Why and for whom this extra charge?
Ahmed Iqbal Mohammadpur, Dhaka
A common word of our finance minister (FM) is 'Free Market Economy'. Any price hike in the market is explained with this popular term. For a consumer, free market economy usually brings the prospect of buying goods in cheaper price due to the competition in the market. But in Bangladesh things are always reverse. Bangladeshi people never had the opportunity to get this advantage. There was only one exception, the mobile telecom sector. Though late, still we started enjoying the facilities of the 'free market economy' in the mass communication sector. Due to the huge competition, as a user I had wider options of choosing my operator. I could switch over to different operators basing on the best possible price suited for me. Suddenly this flexible environment for the consumers has been taken away by the decision of the finance ministry, charging Tk 1200 for the SIM card as revenue. The finance minister tried to support this act with some ridiculous logic. He explained how the mobile phone operators had been enjoying various facilities in doing their business in Bangladesh. He mentioned about the licence charge from which companies where exempted. It might be a policy failure for which the government was deprived of revenue. From his statement it is apparent that imposing extra charge on the SIM card may compensate for revenue deficiencies. My question is, can he ensure that the mobile companies will pay this SIM card revenue, not the subscribers? The simple answer is "no". Then why the ordinary customers will have to bear the expenses? Citizens have been made the victim of the government's policy lapses.
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