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Check extortion to bring down essentials' prices

Business leaders ask Babar

Staff Correspondent
Business leaders yesterday called on the government not to engage the Rapid Action Battalion (Rab) and other law enforcing agencies to check the price hike of essentials.
They feared Rab and other specialised crime-busting units' involvement in controlling the market might prove futile and backfire.
Leaders of Federation of Bangladesh Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FBCCI) at a meeting with State Minister for Home Affairs Lutfozzaman Babar
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also asked for immediate actions against extortion from businessmen and the freight trucks plying the highways. The rampant extortion accounts for the rise in prices of essential items, they observed.
They said raiding the warehouses and kitchen markets would not help in controlling the price spiral. The law enforcers should better go all out against the middlemen who deprive farmers of fair prices while extract excessively from the end-users.
The government needs concerted efforts involving the concerned ministries and law enforcing agencies to address the price hike issue, they said.
The business leaders, however, lauded the government for posting Rab and other law-enforcers at the shopping malls. They said the lawenforcers' presence has improved the security situation at the markets with the Eid approaching.
They said silent extortion is still going on though law and order has improved and direct toll collection in some cases has been reduced by the law enforcers' prompt actions.
They also urged the government to help rid the business community of phone threats.
FBCCI President Abdul Awal Mintoo led the delegation of businessmen. Coming out of the meeting, he told The Daily Star that the state minister has assured them of clearly defining the roles of Rab and other law enforcing agencies in checking the price spiral.
"The minister has also assured us that the ministry will take an integrated role to contain the spiral of prices. He has sought cooperation from businessmen in stopping the silent extortion," Mintoo said.
The minister has asked the inspector general of police (IGP) to take steps to ease traffic congestion in the city especially in Motijheel and stop terrorism centring the garment wastes ahead of Eid. He also said that the government is already procuring vehicles for police to patrol the highways for checking extortion.
Secretaries in charge of home
and commerce ministries, IGP, director generals of the Bangladesh Rifles (BDR) and Ansars, chief of Rab and other high officials were present at the meeting held at the Secretariat.