BM Desk:The size of the Annual Development Program (ADP) has been reduced by a record amount. The expenditure has been reduced by 18 percent from the original ADP for the current fiscal year 2024-25. The amount has been reduced by 49 thousand crore taka. This brings the size of the Revised Annual Development Program (RADP) to 2 lakh 16 thousand crore taka. The original ADP was 2 lakh 65 thousand crore taka. Never before has the ADP been cut at such a high rate.
The RADP was approved at the meeting of the National Economic Council (NEC) yesterday, Monday. The meeting held at the NEC conference room of the Planning Commission in Sher-e-Bangla Nagar in the capital was chaired by the Chief Advisor to the Interim Government, Professor Dr. Muhammad Yunus. All members of the Advisory Council and the concerned secretaries were present.
After the meeting, Planning and Education Advisor Dr. Wahiduddin Mahmud presented the details of the RADP in the briefing. Regarding the instructions of the Chief Advisor at the NEC meeting, he said that the Chief Advisor has ordered that all projects be included in the EMIS software. This will show the latest status of the implementation progress of any project. If there is no updated information on any project, the Finance Ministry will not release money. In addition, the Chief Advisor has instructed to give utmost importance to the environment for accepting projects.
In this context, the Planning Advisor said, ‘We all know how the no of the Department of Environment was turned into yes earlier. There were irregularities in giving clearance from the Department of Environment even for building houses. They will now be strictly looked into.’
Stating that 7 to 8 thousand crore taka of pensions of teachers under MPO have been lost, Education and Planning Advisor Professor Wahiduddin Mahmud said that a DO letter (semi-official letter) has been given to the Finance Ministry to resolve the matter. Regarding corruption in the Ministry of Education, he further said that many projects of this ministry have also been closed due to corruption.
In explaining such a big cut in RADP, Dr. Wahiduddin Mahmud said, “We want the RADP to be small in the current fiscal year. Because if we cannot spend it with a large allocation, it does not look good. At the same time, major changes are being made in the budget management of the next fiscal year. Since revenue collection is already low, allocation will not be made with a large deficit.”
The briefing informed that the approved RADP allocation includes the government’s own funds of 1 lakh 35 thousand crore and 81 thousand crore taka from development partner organizations and country loans. There were 1 thousand 352 projects in the original ADP. The number of projects in the revised ADP has increased to 1 thousand 437. In addition, unauthorized new projects have decreased by 770, which was 910 in the original ADP.
Among the five sectors that received the highest allocation in the revised ADP, 48,253 crore taka has been allocated to transport and communication, 31,897 crore taka to power and energy, 20,349 crore taka to education, 19,653 crore taka to housing and community facilities, and 16,909 crore taka to local government and rural development.
The local government department received the highest allocation by ministry (36,158 crore taka). The power department received the second highest allocation (21,475 crore taka). The third highest allocation was given to the road transport and highways department (18,624 crore taka).
