Proposals to lease two jute mills to private operators turned down
The government yesterday sent back the proposals for handing over management of two state-owned jute mills to private operators on lease basis.
These two mills are Peoples Jute Mills and Qaumi Jute Mills.
The advisory committee on economic affairs headed by the finance adviser turned down the proposals because of some procedural bottlenecks in the initiative.
"We need a review of the lease programme as it has some procedural bottlenecks before bringing the two jute mills under private management,” Mirza Azizul Islam told reporters after the committee meeting.
Earlier, the Bangladesh Jute Mills Corporation (BJMC) invited tenders to lease out seven jute mills out of its 18 mills. But it found only two tenders eligible for awarding them the operational responsibilities.
"We received the proposal of Tk 6.13 crore annual fee for Peoples Jute Mills and Tk 4.81 crore for Qaumi Jute Mills from two local firms," said Md. Atharul Islam, the BJMC chairman.
He said the corporation also invited re-tender for handing over the other five jute mills to private operators.
Explaining about the lease programme, the chairman said the private operators will pay the amount on a monthly instalment basis by which the government will pay its liabilities.
"The private operators will not take any liabilities of the industries," the chairman said.
Atharul Islam said primarily the tenure of the lease agreements will be five years, which might be renewed subject to successful performance of the leasees.
The leased out mills will be owned by the government and the BJMC will set a small office to all the mills under lease programme to regularly monitor their performance..
As per terms of the lease contract, the private operators will not be allowed to retrench any workers and officers of the mills in operation, but the operators will have the option to appoint workers or officers of their choice in the mills that have already been closed.
The present caretaker government decided in October last to continue operation of the seven state-owned jute mills, four of which are in operation, by leasing out those.
The mills under the project are Qaumi Jute Mills Ltd, Karnaphuli Jute Mills Ltd, MM Jute Mills Ltd, RR Jute Mills Ltd, Furat Karnafuli Carpet Factory, Peoples Jute Mills Ltd, Aleem Jute Mills Ltd and Baghdad-Dhaka Carpet Factory Ltd.
Among those MM Jute Mills Ltd, RR. Jute Mills Ltd, Aleem Jute Mills Ltd and Baghdad-Dhaka Carpet Factory Ltd are now in operation.
The BJMC, which has 18 jute mills, plans to privatise its loss-making jute mills and retrench its 14,000 workers.
The retrenchment process has already been completed, according to the corporation.
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