Vested property to be returned

The cabinet yesterday gave final nod to the Vested Property Return (Amendment) Bill, 2009 paving the way to turn the seized property over to the real owners from the Hindus.
The approval came at a regular meeting at the Cabinet Division at the Secretariat with Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in the chair.
Hasina at the meeting also directed the home ministry to arrest the culprits responsible for the bomb attack on AL lawmaker Fazle Noor Taposh and unrest in the RMG sector.
With the approval of the vested property bill, the government would now make it a law in parliament soon which would replace the caretaker government's Vested Property Return Ordinance.
The government would also publish a fresh list of vested property after a review across the country 210 days into passage of the law. With the law in effect, the long-standing complexities over the vested property are expected to be resolved now.
The vested property, which was termed Enemy Property before the Liberation War in 1971, was left behind by the Hindus during the 1947 partition and the India-Pakistan war in 1965.
The government took its ownership by enacting the enemy property act after independence in 1971 and renamed the law as the Vested Property Act in 1974.
There is about 6.43 lakh acres of land counted as vested property, of which about 1.97 acres is returnable. According to the new bill, the government would have no authority on about 4.46 lakh acres of land.
The previous Awami League government, just before the end of its tenure in 2001, framed a new law -- the Vested Property Return Act. The government had also fixed a 180-day timeframe to prepare a list of properly documented vested property in order to take steps to restore falsely seized land.
The subsequent BNP government by the end of 2001 amended the bill replacing the 180-day deadline with an 'indefinite period'. The list was however never completed.
The immediate past caretaker government took an initiative to publish the list of vested property in 61 districts and sent it to the BG Press on November 30 last year.
After assuming office, the AL government decided to review the list and asked the BG Press to stop publishing it.
A parliamentary watchdog on March 11 asked the Ministry of Land to draft the new Vested Property Return Act restoring the six-month deadline for the local authorities to compile a list of the land seized under the law.
At yesterday's meeting, the cabinet also approved in principle the Acid Control (Amendment) Bill, 2009 in a bid to establish "strict government control on the use of acid materials and curb acid related crimes".
It also approved in principle the National Institute of Biotechnology Act, 2009, Bangladesh Environment Conservation (Amendment) Act, 2009 and the Environment Court Act, 2009.
Besides, the cabinet gave approval to amendment to the Bangladesh Private Sector Infrastructure Guidelines (BPSIG) providing that from now on, like Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (Buet), representatives of other public engineering universities will come under the purview of the guidelines.
Deputy Press Secretary to the Prime Minister Mahbubul Hoque Shakil briefed newspersons in the conference room of the Press Information Department about the cabinet meeting.