about Tk 9 lakh, while another from Jatiya Party has bills of about Tk 8 lakh.
Also, different government bodies have overdue bills of about Tk 50 crore, semi-government 18.50 crore, private 131.84 crore and newspapers 2.39 crore.
'We filed 6564 cases against MPs, newspapers and others under the 1885 Telegraph Act, under which, the telephone authority can confiscate the property of the accused. But this drive has not been successful," the Minister added.
Toriqul however noted that due to improvement of the system, complaints against ghost billing has declined to 3000 from previous 12000 to 14000 daily.
To further improve the system, "One Stop Customer Service" will be introduced at a cost of Tk 70 crore from September, T&T Chairman MH Chowdhury, who was present at the press conference said.