The Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC) (Bengali: বাংলাদেশ টেলিযোগাযোগ নিয়ন্ত্রণ কমিশন) is an independent commission founded under the Bangladesh Telecommunication Act, 2001 (Act # 18 of 2001). The BTRC is responsible for regulating all matters related to telecommunications (wire, cellular, satellite and cable) of Bangladesh. The chairman of the commission has the status of a judge of the Bangladesh High Court.[1] Md Mohiuddin Ahmed is the chairman of the commission.[2]
History
In 1979, the Bangladesh Telegraph and Telephone Board was created through the Bangladesh Telegraph and Telephone Board ordinance.[3] The ordinance was revised in 1995.[3]
The BTRC started operating from 31 January 2002 with a vision of facilitating affordable telecommunication services and increasing the teledensity to at least 10 telephones per 100 inhabitants by 2010.[3] The ordinance was updated with the passage of Telecommunication Act (Corrected) bill in 2010.[3]
In 2016, the salaries of the commissions and chairman was doubled by the government of Bangladesh.[4]
Censorship
In March 2013, BTRC was criticised by the Human Rights Watch[5]
and other groups for banning a number of "atheist blogger" websites.[6] Blogs banned by the BTRC included the award-winning popular blog[7]
by Asif Mohiuddin, who had been attacked by a machete wielding group in January.[8]
Mohiuddin was arrested the following month,[9] along with three other bloggers
.[10]