Don`t create barrier to development: PM

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina on Monday made a fervent call to everybody to refrain from creating any barrier to the country`s development, saying there is a section of people who finds a "but" in every development project and tries to frustrate advancement on any plea.

In reference to the students` agitation against metro rail and teachers` movement against new pay scale, the prime minister said the rail line was taken through Dhaka University campus for the benefit of the students. She urged the teachers not to paralyze the academic activities in the name of movement to attain respect and privilege.

The prime minister was addressing a big public rally at Suhrawardy Udyan organized by Bangladesh Awami League marking the "Homecoming Day of Bangabandhu" on January 10, 1972, from Pakistan captivity after the country`s victory in the War of Liberation in 1971.

Sheikh Hasina said her government has been working for changing the fate of the people and wants the people of Bangladesh would get a better and prosperous life. She said she has minimum knowledge what is beneficial for the people of Bangladesh and how they would be benefitted better.

The prime minister said people of Bangladesh could not imagine the pace of development seven years ago. Twenty-one years they were deprived of development. In fact, they witnessed development after Awami League took office in 1996, she said.

"Bangladesh is now on the road of progress and it would continue. We want to build a poverty- and hunger-free nation as dreamt by the Father of the Nation," she said, adding 50 million people could came out of extreme poverty over the last seven years of Awami League government.

"Bangladesh is now recognized as a lower middle-income country. But our target is to make Bangladesh a middle-income country," she said.

Sheikh Hasina expressed her full confidence in making Bangladesh a middle-income country and said none would be able to derail the country from the track by creating obstacles.

She urged people to keep confidence in her party about its capacity to move the country forward.