A study on Public Pension under the TIB Fellowship Program was released in August 2008. It revealed how retired government officers and employees suffer in getting their pension benefits. Key recommendations included:
• Reduction of paperwork and processing stages and automation of the process for drawing pension; • Creation of digital database for the pension entitlement and delivery system including a modern record management system, which should be accessible to all those who are entitled to pension; • Ensuring Transparency through updating the Pension Delivery Handbook and proper observance of the same; • A Charter of Pension Rights and Entitlements, which will also indicate the basic information of the process and documentation needed for drawing pensions should be developed and made available to all who are entitled to pension; • Institutional capacity with respect to delivery of pensions should be enhanced with the provision for specifically designated functionaries with clear job descriptions; • Disclosure of information on pension delivery including periodic reports preferably on quarterly basis; • Clear-cut complain and grievance mechanisms and processes should be established including the channels of reporting including steps for speedy disposal of pending cases; • Reviewing implementation of the 2001 Order and its updating with a view to reforming the pension delivery system; • Review of salaries and benefits of public officials which must be consistent with the cost of living. At the same time institutionalization of positive and negative incentives including rigorous application of disciplinary measures for violation of laws and rules; and • Awareness programme for employees entitled to pension about their rights and entitlement with respect to pension as well as responsibilities, especially own record-keeping in order to avoid harassment.
A study on Primary Education was released in July 2008. The nature, extent and processes of corrupt practices in the sector was revealed. It was also drawn heavily from findings of a number of Citizens Report Cards on primary education at the local level conducted earlier so that the study provided a combination of local and national level inputs. The study recommended that:
• Integrity must be ensured in the process of appointment, promotion and transfer of teachers, which has to be based on merit, expertise and experience;
• Sufficient resources should be allocated for skills and capacity building of teachers;
• In order to improve the teacher-student new teachers should be appointed in vacant positions;
• Salaries and benefits of teachers and other officials and staff involved in education system must be enhanced to be consistent with cost of living;
• Positive and negative incentives must be in place for teachers such as rewards including promotion on the one hand and strictly enforceable disciplinary action on the other to prevent erosion of integrity in the teaching profession;
• As an incentive for teachers through the scope of promotion a new tier between assistant teacher and head teacher can be introduced - such as assistant head teacher;
• A 360 degree evaluation system should be introduced for all employees including teachers and other staff at various levels;
• Strict observance of free education for all must be enforced and duly monitored so that no unauthorized payments are collected from the pupils. If fees/subscriptions are required to be collected, they must be determined through consultations with guardians, teachers and upazila level education officials. However, all such payments must be fully documented and duly accounted for;
• Officials and staff employed at the management level in the directorate for primary education and local education offices should preferably have field experience. For those who lack such experience, field visits and appropriate trainings and orientation should be made mandatory so that there is a knowledge and ownership of problems. Vacant positions in management level should be filled up through due process including promotion of deserving candidates and direct recruitment, where necessary;
• The budget for primary education should be increased to meet soaring costs, but more so for training and capacity building of teachers and other costs involved in ensuring higher quality education.
• To reduce burden of teachers because of non-academic duties, an office assistant may be appointed in each school;
• The training materials and training allowance of sub-cluster training for the teachers may be distributed through Upazila Resource Centres;
• Allocation of fund for school visits by Upazila Education Officers should be raised to ensure more intensive monitoring and cost of such visits should be covered on actual basis. Proper monitoring system including tested tools and processes should be developed to ensure objectivity, honesty and professionalism in such school visits which should not be used as a means for corruption;
• Transparency and accountability must be ensured in all procurements and purchases, especially in selection of vendors for class-learning materials;
• To improve gender sensitivity, especially to promote rights and positive attitude towards women teachers and students inclusive programmes of gender orientation should be implemented for all teachers, guardians and managing committee members; Similar awareness programmes should be undertaken in schools to prevent discrimination on the basis of disability, ethnic and Religious identity;
• Awareness programme about rights and entitlements of students and guardians should be Undertaken to prevent deception for lack of information; Mothers’ meetings, SMC activation, Parent-teachers’ interaction, and courtyard meetings involving various stakeholders could be Used as processes. Citizens Charter for each school side bys side with on for the sector as a Whole should also be useful in this regards; and
• A Code of Conduct should be institutionalized for everyone involved in primary education should be adopted with built-in mechanisms for enforcement and monitoring on the basis of zero tolerance to corruption, negligence of duty and other irregularities and violations.
A study on the Chittagong Customs House was released in June 2008 in Chittagong. The study, as a follow up on ChittagongPort, made an attempt to diagnose the problems that exist in the Custom House. After the release, a number of fundamental reforms and changes have been made that include introduction of automation of its operational activities, reduction in the transaction of bribe, and other irregularities. The Government cancelled the license of a PSI Company Cotecna due to its involvement in huge irregularities. Besides, for the first time in five fiscal years Chittagong Custom House had exceeded revenue target and was able to recover huge sums of outstanding payments. TIB put forward a number of recommendations, which included complete automation of the Customs House. TIB also recommended early filling up of vacant posts and capacity building through training and skill development programs; installation of a modern laboratory; amendment and updating of SRO regulations and Customs Act, 1969; making the process of granting bond license transparent and preventing its misuse; improving coordination between the customs and the port authority; and automation of the port activities.
National Household Survey on Corruption By TIB:
TIB conducts the National Household Survey on Corruption once in every two years with the objective of measuring the nature and extent of corruption in essential service delivery sectors as experienced by households. The survey for 2007 was the fourth in this series covering the period June 2006 to July 2007. The sample size was 5000; the households were selected for interview through a multistage cluster sampling design. The survey results were released through a press conference on 18 June 2008 at the National Press Club.
The survey revealed that overall 66.7% households experienced corruption during interactions for receiving services in the selected sectors. Among the surveyed households 42.1% had to pay bribe for receiving services from different sectors. An average household in Bangladesh had to pay Tk.4134 ($1=Tk.69.50) as bribe in the reference period for receiving services from the selected sectors with per capita bribe amounting to Tk. 861. Bribery had claimed 3.84% of per capita household income. It was estimated that total amount of bribe paid nationally was Tk. 54.43 billion. One of the conclusions drawn from the survey results was that corruption is being increasingly institutionalized in Bangladesh. The incidence of corruption is indifferent to location (urbanlocal) and gender, indicating indiscriminate depth and breadth of the problem.
The incidence of corruption was highest in the law enforcement agencies in which 96.6% households of those who interacted with them during the period had experienced corruption. The other leading sectors from where households experienced corruption were local government (62.5%) and land administration (52.7%). The ratio of people who experienced bribery was also found to be highest in law enforcement agencies, with 64.6% households having such experience for receiving servicesfrom law enforcement agencies followed by land administration (51.1%) and judiciary (41.7%).
The survey brought out a comparative picture of prevalence of bribery during July-December 2006 and January-June 2007. The results were mixed. In some sectors corruption in the form of bribery increased, while it had decreased in some other sectors. The overall incidence of bribery was found marginally higher in July-December 2006 than January-June 2007. The incidence of bribery increased in education, health, land administration, local government and NGOs. The sectors that showed decline in incidence of bribery include law enforcement, judiciary, electricity, banking and taxation. This might have happened due to anti-corruption drive by the caretaker government which apparently impacted upon the second group of sectors more than others which remained largely unaffected by the drive. The survey, however, found that in both cases of increase and decrease of corruption during the compared period the changes were not statistically significant. On the basis of the findings of the survey, TIB made some recommendations for consideration of the Government and other stakeholders.
1. It has to be established that corruption is punishable offence in the society, irrespective of the level at which the act of corruption takes place.
2. In the drive against corruption, rule law must be ensured without fear or favour, and without deviating from due judicial process and transparency.
3. The process of checks and balances in use of power at every stage and every institution must be firmly established.
4. Strong transparency and accountability mechanism in every institution has to be in place and strictly practiced.
5. Every institution in the Government and outside should establish its own regular monitoring cell to address irregularities and corruption.
6. Appointments, promotions, postings and transfers in public service should be based on performance and merit and not on political influence, bribery and other means of influence. Effective legal and ethical standards have to be put in place with enforcement and monitoring mechanisms for zero tolerance against corruption. Salaries and benefits of public servants should be commensurate with the cost of living to prevent erosion of integrity and honesty. But such positive incentives have to be accompanied by negative incentives ensuring disciplinary action in case of deviations from rules and regulations and established codes of conduct.
7. Citizens’ Charter has to be adopted in every service delivery institution in a participatory process including provisions for enforcement, specific measures to prevent deviation, and strict monitoring.
8. Independent and effective functioning of the watchdog bodies like the Anti-corruption Commission is indispensable. Equally, measures have to be taken to allocate necessary resources and to increase their skills and capacities. The office of Ombudsman should be created with sufficient resources and capacities in every Government Ministry and/or Department.
9. In addition to the watchdog bodies like the Anti-corruption Commission and Ombudsman’s office, the key institutions of democracy and National Integrity System (NIS) must work effectively, reflecting high degree of professionalism, impartiality, ethics and integrity.
10. Media should be allowed full freedom to report on corruption and create public awareness and demand for controlling corruption.
11. Access to information is a key to the effective prevention and control of corruption. People’s right to information must be legally ensured and rigorously implemented.
Friday, December 18, 2009
আজকের এই লেখা সুধু বিজয়ের শুভেচ্ছা জানানোর জন্য। বিজয় দিবস কে স্রদ্ধা করে আমি আজকে বাংলায় লেকছি। আমার পক্ষ থেকে সবাই কে বিজয় দিবসের শুভেছা। সবাই এই দিনটি উদজাপন করুন কিন্তু মনে রাখবেন এই দিনটি পেতে আমাদের কত কষ্ট করতে হোয়েছে। তাই এই দেশের জন্য আমদের সবার কিছু করতে হবে। তাই চলেন দেশের জন্য কিছু করি।
Saturday, December 5, 2009
Street people in Bangladesh
Bangladesh is a poor country. Majority of the people live below the poverty line. And many of them don't have any home to live so they live under the open sky. There are some other poor people who live in slums. They live in such a bad condition which is unmentionable. In the slums many kind of problems are there. The slums in Dhaka are the capital for many types of crimes like drags, hijack, prostitution and contract killing etc. the slums are also a big reason for land robbery.There are a big numbers of slums in Dhaka which are situated in the place of lack or river. On the other hand those people who live under sky are the worse sufferer. Only god knows how they are surviving. Think for a moment if one day you don't have any money with you and no were to go what would you do? And now think that the street people especially the children & women have to face this problem every day. We must do something for them. We have to do it now.
Some suggestions:
§Government can build a bid place there all the street and the people of slums will live.
§Government can give them job to do to feed them selves. ( job of garbing, cleaning, west management etc)
§Government can restart government owned factories and stuff the skilled people.
§We can open a night school for the street people & every conscious, patriotic, and educated person will teach any thing to them, and also donate some money for there books and other things.
§We can also open a training center for them where they can train them selves.
A lot of other things we can do to reduce there pain.
Drinking Water
Bangladesh is known as the country of rivers. About 700 rivers including tributaries flow through the country constituting a waterway of total length around 24,140 km. so we must not have any problem of water. But it is very sad that we are facing a lot of problems about water. The two major problems are crisis of clean drinking water & water pollution. We have a lot of water but it is not clean enough to drink. Now I am giving some cause and solutions to them.
·Most of our rivers are not born in our country
·Our neighbor country is not giving us enough water
·Because of global warming sea level is raising and flow of river is decreasing
·We do not have advance technology to purify drinking water
·We have already used a lot of under ground water so the water level is going down
