The deputy commissioners yesterday asked the government to change the financial year to April-March from July-June, in order to complete development works in the dry season.
They also recommended to establish an authoritative body to deal with agricultural loans and to handle disaster management funds.
They made these suggestions in separate meetings with the ministers including to Finance Minister AMA Muhith and the prime minister’s advisor Tawfiq-e-Elahi Chowdhury.
“We can do our development work smoothly during the dry season, October to April, so the financial year should be April to March,” a DC told the Dhaka Tribune.
Muhith said the financial year should not be changed, adding that he discussed the matter with the prime minister.
He said agriculture loan was a good system, but there was some mismanagement in its distribution system.
“We should try to manage it properly to help the poor people of the country. The government will set a mechanism over the matter,” he said.
The DCs told the minister that the private banks were not distributing any agricultural loans. Poor farmers were depending only on the public banks for agricultural loans, they said.
Muhith assured to take steps on the matter after communicating this to the Bangladesh Bank governor.
The minister, however, reproached the DCs for demanding back the income tax they had previously paid. “The government suspended the income tax return in 1972 because of the financial crisis but now we have reintroduced it. The DCs should be proud to give income tax,” he said.
Cabinet Secretary Mosharraf Hossain Bhuiyan told reporters at a press briefing that the cabinet division would send a proposal to the law ministry for amending the penal code to empower DCs for summary trial, as per their demand.
The law ministry will examine the matter and take further steps, he said.
