Agencies asked to fulfil debt servicing targets

The finance ministry is expected to sit with relevant government agencies shortly to discuss their poor debt servicing performance and ask them to comply with the current fiscal year's payment targets, officials said. "We are holding meetings with the relevant government, semi-government and autonomous bodies to review their official debt servicing performance for the current fiscal year," a senior finance ministry official said. The meeting is scheduled to issue a fresh reminder to the agencies concerned to meet their respective debt servicing targets, set earlier by the government, he mentioned. Citing figures, officials of the Debt Service Liability (DSL) wing under the Ministry of Finance said the outstanding debts of government, semi-government and autonomous bodies swelled to over Tk 726.94 billion as on June 30, 2010. They also attributed such a large volume of arrear debts to non-payment of the official liability by most of the agencies concerned, especially by the big defaulters. "Non-payment of such large amount of arrear debts, especially by big defaulters, has put the government's current expenditures under pressure," the official said. Of the total outstanding debts, the government earlier set a target of realising about Tk 30 billion for the current fiscal. "So far, we have realised debts amounting to about Tk 15 billion from the defaulter organisations," said a senior finance ministry official. Earlier, the debt service wing sat with all the big defaulters either individually or group-wise, and advised them to settle their respective liabilities accordingly, officials said. Referring to the official figures as on June 30 last, officials said Bangladesh Power Development Board (BPDB) topped the list of debt defaulters with total liability of nearly Tk 339 billion, followed by the Petrobangla with 89.65 billion, Bangladesh Chemical Industries Corporation (BCIC) with Tk 60 billion and Rural Electrification Board (REB) with Tk. 40 billion. Among others, the Dhaka Power Distribution Company (DPDC) is liable to pay Tk 27.62 billion, Bangladesh Bridge Authority Tk 23.76 billion, Dhaka WASA Tk 20 billion, Bangladesh Steel and Engineering Corporation (BSEC) Tk 14.65 billion, Palli Karmo Shahayok Foundation (PKSF) Tk 14.55 billion and the debt liability of Bangladesh Inland Water Transport Authority (BIWTA) is Tk 13.20 billion.