Bonik Barta, BIDS honour entrepreneurs

Three entrepreneurs have been honoured by the Bonik Barta newspaper and the Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies (BIDS) for their contribution to job creation and the economy.

They are Maliha M Quadir, managing director of online service provider shohoz.com, Afroza Begum, managing director of Khan's Kitchen, and Faruk Hossen, proprietor of Madina Metal Industries.

Commerce Minister Tofail Ahmed gave away the Entrepreneurs Award 2017 to the winners at a ceremony at the Pan Pacific Sonargaon hotel in Dhaka on Monday.

Speaking on the occasion, KAS Murshid, director-general of the BIDS, said the winners attained success in their respective businesses thanks to their innovative ideas. “Innovation is a must for economic development.” Started its journey in 2014, shohoz.com is an online travel service provider and pioneered in offering bus tickets and launch tickets. It also sells tickets for movies, various events and cricket matches. Recently, it introduced ride-hailing service.

Quadir said the innovative idea was her only capital before the online service was introduced. “We provide online service to make people's live easy.”

Hossen, of Madina Metal Industries, started thinking of making parts in Bangladesh while importing various parts used in motorbikes. This led him to set up a factory in the BSCIC industrial area in Jessore in 2010 and production began in 2015. He employs 150 people now.

“I made the investment taking the risk and finally got success,” he said.

Khan's Kitchen was set up in Dhaka with an aim to provide safe and tasty food to office-goers at lower prices.

Begum said she got her business idea sensing that jobholders sought hygienic food during office hours.

“When I was a private jobholder I saw that my colleagues were taking unhygienic food during lunch. So, I developed a small business to serve my colleagues and later expanded it,” she said.

Opened in September last year, Khan's Kitchen supplies all types of local food.

This was the fifth time the Bonik Barta and the BIDS jointly handed out the awards.

Dewan Hanif Mahmud, editor of the Bonik Barta, spoke at the event, which was also attended by leaders of various chambers and trade bodies and heads of financial institutions, and corporate bodies.