Dhaka: Mutual Trust Bank Limited (MTB) recently signed an agreement with Apollo Hospitals Dhaka. Under this agreement, MTB Privilege Banking customers will enjoy special health care facilities from Apollo Hospitals Dhaka.
Dr. Shagufa Anwar, General Manager, Business Development of Apollo Hospitals Dhaka and Syed Rafiqul Haq, Deputy Managing Director & Chief Business Officer of MTB, signed the agreement on behalf of their respective organizations, at a simple ceremony held at MTB Centre, the Corporate Head Office of MTB in Gulshan, Dhaka. Md. Mahfuz Alam, Senior. Manager, Corporate Business Development of Apollo Hospitals Dhaka, Irfan Islam, Head of MTB Privilege Banking and other senior officials of both the organizations were also present on the occasion.
“Mutual Trust Bank Ltd. (MTB) is a third generation private commercial bank, based in Dhaka, Bangladesh and has been adjudged the first-ever best “SME Bank of the Year” and best “Women Entrepreneurs’ Friendly Bank of the Year” by Bangladesh Bank and SME Foundation. MTB aspires to be one of the most admired banks in the nation and recognized as an innovative and client-focused company.
With our current network of 103 branches, 10 kiosks, 194 modern ATMs, over 1,900 Point of Sales (POS) machines, located in prime commercial, urban and rural areas, MTB offers fully integrated real time Online Banking Services, Internet and SMS Banking to its clientele, through a dedicated Team of experienced Relationship Managers and Alternative Delivery Channels (ADC).”

Dhaka: Mutual Trust Bank Ltd. (MTB) held its Annual Business Conference 2015 (MTB ABC 2015) on Saturday at a local hotel in Dhaka, reports in a press release.
The program was attended by MTB Chairman, Rashed A. Chowdhury, Founding Chairman, Syed Manzur Elahi, Vice Chairman, M.A Rouf, JP, MTB Directors, Dr. Arif Dowla, Md. Abdul Malek, Khwaja Nargis Hossain, Independent Director Anwarul Amin. The Bank’s Managing Director & CEO, Anis A. Khan, Deputy Managing Directors, Quamrul Islam Chowdhury, Md. Hashem Chowdhury, Md. Zakir Hussain and Syed Rafiqul Haq also attended the day-long session. Divisional and Departmental Heads, Managers of all MTB branches and Chief Executive Officers of two subsidiary companies – MTB Securities Ltd. and MTB Capital Ltd. were present at the MTB ABC 2015. The conference discussed strategies and plans on how the bank will reach its desired targets in 2015, considering the previous year’s achievements and current year’s economic scenario and market conditions.
The theme for 2015 – “Unlocking New Horizons”, was unveiled at the conference. MTB Chairman Rashed A. Chowdhury, in his speech, expressed his gratitude to all MTBians for successfully closing the financial year 2014 with significant progress achieved over 2013. He also advised all to reinforce their commitments, which will enable them to progress better than the competition. The MTB Founding Chairman Syed Manzur Elahi appreciated the efforts of the management to bring the bank to its current stage of development, and success in growing the infrastructure, network, products and services and keeping the trust of its customers. Anis A. Khan, the MTB Managing Director & CEO said that MTB has taken the leap to become one the best equipped and high-performance banks in the country, and everyone now needed to fully utilize the bank’s expanding capabilities and help realize MTB3V – the bank’s vision. He also presented highlights of the bank’s performance and strategic direction for this year. Deputy Managing Directors, Divisional and Departmental Heads also made presentations at the very largely attended conference. “Mutual Trust Bank Ltd. (MTB) is a third generation private commercial bank, based in Dhaka, Bangladesh and has been adjudged the first-ever best “SME Bank of the Year” and best “Women Entrepreneurs’ Friendly Bank of the Year” by Bangladesh Bank and SME Foundation. MTB aspires to be one of the most admired banks in the nation and recognized as an innovative and client-focused company. With our current network of 103 branches, 10 kiosks, 194 modern ATMs, over 1,900 Point of Sales (POS) machines, located in prime commercial, urban and rural areas, MTB offers fully integrated real time Online Banking Services, Internet and SMS Banking to its clientele, through a dedicated Team of experienced Relationship Managers and Alternative Delivery Channels (ADC).”

The World Bank is pumping $400 million of additional funds into the ongoing Third Primary Education Development Program (PEDP3) to help ensure quality learning and completion of rudimentary schooling for 19.5 million children.
A loan agreement between the government of Bangladesh and the Washington-based lender was signed at Economic Relations Division (ERD) on Sunday with regard to the additional financing.
WB’s Country Director Johannes Zutt and ERD Senior Secretary Mohammad Mejbahuddin inked the deal on behalf of their respective sides.
Under the additional financing, the WB will scale up support for improving primary education from grade 1 to 5. PEDP3 will also continue the rollout of one year of pre-primary education with trained teachers and quality materials, with a focus on public primary schools in disadvantaged areas.
Additionally, the programme will expand efforts to bring out-of-school children into the school system.
“Today, nearly every child in Bangladesh attends primary school, thanks to successive government programs to bring all boys and girls into the classroom,” remarked Zutt.
“To build on these achievements, the World Bank and other development partners are stepping up their longstanding support to further strengthen quality, access, and equity, and to establish an effective assessment system in primary education sector. An educated work force will be critical for Bangladesh’s aspirations to achieve middle-income status,” he added.
The credit from the International Development Association (IDA), the WB’s loan arm, has a 38-year maturity with a 6-year grace period and a service charge of 0.75 percent.
PEDP3 is considered a landmark programme globally, which along with its predecessor programmes have helped Bangladesh increase the primary education enrolment rate to over 97 percent and completion rate to about 79 percent.
The number of primary schools receiving textbooks within the first month of the school year has increased from 32 percent in 2010 to over 90 percent in 2014.
The programme has been supporting merit-based recruitment of teachers and the filling of vacancies to reduce the teacher-student ratio. PEDP3 also supports the development and expansion of an 18-month Diploma for primary school teachers.
Facilitated by the programme, the Primary Education Completion Exam has been reformed to address testing competencies instead of rote learning. The additional financing will continue to enhance the quality of school facilities and infrastructure, including use of Information Communications Technology.
“The additional financing would ensure access and equity by bringing the poorest children into pre-primary education, enhancing their learning experience and boosting their earning potential as adults,” said ERD Senior Secretary.
PEDP3 is a government-led programme, supported by nine development partners. It has introduced the use of country systems for financial management and audit, and harmonised external financing to primary education in Bangladesh under a single programme.
The World Bank is the largest external financier in the education sector in Bangladesh. Its current commitment in the education sector is over $ 1.5 billion, which spans primary, secondary, tertiary, vocational education and also includes programs for out-of school-children. 

MA Mannan, state minister for finance; Shaikh Md Wahid-uz-Zaman, chairman of Janata Bank, and Md Abdus Salam, managing director, attend the annual meeting of the bank at Sonargaon Hotel in Dhaka yesterday. 

Janata Bank's default loans decreased 0.77 percentage points due to better recovery. The bank's defaults were Tk 3,306 crore or 10.34 percent of its total loans in December 2014, compared to 11.11 percent in the same month of the previous year, according to statistics disclosed at the bank's Annual Conference yesterday.

Md Abdus Salam, managing director of the bank, said defaults were much lower than state banks' average rate of 20 percent.

Janata's performance was mixed in 2014 but it does not have any provision shortfall at present and its capital adequacy ratio stands at 10.30 percent, against a minimum requirement of 10 percent, Salam said.

In 2014, Janata realised Tk 885 crore against its classified loans, which is almost 85 percent of its annual target.

The bank made an operating profit of Tk 1,053 crore in 2014, which was 13 percent lower than in the previous year.

However, the managing director said among the state owned banks, Janata succeeded in bagging the highest profit.

The bank realised Tk 261 crore in cash from the written-off loans, and the number of its loss-making branches is now 60 out of a total of 904 branches, said Salam. It aims to turn 50 percent of those into profit-making units this year. Due to the finance ministry's reservation, Janata Bank could distribute only Tk 13.84 crore against a target of disbursing Tk 35 crore under its corporate social responsibility.

Shaikh Md Wahid-Uz-Zaman, chairman of Janata, said alongside widening the bank's scope in online services, it will ensure modern banking services to its customers in remote areas through green banking, internet banking and mobile banking.

MA Mannan, state minister for finance, urged bank officials to provide high-quality services to customers using information technology. The government will not intervene in the day-to-day operations of the banks, he added.

The state minister said the present government is a reformist one; however, mistakes happen when reforms are made hastily.

Shamsul Huda Khan, Managing Director & CEO of National Bank Limited handed over the blankets to S K Sur Chowdhury, Deputy Governor of Bangladesh Bank for distribution among the cold-hit people of the country recently. A F M Asaduzzaman, General Manager of Bangladesh Bank, Md. Jahangir Bin Hamid, Senior Vice President, Mir Mosharref Hossain, Vice President of National Bank Limited and other executives & officers of the bank were present at that time.