Shawdesh desk: Center for Policy Dialogue (CPD) executive director Dr Fahmida Khatun has said no central bank of the world plays tricks with information like Bangladesh Bank.
“They (central banks around the world) upload all the information on their websites. But, the Bangladesh Bank hides much information instead of putting those on its website. Because of it, journalists need free accsess to the central bank,” she said.

Dr Fahmida Khatun was speaking as the chief guest at a shadow parliament debate competition organised by Debate for Democracy over the merger of banks at the FDC in Dhaka on Saturday (May 18). Debate for Democracy Hasan Ahmed Chowdhury Kiron chared the debate competition.
Fahmida Khatun said anarchy in the country’s banking sector has reached such a stage that Bangladesh is being forced to take bank merger decisions at the IMF’s dictation. However, the initiatives of merger are facing great challenges due to the lack of preparations. “Forcible merger of banks will not be sustainable,” she said.
According to the CPD ED, the banking sector in Bangladesh has lost the capability of supporting the country’s overall economy due to lack of good governance. People have lost their faith in the banking sector. Bangladesh Bank becomes unable to give any gurantee to keep the deposits safe in the banks. As a result, depositors have become worried. “Those who are responsible for bleeding in the banking sector, they have remained untouchable. People cannot know the proper information about the defaulted amount of bank loans.”
Speaking at the debate, Hasan Ahmed Chowdhury Kiron said the banking sector in Bangladesh has collapsed. BASIC Bank was looted, Padma Bank was looted, everybody knows about “vault scandal” in Union Bank, while National Bank Limited has been burning since its birth. As a result, all the banks which were once approved on political consideration, are now on weak position. The main objective of the owners of these banks was looting. Now, Exim Bank is being merged with Padma Bank. Now there are great concerned whether the Exim Bank dies in the Padma.