Dhaka, Jun 5 – The additional excise duty imposed on bank accounts in the proposed budget will increase the influence of bank money in the country’s economy and it will act as a tool to protect loan defaulters, said Executive Director of Transparency International Bangladesh (TIB) Dr Iftekharuzzaman on Monday.
“Of course, excise duty proposed in the budget will pose a negative impact…it’ll discourage general depositors to deposit their money in banks,” he said at a meeting at the Anti-Corruption Commission’s (ACC) head office.
Replying to questions from reporters, the TIB chief said the government must rethink of the excise duty as it will promote bank money and create risk.
Noting that a strong discussion should be held in Parliament in this regard, he said the excise duty is not acceptable both morally and legally. “This is injustice to general people as it has no moral base.”
Iftekhar said there is no example of such excise duty on bank accounts around the world and expressed his surprise that the system was introduced without any legal base.
He said money will be collected from general people through excise duty increasing tax burden on them and a huge amount of this money will be spent to protect ‘corrupt banking sector’, which will ultimately patronise corruption and irregularities.
Speaking on the occasion, ACC Chairman Iqbal Mahmood said political will is a must to combat corruption and the Commission has received adequate allocation in the proposed budget, which is manifests government’s strong political will.
He said general people do not get public services due to corruption, and it creates black money and promotes money-laundering and terrorism.
The ACC chairman said corruption will adversely affect the future generation, calling upon all to come forward and raise a united voice against the menace.
At the meeting, the ACC and TIB signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) aiming to increase cooperation to jointly carry out prevention activities to check graft.
TIB Executive Director Dr Iftekharuzzaman and ACC Director General Dr Shamsul Arefin signed the deal on behalf of their respective sides.
ACC Commissioner AFM Aminul Islam and its Secretary Abu M Mustafa Kamal were, among others, present. – UNB
