The central bank has differed with a proposal of the Palli Sanchay Bank (PSB) to launch micro-savings programme for apparel workers in urban areas, officials said.
The Bangladesh Bank (BB) has found that the move is out of purview of the specialised bank, which was established only to provide banking services to the poor and underprivileged people in rural areas.
The government formed the bank by converting the 'Ekti Bari Ekti Khamar' project and turned each of the offices of the samity (association) under the project into branches. Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina inaugurated 100 branches of the bank at a time through video conference on June 22 this year.
The bank will work with the members of the samity for their welfare through collecting deposit and providing loan for investment in businesses. The bank will encourage the samity members for savings and provide loans with or without collateral.
A senior official at the Ministry of Finance (MoF) told the FE, chairman of the bank Mihir Kanti Majumder, in a recent letter to the ministry, proposed to include four million readymade garment (RMG) workers in the micro-savings programme to promote their savings habits.
In this case, he opined that launching of the micro-savings programme will include the apparel sector workers directly in the financial sector which will help them bring changes in their lifestyles.
Mr Majumder proposed that the bank, alongside running of the micro-savings programme in rural areas, will also conduct the same programme in urban areas for apparel sector workers.
He also suggested for depositing 50 per cent incentives of Tk 15 billion, given to the apparel sector each year, to the RMG workers' welfare savings fund.
The central bank, in a recent letter to the MoF, said the Palli Sanchay Bank got licence for carrying out banking activities in rural areas, not in urban domain. It will work only for the welfare of members of the samities of 'Ekti Bari Ekti Khamar' initiative.
The BB said most of the garment factories are located in urban areas and their workers also live near the factories. Thus, neither the apparel factories nor their workers fall within the purview of the PSB.
It also said cash incentives are being given to apparel factory owners to support their business. They would not agree to pay 50 per cent of the amount to the workers' welfare fund.
When contacted, PSB chairman Majumder told the FE, "It is not necessary that my bank itself has to be engaged in micro-savings programme for apparel workers. If the area is out of purview of my bank, any other banks can be engaged in the programme."
"The question is whether the government is taking my idea or not. Most of the apparel workers are from rural areas, and after getting salaries, they send money to their relatives living in villages. If they can be brought under micro-savings programme, they will be financially gainer," he said.
The Palli Sanchay Bank was formed with Tk 2.0 billion paid-up capital of which Tk 1.20 billion is being provided by the government. Presently, there are some 40,101 associations under the 'Ekti Bari Ekti Khamar' project.
Some 2.4 million members are involved with those associations, whose savings reached over Tk 7.0 billion. From the bank, the association members will get loans at less than 10 per cent rate of interest.
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