Commodity transportation is facing serious problem due to hartal and blockade. As a result, it is not being possible to transport commodities despite huge demand. The business transaction is also being hampered. Businessmen are now worried over how they will pay the loan installments.
Talking to this correspondent on Tuesday evening the proprietor of M/S Sarker Traders of Nilphamari Md Abdul Wahed said the Transport (truck) movement has been stopped for some days as the drivers of those vehicles are not interested to ply vehicles.
Police assistance is also not bringing any effective result as blockade activists the day before yesterday hurled brick chips towards my rented truck and broke the glass of the vehicle, the Daily Sun reports.
Wahed Sarker who is also the president of Bangladesh fertilizer association of Nilphamari district and also the former president of Nilphamari chamber of commerce and industry said the sale of fertilizer has declined by 10 percent though it is the peak season.
Wahed Sarker is not the lone businessman facing the trouble rather most of the businessmen are facing same situation. Earlier, the organizations those who sold fertilizer of Tk 15 to 20 lakh are now selling fertilizer of Tk one to two lakh, he said adding that under this situation it would be tough to pay loan installments. “Though there is no business, we are paying bank interest. We are worried over the situation,” he mentioned.
Blaming the political unrest for such consequence, he said this problem should be resolved soon.
Like the trader of Nilphamari, large business organizations are also facing economical losses.
An official of a leading business organisation of the country said their daily business transaction was Tk 30 crore everyday. And due to blockade the average transaction now stands at Tk two crore.
BGMEA informed that the production of RMG sector is being lost to the tune of Tk 250 crore everyday due to ongoing political instability. Under this circumstance, the organisation is thinking over bank loan and salary of the workers.
FBCCI, the leading business organisation has demaded exemption of bank interests for debacle of businesses at the moment. At a press conference, the president of FBCCI president Kazi Akram Uddin Ahmed made the demand on Saturday at the office of FBCCI.
Analyzing the available information it is found that most of the business houses had been in trouble to pay the installment of their bank loans due to unstable political situation round the year in 2013. As a result, at the end of September 2013, the level of classified loan stood at Tk. 56,320 crore which was 12.79 percent of the total disbursed loan by that time.
In such a situation, the Bangladesh Bank relaxed its condition of loan rescheduling aiming to provide safeguard to the loosing businessmen. As a result, the banks rescheduled the classified loan worth Tk. 18,000 crore from December 2013 to June 2014. Many businessmen even failed to reschedule their default loan within that period, besides, the rescheduled loan again started becoming classified because they failed to overcome the loosing trend in their business.
In a press release, ‘Dhaka Mahanagar Dokan Malik Samity’ on Tuesday said the hartal and blockade caused a big fall in the country’s business in the previous time. Almost all sorts of businessmen became looser in that political unrest. Even many of the business organizations are heading towards the verge of collapse due to political anarchy.
“Today many businessmen houses are about to wind up business failing to bear the burden of loan coupled with continued loss in their business”, the release added.
The handout also said meeting the target of earning the revenue will not be possible as normally satisfactory investment is not taking place in the country. Local investment is facing trouble as well as the foreign invests are loosing interest while the consumer traders are being looser.
When asked, Dr. Syed Abdul Hamid, Managing Director and CEO of Agrani Bank told this correspondent that selling is declining at the business houses due to hartal-blockade, transaction is also reducing, in such a situation doubt has been created whether the credit holders will be able to pay their regular installments timely.
Dr. Hamid said the picture will be clear when the banks will compile their data on classified loan in March this year.
Meanwhile, President of Bangladesh Knitwear Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BKMEA), Selim Osman MP terms the on-going political instability as the conspiracy to destroy the country’s Ready Made Garments (RMG) sector.“Its not political unrest, rather it’s a blue print to destroy the country’s RMG sector, this destructive act is run to interrupt the development of the country in the name of hartal and blockade in a planning way through some foreign agent”, Osman added.
