The march will begin through a brief rally at 10:00am at Muktangan followed by a procession on different city streets. The committee will leave for Dinajpur at 12:00noon and hold rallies at different points on its way tomorrow and the next day.

The march will end through a grand rally at Phulbari on March 25 through adopting 'Phulbari Declaration' and announcing the next course of action, the committee members told newsmen at a press conference at Dhaka Reporters' Unity yesterday.

Declaring the bus-march programme, Professor Anu Muhammad, member secretary of the committee, said Energy Adviser Mahmudur Rahman, who had earlier denied existence of the contract with Asia Energy, has recently said the contract with the company on Phulbari coalmine is against the national interest.

"On behalf of the people of this country we want to clearly state that not only the contract with Asia Energy but all the previous contracts that are to cause disaster in the mine sector of the country and signed secretly, should be scraped immediately," he said.

Muhammad, a renowned economist of the country, also said Bangladesh will count a loss of eight billion dollars in 30 years if Asia Energy is allowed to extract coal from Phulbari Coalmine.

The loss will be much more if bio-diversity, environment, uncertainty of the life of the locals, physical damages and energy security are considered in the calculation, he added.

Convenor of the committee Sheikh Mohammad Shaidullah, geologist and mining expert SK Abdullah, former chairman of Power Development Board Nuruddin Mahmud Kamal, Zunaid Saki of Gonosanghoti Andolon and Ruhin Hossain Prince of Communist Party of Bangladesh were also present at the press conference.