Eminent economist Dr Debapriya Bhattacharya on Wednesday described the proposed budget for the 2025–26 fiscal year as “in many ways, a budget of disappointment.”
“This (budget) has turned out to be a budget of disappointment in many cases, this disappointment has come from expectations because our desire was something different, but we are seeing that in many cases it is traditional,” he said.
The distinguished fellow of Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD) made the remarks while delivering his introductory speech at a discussion meeting titled ‘National Budget 2025-26: What is there for the left-behinds’.
Citizen’s Platform for SDGs, Bangladesh organised the programme at a city hotel where Senior Research Fellow of the CPD Towfiqul Islam Khan presented the keynote speech at the event.
Dr Debapriya said this budget was the budget of big expectation as the government has come through a big political uprising.
“This government has been formed through an anti-discrimination spirit. So, this budget was supposed to be something different, we have that huge expectation from this budget,” he said.
The CPD distinguished fellow also alleged that this budget was presented to the public before getting a nod from the cabinet. “Usually, the budget passed in the cabinet first, this has come in front of people without administrative and state approval,” he said.
Senior Research Fellow of the CPD Towfiqul Islam Khan, in his keynote speech, mentioned that Macroeconomic realities are not fully reflected in the setting benchmark and economic policy.
“Fiscal framework remains unrealistic and expected to go through a significant change as the tradition of the past regime continues, Fiscal measures lack transparency and are often not backed by evidence with the legalising black money provision remaining in place without justification,” he said.
He mentioned that Revenue mobilisation will continue to rely on indirect taxes, disproportionately putting a burden on low-income people; the budget signals no meaningful structural shift in revenue mobilisation. “Limited fiscal space will continue to haunt Bangladesh.
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Towfiqul Islam Khan said there is no significant positive change in allocating resources for priority sectors for the LNOB groups although social protection has brought some positive changes.
“ADP allocation mirrors past trends, with no major shift in priorities or project quality improvements,” he said.
He said the budget remains disconnected from the government's broader reform agenda, Budget process lacks inclusivity and rigour, and political actors were completely ignored, and data transparency remains poor,” he observed.
In the winding up speech, Dr Drbapriya Bhattacharya called the 2025-26 as the budget of mistakes and errors, anti-reform budget and anti-equality budget.
He attributed this outcome partly to citizens, citing a "demand-side failure"—a lack of sufficient public pressure on the interim government.
“Taking lessons from this we have to continue our pressure on the government in the coming days. Election will be held today or tomorrow, we have to put this pressure on the future leaders,” he said.
He said the financial security of the already solvent section of society could be at risk if 80 percent of the population continues to be neglected.
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