The government will bring an end to the vulnerable situation public jute mills are in by running those under the public private partnership (PPP) model.

A corporate tax cut for listed banks, insurance companies and financial institutions and announcement of development measures for the bond market are the only achievements of stock investors from the budget announced for FY 2018-19.

The proposed rise in corporate tax will hurt the flow of fresh investment into the garment sector as entrepreneurs will feel discouraged to inject fresh funds, said the top leader of the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA) yesterday.

Asad Kazi of Bagerhat was advised dialysis for kidney disease. His wife Hawa told doctors that they wanted medicinal treatment as dialysis would cost them Tk 7,000 a month on average.

As the government had formulated National Education Policy immediately after coming to power in 2009, educationists started advocating for spending at least six percent of the GDP for education.

Customer will have to pay more for products and service bought from one's mobile phone as the government yesterday introduced a 5 percent value-added tax on those from next fiscal year and also raised the surcharge on handset imports.

It looks like another repeat story. We had a big budget that failed to achieve its targets. Now we are pushing for a bigger one with higher targets. But with the ground reality remaining the same, are we to see a story foretold for the next year?

Interest payments get the fourth highest allocation, which is also higher than the combined allocation for health, social security and welfare in the proposed budget for 2018-19.

Government employees can get loans for the construction of house or purchase of flats anywhere in the country as a policy guideline has already been formulated for providing such loan from the banking system.

BNP strongly criticises the budget Finance Minister AMA Muhith placed in the parliament, saying it is imaginary and aimed to gain popularity ahead of the election.

Citing the government's commitment to ensure a 'Digital Bangladesh', Finance Minister AMA Muhith says that 8,000 km of optical fibre cables have been installed in 1104 union parishads of 114 upazilas in 64 districts.

Government is planning to impose 5 percent value added tax on the ride-sharing services which will make the new kind of transporting system in big cities of the country costlier.

Finance Minister AMA Muhith proposes introduction of new provisions in the tax laws over the taxation of virtual and digital sectors, such as Facebook, Google, Youtube, on their incomes earned in Bangladesh.

Terming the proposed budget “traditional”, Raushon Ershad, leader of the opposition in the parliament, says there is nothing new in it.

The government allocates Tk 1,498 crore for the Youth and Sports Ministry in the proposed budget for fiscal year 2018-19, Tk 307 crore up from the revised budget of the last fiscal year.

The government proposes raising allocation in the education sector by 11 percent to Tk 53,054 crore for the next fiscal year compared to the revised allocation in the outgoing fiscal year.

Energy drink and cigarette-bidi papers prices are expected to go up with the additional supplementary duty proposed in the budget for fiscal 2018-19.

Imported mobile phone handsets will be costlier as Finance Minister AMA Muhith proposes to increase 1 percentage point surcharge in his budget speech for fiscal 2018-19.

Finance Minister AMA Muhith proposes to allocate Tk 400 crore in 2018-19 fiscal to support insolvent war-wounded and sick freedom-fighters or their spouses, children or grand-children.

Finance Minister AMA Muhith proposes to borrow Tk 42,029 crore from the banking sources to manage the deficit financing.