All set to set up Samriddhi Sopan Bank

The government is finally all set to establish the proposed Samriddhi Sopan Bank (SSB), which will mainly function for welfare of the government employees, officials said.
Ministry of Public Administration (MoPA) will take necessary steps to set up the bank under Government Employees' Welfare Board. A proposal is likely to be sent to Bangladesh Bank (BB) to take initiatives in this regard.     
The decisions have been taken at a meeting, held early this month with Bank and Financial Institutions Division (BFID) additional secretary Gokul Chand Das in the chair, they also said.
The process of setting up the proposed bank has been discussed at the meeting. The government is trying to bring the bank into operation soon for the sake of its employees, a high official of BFID said.   
"We've discussed in the meeting how its establishment process will proceed. Its possible initial paid-up capital will be Tk 4.0 billion."
The bank will be established following Trust Bank Limited, which is sponsored by Army Welfare Trust.
SSB will conduct commercial and development operations. Its lending rate will be a single-digit one. Over 2.0 million (20 lakh) government employees and all the pensioners will be shareholders of the bank, he added.
Earlier, National Pay and Services Commission (NPSC) recommended setting up a bank for public servants, and providing loan at single-digit interest rate through it.
A number of retired public servants opined that the government should have established such a bank for its employees much earlier. The bank will benefit the government employees - serving and retired - if it is set up finally.  
At present, there is no specific authority for doing the government employees' pension-related work. There are about 520,000 pensioners in the country.  
    [email protected]