Major opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party on Thursday termed the proposed budget for the 2024-2025 fiscal a new plan of looting.
Amid the sky rocketing prices of essentials, dollar crisis and fall of reserves, Finance Minister Abul Hassan Mahmood Ali placed a Tk 797,000 crore budget for the fiscal year 2024-2025 in parliament.
In an instant reaction, the BNP secretary general Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir alleged that the so-called budget shows more expenditure than income.
“This budget has been prepared for looting. The entire burden will be imposed on the people and loans from banks and foreign sources will increase further,” he said.
“There is nothing for the people in this proposed budget. This budget is meant for wholesale corruption in the name of mega projects,” he added.
The BNP secretary alleged that the proposed budget would increase the burden on the common people.
The prices of all items will soar with the budget. The corruption in the power sector is known to all,” he said, adding that the proposed budget would help looters to increase the prices of all services.
BNP standing committee member Abdul Moyeen Khan described the proposed budget for the financial year 2024–25 as a cruel play on reality.
“In a word, this entire budget process is a tool arranged by the Awami League government to exploit the poor people of this country,” he said.
Moyeen Khan added that the government had created an oligarchic state and its budget after the election drama was another heartbreaking and pathetic deception.
“This unrepresentative government has no moral right to decide the fate of 18 crore people in this country for the next year and this is the biggest misfortune of Bangladesh today,” he said.
Leaders of the 12-party alliance also termed the proposed as anti-people.
Nagarik Oikya president Mahmudur Rahman Manna alleged that the proposed budget reflect the attitude of the government of looters.
“This budget will push the country towards darkness further,” he said, adding that this budget created scopes for looting the people afresh.
Leaders of the left leaning democratic alliance also mentioned the proposed budget as so-called and loan-dependent one.
Rejecting the proposed budget, convener of the alliance and BaSoD general secretary Bazlur Rashid Firoz, Communist Party of Bangladesh president Shah Alam, Ganatantrik Biplabi Party general secretary Moshrefa Mishu and Biplabi Communist League general secretary Iqbal Kabir Jahid, among others, urged the government for formulating a people-friendly budget.
The leaders said that the budget was prepared to take loan from domestic and foreign sources to meet up the deficit of Tk 2.56 lakh crore.
Biplabi Workers party general secretary Saiful Islam alleged that there was no piece of good news for the people in the proposed budget.
“The proposed budget has been prepared to keep international donor agencies, including the International Monetary Fund, happy. But it is uncertain to get the desired loan and investment from those agencies,” he said.
