Finance Adviser Dr Salehuddin Ahmed on Monday slammed a section of economists for their reluctance to see any positive move of the country's economy and urged them to see things with inner eyes.
“There are some junior economists, they do not see anything at all, I know them all very well, I have been teaching since 1970, and all of them are my students. If you want to see, you need to have eyes, inner eyes,” he said.
The Adviser was speaking at a seminar on activities of income tax, VAT and Customs in the 2025-26 budget and inauguration of the e-return submission for the 2025-26 fiscal.
The National Board of Revenue (NBR) organised the programme at its headquarters with its chairman Md Abdur Rahman Khan in the chair.
Dr Salehuddin asked the young economists of the country to change their attitude and recognize good things. “It needs an attitude, if we do not want to see, then we will not see anything,” he said.
He also admitted that there are many mistakes of this government, but if anyone encourages the good things it brings in a positive move for all concerns. “This is not right that you will tell anything mixing your imaginations. Whatever, we have independence (to say anything), they will continue to say.”
Bangladesh’s private sector credit growth dips below 7% amid economic uncertainty
The Finance Adviser urged the mass media to focus on the positive side of the government in a bigger way. “Let’s see the mistakes less, always try to see the glass is half-full rather than half-empty,” he said.
Regarding the e-return of the income tax issue, he highly lauded the NBR for this great job. “NBR is the centre point of the revenue, trade and commerce, it is not only to collect revenues, but also facilitate the trade and commerce of the country,” he said.
Dr Salehuddin mentioned that time has come to ensure the transparency and accountability of everything.
The Adviser, who was the central bank governor during BNP-Jamaat regime, said whatever the law enacted by the government, it might be deviated due to the men behind who will implement that.
“Those people might have anger or affection on anything, this has to be averted,” he asked the NBR officials.
Dr Salehuddin appreciated the NBR officials for their rigorous tasks to gather revenue for the country saying that everyone lauded NBR, even the Chief Adviser.
Meanwhile, the National Board of Revenue (NBR) has made online submission of income tax returns mandatory for all individual taxpayers across the country, except for senior citizens aged 65 years or above, physically incapable or taxpayers with special need subject to submission of certificates, Bangladeshi taxpayers residing abroad and legal representatives of deceased taxpayers.
According to the NBR, from August 4, 2025, all individual taxpayers will be able to submit their returns for the 2025-26 tax year online through the NBR’s e-return platform. (www.etaxnbr.gov.bd).
The exempted categories will, however, retain the option to submit paper returns if they wish.
Any individual taxpayer unable to submit online returns due to registration-related technical problems may, upon submitting a written application with proper justification to the concerned Deputy Commissioner of Taxes, be allowed to file paper returns with the approval of the Additional or Joint Commissioner of Taxes.
The deadline for such applications is October 31, 2025.
Bangladesh's exports hit $48 billion in FY25, marking 8.58% growth
Last year, when NBR introduced mandatory online return submission for taxpayers under certain jurisdictions, employees of all banks, and employees of selected multinational companies, more than 1.7 million taxpayers filed their returns online.
Taxpayers can conveniently pay their taxes from home through bank transfer, debit card, credit card, bKash, Rocket, Nagad, or other mobile financial service apps while filing their returns online.
To facilitate the process, NBR has deployed dedicated teams to provide round-the-clock assistance through its call center and other electronic support channels to resolve any issues faced by taxpayers in filing their returns.