Finance Minister AMA Muhith yesterday came down heavily on the Monthly Pay Order (MPO) system in educational institutions, saying that the system is a bad one due to the amount of forgery involved in it.

"The Monthly Pay Order system is a bad system, which is still being continued,” Muhith told the House while responding to a question of Tariqat Federation MP Najibul Bashar Maizbhandari.

The finance minister said the MPO system does not play any role in improving the quality of education.

"Rather stipends and school feeding programmes play special roles for the improvement of the quality of the education system. Instead of making  any moves on these regards, you [MPs] raise voices for the Monthly Pay Order system,” he said.

Muhith however said the education minister has been trying to reduce forgery in MPO system.

He added that the budget for the MPO has been allocated in the annual budget this fiscal year.

Responding to a question of treasury bench lawmaker Mizanur Rahman, the minister said various measures had been taken to ensure that people's fears of tax-paying hassles are driven away. 

To a question on reducing interest rates on land rent, the minister replied saying the government does not fix the interest rate of bank loan.

“But, we participate in the discussions held by the Bangladesh Bank,” he said.

“We have advised them to bring the interest on bank loans to a single digit. The advice has been considered,” he said.

Replying to another question, the finance minister said the government set a target to realise Tk 2.25 lakh crore as revenue during the 2017-2018 fiscal.

 “Some 1.79 lakh crore has been realised till now,” he said.

Muhith added that in the last nine years the government took 64 projects under the assistance of the World Bank. “Of the projects, some 19 have been implemented while the rest are underway,” he said.