BNP keeps its promises

Home Minister Salahuddin Ahmed said on Saturday that the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) keeps its promises and implements the commitments set out in its election manifesto.

“BNP makes promises and fulfils them. It announces an election manifesto and implements it. It gave a 31-point programme and is fulfilling even the 32nd point – that is BNP,” he said.

The minister was speaking at an event at the Osmani Memorial Auditorium in Dhaka where retirement and welfare benefits were distributed among retired teachers and employees of private educational institutions.

Salahuddin said providing retirement benefits to teachers was not included in the party’s election manifesto, describing it as the “32nd point”.

He also referred to the  government’s plan to provide free school uniforms to students as the “33rd point”.

Highlighting initiatives taken during the tenure of former president Ziaur Rahman, the home minister said efforts to improve the education system, promote production-oriented education and equip students with practical skills were initiated during his tenure. Technical education was also among those initiatives, he said.

Salahuddin said former prime minister Khaleda Zia had introduced a system for providing retirement benefits to teachers.

“Besides the Teachers’ Welfare Trust, each retired teacher will receive around Tk500,000 to Tk700,000 as retirement benefits. For a poor schoolteacher living in a village, this is a significant amount,” he said.

He said the money was being transferred directly to teachers’ bank accounts through the digitised iBAS++ system, allowing them to receive the benefits from home without having to pay bribes.

“Some people said yesterday that the government will complete 180 days in the next two days and asked what we have implemented. Come and see what we have done. We have implemented these initiatives. They were not in our manifesto – they are the 32nd point,” the minister said.

He reiterated that the free distribution of school uniforms to students would be another government commitment, which he termed the “33rd point”.