Bangladesh Bank (BB) will finalise the draft amendment to the Banking Companies Act by June.

The final draft will take the major amendment process a step forward, but the fate of the much-talked about reform will depend on the active efforts of the higher authorities, a central bank official said yesterday.

Finance Minister Abul Maal Abdul Muhith earlier told media that the Banking Companies Act would be amended by June this year to ensure more transparency in the financial sector.

Chairman of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Finance AMH Mostafa Kamal said the committee was reviewing the pros and cons of the amendment process to ensure a better legal framework for the country’s financial sector.

Referring to the government’s commitment to update the legal framework that governs the banking and financial sector, BB Executive Director Jahangir Alam told BSS that a committee of the central bank would finalise the draft and submit it to the finance ministry by June.

He said the draft would have some major reform proposals to establish more transparency and accountability, removing the room for all sorts of conflict of interests in the financial sector.

The official, however, did not want to elaborate the extent of the reform proposals.

A high official of the finance ministry said the government plans to place the final draft of the act before the parliament by the yearend.

Joint Secretary of the Finance Division Amalendu Mukherjee said the finance ministry would hold a series of meetings with stakeholders on the draft after getting it from the central bank.

Framed in 1991, the Bank Companies Act has so far been amended twice in 1993 and 1995 to make it more effective in managing the financial sector in a better way.

The caretaker government in 2007 amended the law through an ordinance, but it did not come to effect as the government later changed the mind and refrained from ratifying it