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No action before enactment of law

High-powered committee in a month to draft law for implementing nat'l broadcast policy, says Inu

Staff Correspondent
Information Minister Hasanul Haq Inu yesterday said the newly formulated National Broadcast Policy gave his ministry "no administrative jurisdiction" to take action against the electronic media.
"This is a guideline, not an act. So, it does not have legal effectiveness. A policy is needed to enact a law and form a commission for its execution, ” he told journalists following a meeting with the leaders of the Association of Television Channel Owners (Atco) at the information ministry.
He announced that a "high-powered" committee comprising representatives of all stakeholders would be formed in a month to prepare a draft of the national broadcast law.
A search committee, which too will consist of all the stakeholders, will be formed soon to select chairman and members of an independent commission, Inu said. "The act and the commission will regulate the electronic media, not the information ministry."
Atco, an organisation of private television and radio stations, expressed concern over some points of the policy and urged the minister to remove those. It also urged the minister not to implement the policy without first forming an independent commission with "qualified, neutral and nonpartisanpersons".
Felani Killing
It was a very bad act: senior BSF official
Staff Correspondent
A senior official of Indian Border Security Force yesterday said the killing of Bangladeshi girl Felani Khatun by the BSF was a very bad act.
The BSF court didn't do justice by acquitting the accused BSF jawan, BSF Eastern Region Chief BD Sharma said in an exclusive interview with the BBC Bangla service.
"I cannot accept the verdict. A teenage girl died ... the verdict was inappropriate," he said.
"As a Bangalee, I can understand the sentiment of Bangladeshi people," he said in the interview aired yesterday.
"What happened was really awful. But we have to work in line with the law. A trial was held, but I don't agree with the court verdict.
SEE PAGE 11 COL 6
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Chairman of NTV Mosaddek Ali, who heads Atco, said the oiganisation demanded the formation of the commission before the formulation of the policy and the law.
“Our main demand was that an independent commission be formed within the shortest possible time;" said Atco General Secretary Shykh Seraj, who is director of Channel i.
Earlier at a roundtable at a Gulshan hotel yesterday, Inu said if any feature of the policy was found to be ambiguous or unclear and caused concern for the media personnel, it would be omitted during the drafting of the law.
He urged the BNP and other parties to come up with specific recommendations for the law instead of demanding its cancellation.
Bangladesh Copyright and IP Forum in association with Dhaka Tribune and Bangla Tribune oiganised the discussion, moderated by Associate Professor Rubaet Ferdous of the Mass Communication and Journalism department of Dhaka University.
Some discussants criticised the policy, saying the government might apply it to control the electronic media.
Mass media expert Muhammed Jahangir said that the policy was formulated out of "political considerations" and some words used in the policy might be used as tools for harassment of media personnel.
President of Bangladesh Federal Union of Journalists Man jurul Ahsan Bulbul and Chairman of Television and Film Studies of DU Prof AJM Shafiul Alam Bhuiyan said a section of those who are criticising the policy are doing so on political grounds while others did so without reading the text of the policy.
Inu said Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina had asked him to initiate the formulation of the policy to render some powers of the information ministry to an independent commission. "Why should the government, the administration and the information ministry be at loggerheads with the mass media?" Inu quoted the PM as saying
"The policy has been formulated to decentralise the power of the information ministry," Inu said, claiming the policy would protect the interests of the audience; journalists, owners and the state "The policy will also prevent the electronic media from spreading misleading fabricated and false information," he said.