Road Fund starts getting shape from next month

The long-awaited Road Fund will start getting a formal shape from next month with the concerned authority empowered to spend money for carrying out regular road and highway maintenance works.
The Road Fund, the first of its kind, will get all related revenue collection from the road sector from December 1 to raise its reserve, which, according to the Road Fund Bill, will be spent exclusively for road maintenance and repair work of the Roads and Highways Department (RHD).
In a circular published on November 20, the Road Transport and Highways Division of the Ministry of the Road Transport and Bridges (MoRTB) declared the 'effectiveness' of the fund from December 1.
It also sent a letter to the Ministry of Finance (MoF) to provide a code so that all related non-tax revenues from the RHD and the Bangladesh Road Transport Authority (BRTA) in the form of road tax, motor vehicle tax, motor fitness fees, route permit, registration and license fees, road cutting and utility fees, road penalties etc are deposited to the fund.
The Road Fund, however, is being made effective more than a year after the 'Road Maintenance Fund Board Bill, 2013' was passed in the parliament on July 14, 2013.
 "With the effectiveness of the Road Fund, we expect to collect at least Tk 20 billion for carrying maintenance work of the country's roads and highways," said Road Transport Secretary MAN Siddique.
He said the fund is expected to be increased every year.
With the creation of the fund, the long-awaited demand of different quarters including the development partners has been met.
The development partners including the Japan International Cooperation Agency, the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank felt that the fund would help overcome crisis of money in the RHD in carrying road maintenance work.
Its need was also felt urgently as condition of the countrywide roads and highways turned deplorable, creating immense sufferings to the commuters since 2010.
However, sources said, real operation of the Road Fund will take more time as its modalities are yet to be spelt out as it is a new concept for the Ministry of Finance..
The operation of the fund would not bring any immediate benefit to repair and maintenance work as the MoF has found the related Bill running counter to the country's Constitution, they added.
The MoRTB and the MoF held a series of meetings during the last one year to make the fund functional but could not do it.
To avoid the complication, the MoF has recommended the line ministry to form a joint committee to finalise an operating system of the fund through coordination.
Contradiction with the Constitution arose as the Bill violates the provision of depositing all the revenues of the state into the Consolidated Fund.  
For this reason, the MoRTB cannot get all its revenues directly into the Road Fund through a code, said a source preferring not to be named.
The MoF, for that reason, recommended the MoRTB to inform the ministry of the total collection it expects from its sources of revenues from the RHD and the BRTA before announcement of the budget which is supposed to make allocation to the fund during the coming fiscal year.
It also ruled out the possibility of exercising the MoRTB's lone power to use the Road Fund bypassing the MoF.
Sources said the money to be allocated for the Road Fund will be released as usual by the same ministry (finance) confirming non-duplication of the work. The Fund actually cuts the power of the RHD to take decision alone on the road maintenance work.
Although many quarters blamed the relevant authorities' negligence and monetary irregularities in road maintenance job for deterioration of the countrywide road network, the RHD officials, however, always made the MoF liable for poor allocation against their demand every year.
The RHD claimed that maintenance cost of roads and highways has shot up to 165 per cent in the last 10 years, but the allocation under the national budget for such works has not increased even by half of the requirement.
The MoF allocated Tk 14 billion in the national budget this year for repair and maintenance works of damaged roads and highways which was, however, doubled in four years.
The Road Fund will be managed by an autonomous board with 12 members, comprising six from both public and private sectors respectively.
Secretaries of road, rail and bridge divisions, members of the infrastructure department of the Planning Commission, and heads of the Bangladesh Road Transport Authority and the Roads and Highways Department, a professor of civil engineering department of the Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET) and presidents of the Federation of the Bangladesh Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FBCCI) and the Women Chamber of Commerce are to be board members.

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