Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has said opposition leader Khaleda Zia’s son Tarique Rahman attempted to kill her through grenade attack on August 21, 2004.
The premier was addressing a civic gathering at Ashuganj in Brahmanbaria after inaugurating a 53MW power plant constructed by Ashuganj Power Company Ltd.
Hasina slammed the BNP-led government for making Bangladesh a haven of terrorism, militancy and corruption.
She said her government initiated war crimes trial in line with the election pledges. “The families of the martyrs along with the countrymen are now happy with the verdicts.”
Criticising BNP founder Major General Ziaur Rahman for his role, Hasina said her father Bangabandhu started the trial but after his assassination, the military government of General Zia stopped the trial and released the convicted accused.
She alleged that opposition leader Khaleda Zia repeated what her husband had done.
Regarding the growing demand for power, she urged people to be very economical in using electricity and gas.
“Your small cutback will allow others to have access to electricity and gas,” she said.
She also laid the foundation stones of five other plants of the same company with a generation capacity of 1,376MW.
Hasina blamed the previous BNP-Jamaat government for not adding a single megawatt of electricity.
“They even did not carry out the maintenance work on the existing power plants.”
To overcome the huge power shortage, the government started implementing short-, medium- and long-term plans to increase generation, she said.
Construction works of 55 power plants with a combined capacity of 3870MW were completed over the last four and a half years, Hasina said adding that the total installed capacity has risen to 8537MW.
Hasina, also in charge of the power and energy ministry, said construction work of 34 other power plants with 6,951MW was nearing completion and tender for 19 others with 3,974MW was under process.
The premier mentioned that her government took initiatives to produce coal-fired electricity to minimise its cost. “Moreover, the import of 250 megawatts of power from India will begin soon.”
Hasina also said initiatives were taken to produce electricity in a joint venture with India-Bhutan and Nepal.
She mentioned about the agreement with Russia to generate 2,000MW of nuclear power.
The present government is also encouraging the use of renewable energy. Some 3m solar home systems have already been set up and they are producing about 100MW in the remote areas of the country.
She also said the government installed 9,000km transmission and 300,000km distribution lines so far and set up 20 grid substations for electricity transmission.
The prime minister claimed that about 62% people of the country were brought under electricity coverage with 3.2m new connections given during the last four and a half years.
Listing some other achievements of the government, Hasina requested people to vote the AL-led grand alliance in the next general elections for the continuation of the development activities.
