Economists are critical of government guarantees given against substantial volume of loans negotiated by different state-owned enterprises (SoEs).
The stock of government guarantees valid beyond June 30, 2014 is nearly Tk.669 billion, an amount equivalent to the resources allocated to the country's Annual Development Programme (ADP).
The economists said such a large volume of 'contingent liabilities' might cause fiscal risks to the economy.
Citing examples, they said the government provided guarantee worth Tk.20 billion to US EXIM Bank for purchasing Boeing for the Bangladesh Biman Airlines.
On failure to repay loan in time, the guarantees are invoked and the liabilities for payment are passed on to the government.
They said there are many instances of failures in repaying instalments by the government agencies in the past. They said the government does not maintain transparency in this connection.
The economists vented their reactions at a seminar organised by the Policy Research Institute of Bangladesh (PRI) held at its Dhaka office last week.
According to the economists, the government has been paying to tenders every year for such type of failures in instalment payment by the government agencies.
Such type of failures might raise budget deficit which will lead to borrowing by the government mainly from the domestic sources.
They said the impact of the failure in payment of instalments by the government agencies becomes visible in the revised budget. There is 'no transparency' in this regard, they said.
Dr Zahid Hussain, lead economist at the Dhaka office of the World Bank (WB) who attended the programme as a panellist, said the contingent liabilities are on the rise.
He said if instalments of big loans become irregular, the budget deficit will widen and borrowing from the domestic sources will increase accordingly.
He said there is a lack of transparency as far as the payment for loan irregularities by the government-owned financial and non-financial organisations is concerned.
He said: "We can just assume that the government is paying each year for its guarantees following failures in paying instalments"
The WB lead economist at its Bangladesh country office said the government should not provide guarantees randomly.
"If the government provides guarantees for all cash-strapped agencies, this could lead to fiscal risks for the economy."
He said reforms are needed in the state-owned enterprises (SoEs) to make the organisations viable financially.
Dr Sadiq Ahmed, vice chairman of the PRI said the government should give its considerable attention to the contingent liabilities.
Terming the liabilities as a source of financial bleeding, Dr Ahmed said the government should take steps for energy pricing policies.
He said sound lending practices and better corporate governance are also required to stop the financial bleeding.
Dr Ahmed also said a full accounting of the stock of contingent liabilities from all sources must be done with a view to devising a time-bound action plan to gradually reduce the liabilities.
