State Minister for Finance and Planning MA Mannan said on Wednesday mismanagement and corruption were eating up a significant amount of the national budget spending every year.
"Let me reiterate, because of inefficient management, a large portion of the budgetary allocation of the government is wasted," Mr Mannan said while addressing a pre-budget discussion at the Dhaka University (DU).
The Centre on Budget and Policy of the university organised the discussion styled "Pre-budget consultation on education budget 2015-2016".
The junior minister, who is closely involved with the budget-making process, said he had come across the serious matter after scrutinising the budgetary documents.
He also identified corruption as another challenge for the administration. "We've immense corruption and we're dealing with such a situation," he noted.
Speaking at the discussion, DU Vice Chancellor Prof AAMS Arefin Siddique underscored the need for increasing budgetary allocation for the education sector, in particular for higher education.
Referring to the previous year's budget for the public universities, Prof Siddique said the government allocated Tk 13.80 billion (1,380 crore) last fiscal. Every university got on an average Tk 0.43 billion. "Undoubtedly, this amount is not sufficient to run any university," the DU VC added.
Addressing the function, Dhaka University Teachers' Association (DUTA) president Prof Dr Farid Uddin Ahmed criticised the University Grants Commission (UGC) advice for the country's public universities to increase earnings from their own sources.
The DUTA president, also an Economics Department professor, said because of the low cost most of the brilliant students from middle-income groups could study at the country's public universities like Dhaka University.
Director of the centre Prof Dr M Abu Eusuf placed a set of proposals including preparing the education budget in consultation with stakeholders including teachers and students.
The proposals also include increasing salary and other benefits for the university teachers in line with the social needs. He said the salary and other benefits of the community are very poor, which forces them to go for alternative sources of earnings.
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