Govt mulls forming monitoring body for implementation of stimulus packages

The government is mulling the formation of a 3-tier monitoring team to check the utilisation of fund allocated under various stimulus packages it announced to take forward the coronavirus-hit economy.

The main task of the monitoring team will be to monitor whether the incentive packages are being implemented properly.

It will also look at how the package money is being used, whether those for whom the package has been made are getting assistance and to check whether any defaulter person or organization is getting any kind of assistance from it.

Bank and Financial Institutions Division on Thursday will hold a meeting in this regard with the Managing Directors and CEOs of state-owned banks, financial institutions.

It will discuss with stakeholders’ recommendations on these packages announced, assess potential losses and make recommendations to address any obstacles.

Md Ashadul Islam, Senior Secretary, Financial Institutions Division will convene the virtual meeting.

MDs of all state-owned banks and financial institutions including Sonali, Janata, Agrani, Rupali, Basic Bank will attend the meeting.

"The meeting will be attended by the managing directors of state-owned banks and financial institutions“, Joint Secretary of Financial Institutions Division Shukur Ali said.

“We will discuss their action plan for the implementation of these packages”, he added.

He said: "Basically the monitoring committee set up by Bangladesh Bank will monitor the overall process." Besides, each bank will have a separate committee and they will also monitor the usage of the funds, he said.

As these are government announced package, the Ministry of Finance will take care of the overall implementation of the packages.

Managing Director of State-run Sonali Bank, Ataur Rahman Prodhan, said, “Sonali Bank has already started implementing the stimulus package program by providing fund to the cash-crunch hit Bangladesh Biman”.

Meanwhile, the finance ministry is also preparing a summary to be presented to the prime minister with a full account of the incentives announced by the government.

The summary will also contain detailed descriptions of the action plans of government banks and concerned ministries.

The concerned banks and ministries have in this regard prepared an action plan and have sent them to the finance ministry.