Loan to Bangladesh
Today, a report said Bangladesh has clarification from India on procurement complexities concerning 20 projects to be financed USD 1 billion loan sanctioned by New Delhi last year. Quoting a senior economic relations division official, the Financial Express newspaper reported “Our implementing agencies waiting for the lender’s clarification about complexities that have arisen on procurement issue.” Dhaka sent details of the 20 projects to be implemented using the loan, but no response has been received yet.
The newspaper has told by a top planning ministry official that “the project works have not started due to the procurement snags although 8 months have already passed.” If Bangladesh cannot be sourced from India 15 per cent of the total contracts can be procured from them. Mostly in infrastructure sectors, Bangladesh will have to procure all goods, services and works from India for the projects under the loan contract.
To initially finance 14 infrastructure projects, in August last year, Pranab Mukherjee, Indian Finance Minister visited Dhaka Bangladesh with New Delhi penned the USD 1 billion credit agreement. Bangladesh will use the line of credit for developing its communication and railway infrastructure, developing the state-run standard and testing institute and power grid connectivity between India and Bangladesh.