1,000 Biman staffers apply for golden handshake offer

FE Team | Published: June 18, 2007 00:00:00 | Updated: February 01, 2018 00:00:00

Naim-Ul-Karim
About 1,000 Biman employees have applied for voluntary retirement until Sunday in response to the management's golden handshake offer announced June 4, official sources said.
By June 20, the last date for submission of voluntary retirement applications, sources said, total number of applicants is expected to be around 1400.
"We are expecting a few hundred more applications in the next few days," an official source said and added a number of employees, allegedly involved in corruption, have already submitted their letters of intention to go on voluntary retirement.
Sources said the World Bank (WB), as part of its pre-condition to provide financial support, suggested that Biman should reduce the number of its existing manpower by 30 per cent.
In this connection, the WB also suggested to take those into consideration whose service tenure crossed 25 years, said a source close to planning division of Biman.
Sources said the WB has granted Tk 2.40 billion for payment of dues of the employees opting for voluntary retirement.
Meanwhile, the government has formed a new seven-member board of directors to replace the existing board when Bangladesh Biman Corporation is officially converted to a public limited company by end of June, sources said.
However, sources said, the government, as per the World Bank suggestion, is likely to appoint a chief executive officer for Biman from abroad. The national flag carrier has earned a bad reputation for rescheduling flights due to delays and inadequate fleet support.
SM Helal, president of the Bangladesh Pilot Association (BAPA) said Biman is likely to become profitable after the recast process end.
Biman has long been incurring financial losses on many routes, both domestic and international totalling around Tk 10 billion over the last few years.
In September last year, the government bailed out the cash-starved national flag carrier with a cash injection of Tk 1.50 billion (150 crore) to help it come out of its severe financial crisis. Biman sought Tk 6.86 billion on emergency basis to overcome its liquidity crisis.
After October last, Biman suspended its flights to New York, Narita, Tokyo, Mumbai, Dubai, Paris, Frankfurt and Bangkok, as they were not profitable.