Civil servants will receive a festival allowance for the first time for the Bengali New Year in the first week of April at 20% of their basic pay.
Finance Division yesterday issued a circular, signed by Joint Secretary Md Habibur Rahman, asking the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) to take necessary measures for disbursing the amount.
“It will require more than Tk317 crore to give the festival allowance titled 'Bangla Nababarsha Bhata' to public servants and government owned autonomous bodies,” a Finance Division official said.
The CAG will take necessary steps to pay out the bonus before April 14, the day of Bengali New Year, the official said.
The government spends more than Tk1600 crore giving basic salaries to its 2.1 million employees.
According to the circular, the Finance Division asked the CAG to approve the bills of Bangla Nababarsha Bhata before April 14 because there is allocation for that bonus before the revised budget. Later in the revised budget of 2015-16 the amount will be adjusted, the circular said.
On September 6, former cabinet secretary Muhammad Musharraf Hossain Bhuiyan announced that public servants would be getting a 20 percent bonus for the Bangla New Year in addition to other festival bonuses.
The cabinet on September 6, 2015 approved the eighth pay scale for government employees with a highest basic pay of Tk78,000 and a minimum of Tk8,250, allowing an across-the-grade hike ranging from 91 to 101 percent.
On Dec 21, 2014, former central bank governor Mohammad Farasuddin, who chaired the Eighth Pay Commission, recommended a pay scale of minimum Tk8,200 and a maximum of Tk80,000.
