Anisul Haque

Md Anisul Haque was elected chairman of Social Islami Bank Limited (SIBL) in its 266th board meeting held Sunday. Mohammad Azam and A Jabbar Mollah have also become vice-chairmen, said a press release. Md Anisul Haque is the finance director of Hamdard (Waqf) Bangladesh. He has been also a director of the Bank on behalf of Hamdard (Waqf) Bangladesh. Mohammad Azam is a leading businessman and director of Northern General Insurance Co Ltd. A Jabbar Mollah is a CIP. He is also Managing Director of Jahanabad Sea Foods Ltd.

Source: The Financial Express/ Bangladesh/ 12th Dec 2011

Millennium Information Solution Limited , a Gartner-awarded Islamic banking solution (IBS) software company, is now moving to Asian countries with its flagship product 'Ababil' to cope with the rising demand of Islamic Shariah-based banking.

Mahmud Hossain, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and Co-Founder of the company in an interview with the FE also said some more banking entities are in the pipeline to launch shariah-based Islamic banking in Bangladesh and if allowed by the Central Bank, the business of Islamic software will take a new height.

He said with collaboration of two renowned global IT companies, Millennium has already started positioning 'Ababil' in Gulf countries.

Mentioning the growing presence of Islamic banking world-wide, he also said two of his company clients--Social Islami Bank Ltd and Al-Arafah Islami Bank-achieved the highest growth in operating profit in the first six months of 2011.

" Since every transaction in Islamic Banking and Finance requires real underlying asset, adoption of this principle in financial transactions could have avoided global economic meltdown of 2008 to great extent," Mr Mahmud said.

"So if the central bank patronises this sector here, Shariah banking can earn huge revenue and remittance through exporting of trained manpower as well as software solution in Islamic banking and this phenomenon have started at a very small scale here," he said, adding that some foreign software companies, even without having true Shariah compliant solution, are earning precious foreign currency through winning projects from local Islamic banks and conventional banks having Islamic branches/Windows.

"By the grace of Almighty, we are the first in Bangladesh in locally developing Centralised Online Solution software (Islamic Banking). The software was supplied to Al-Arafah Bank in 2007," he said."We have been working with only Shariah Banking solution in financial sector to develop deep rooted expertise in this niche sector in a focused manner. Many other foreign software companies also developed IB solution but those don't fully match to the IB because they don't have expertise in this sector, Mr Mahmud Hossain said.

There are huge opportunities of Islamic Banking and subsequently Islamic Banking Solution (IBS) software in countries including Indonesia, Brunei, Malaysia, Thailand, Philippine, Qatar, Kuwait, Abu Dhabi, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia and Egypt, the Millennium CEO said.

In Indonesia, where economic growth rate was the highest in the South-East Asian zone, Islamic banking marked a 55 per cent growth, he said, adding that Millennium started positioning its flagship product in that country keeping entire Asian region in perspective.

Millennium was launched in 2001 after merger of two separate companies started in 1996. At the earlier period, the IBS software company mostly received order of outsourcing works of mostly European countries and continued it till 2007.

The company has been designing, developing and deploying its product for the last 15 years. It firstly supplied IBS software to Islami Bank Bangladesh Limited (IBBL), which used it for 7-8 years (till 2005).

Currently five banks and a non-banking financial institution (NBFI) are using the flagship product of Millennium. They are: Al-Arafah Islami Bank (85 branches), largest 'Ababil' user, Social Islami Bank Limited-SIBL (73 branches), the City Bank (for Islamic banking operation 'Manaraah'-30 branches), AB Bank Limited (for Islamic banking operation-15 branches), Agrani Bank Limited (for Islamic banking operation- 5 branches and 100 more in progress) and Hajj Finance Company Limited (a non-banking joint venture financial institution between Bangladesh and Malaysia-3 branches and 3 more in progress).

'Ababil' includes different modules such as customer information system (CIS), general ledger, Al-Wadia and Mudaraba deposit (current and saving accounts management module), term deposit (fixed deposit) various scheme and products like deposit pension scheme, investment, inland remittance, inward or outward bill collection, trade financing and foreign exchange operations, vault management, Internet Banking and ATM interfacing.

SIBL replaced its earlier distributed system "PC Bank 2000" by 'Ababil', within a period of only 16 months in its all branches, with all required Islamic banking modules including trade finance, ATM, online CIB and integration with BACH.

Source: The Financial Express/ Bangladesh/ 12th Dec 2011

The country's leading economists and bankers Sunday identified severe weaknesses of state-owned commercial banks (SCBs) and risks related to ensuring financial stability and management operations as the major challenges to maintenance of sustainable development of the country's overall banking sector.

They also stressed the need for financial inclusion, banking automation and strengthening of bank supervision and central bank autonomy as imperatives for promoting sound growth of the country's banking sector.

The economists and researchers pointed out these major challenges facing the banking sector, while speaking at the working session of a seminar titled, "Financial Institutions and Management" at Jahangirnagar University (JU).

The programme was organised as part of a three-day seminar on "Bangladesh at 40: Changes and Challenges," organised by Faculty of Business Studies of JU.

Professor K Bazlul Huq, Chairman of the state-owned Agrani Bank Limited, chaired the session.

The Financial Express (FE) was the media partner of the event.

The discussants in the session also said the challenges need to be addressed in a befitting way in order to ensure sustained development of the country's banking sector.

Addressing the seminar, Toufiq Ahmed Chowdhury, Director General of the Bangladesh Institute of Bank Management (BIBM), said it needs no reiteration that the past efforts towards restructuring the SCBs in Bangladesh could not bring about the desired results.

On the other hand, it is obvious that the overall efficiency of the banking system cannot be ensured without a turnaround of the situation in SCBs, he added.

"After the corporatisation of the SCBs, all the commercial banks were expected to enjoy a level playing field within a uniform regulatory framework. But unfortunately, coporatisation of the SCBs is not being reflected in their governance, operation and finally, overall performance," Mr. Chowdhury noted.

In 2009, four SCBs held 28.6 per cent of the total industry assets as against 31.1 per cent in 2008, according to the central bank statistics.

In his paper on 'Financial Market: Past, Present and Future', the BIBM chief focused on changes and challenges in the country's banking sector since 1972.

For recapitalisation, the corporatised SCBs should go for raising new capital by issuing initial public offering (IPO), non-cumulative perpetual preferred stock and long-term subordinated debt, Mr Chowdhury said in his paper.

"…the SCBs must undertake effective measures for reducing non-performing assets and banking costs," he noted.

About financial inclusion, he said the commercial banks should themselves come forward for implementing the financial inclusion programmes.

Financial stability and risk management practices are among the issues that came into the limelight, following the global financial crisis, he said, adding that serious financial instability can manifest itself in terms of banking crisis and recession and can be very costly for any economy, in terms of disruption to the real sectors causing reduction of output and loss of jobs.

"Therefore, to maintain and enhance the pace of growth, it is very important to minimise the risks of instability," he noted.

Dr Chowdhury also proposed that the post of the central bank governor should be made a constitutional one. This will help ensure its independent functioning as the monetary watchdog.

"We need honest, dynamic and patriotic persons to improve the SCBs financial health," Professor K Bazlul Huq said while explaining the need for strengthening in the SCBs' management.

He also said the policy makers should give attention to ensuring stability of the country's overall financial sector.

S M Hashemi, Director of the BRAC Development Institute (DBI), suggested that the micro-finance institutions (MFIs) should introduce new products to ensure access to credit of the ultra poor across the country.

In his paper on 'Democratising the Financial Sector: Next Generation Challenges', the DBI director said a central credit bureau necessary to maintain credit history and repayment capacities of the micro-credit borrowers to check overlapping.

Clients borrow from one MFI to pay off another, he said, adding that multiple borrowing leads to increased indebtedness and worsening client conditions.

Nazrul Islam, Professor and Dean of the State University of Bangladesh, said Bangladesh is a developing economy that is primarily based on agriculture and ready-made garment (RMG) industry.

The country is the largest producer and exporter of RMG products as a plenty of cheap women labourers are available here, he said, adding that remittance receipts from the overseas Bangladesh accounted, as a sector, for about US$11 billion which is equivalent to 7.0 per cent of the country's aggregate national budget.

"Public sector management has substantially been affected by the bureaucracy, corruption, demonstration effect of corruption, frequent changes of the rules and statues, poor management, and, above all, the mindset of the people who influence the systems and are influenced by the systems," Mr. Islam said in his paper titled, 'Whither Private Sector Management in Bangladesh'.

On the other hand, the private sector management is influenced primarily by the related government policies including that of privatisation, he said, adding that the government policy-regime regarding the regulation of private sector enterprises has been changed and modified at different times by the different governments.

Among others, Akhter Hossain, Economic Adviser, the Bangladesh Bank (BB) and former Managing Director of the Prime Bank Limited Ehsanul Huq also spoke on the occasion.

Source: The Financial Express/ Bangladesh/ 12th Dec 2011

A follow-up meeting on loans under consumers’ credit scheme was held at Pubali Bank head office recently, says a press release.

Helal Ahmed Chowdhury, managing director of Pubali Bank Limited, presided over the Meeting. M.A. Halim Chowdhury, additional managing director, Mahbub Mustafizur Rahman, deputy managing director and Santi Ranjan Sarker, general manager of Consumers’ Credit Division, were present at the meeting.

Helal Ahmed Chowdhury, managing director, said that Pubali Bank fixed the lowest rate of interest in competitive market position and it appears to be the lowest in this related sector.

M A Halim Chowdhury, additional managing director, emphasised on recovery of overdue, classified and write off loan on priority basis. He advised regional head and branch manager to keep close vigilance so that newly disbursed loans may not become overdue or classified by intensive supervision and close monitoring of the loan.

Source: The Independent/ Bangladesh/ 12th Dec 2011

The 111th branch of United Commercial Bank (UCB) was opened at Anowara, Chittagong on Sunday.

Chairman of Parliamentary Standing Committee on Ministry of Textiles and Jute Akhtaruzzaman Chowdhury and UCB chairman and managing director M. Shahjahan Bhuiyan were present at the branch opening ceremony as chief guest and special guest.

M A Sabur, director and  chairman, executive committee of the Bank, and Md Jahangir Alam Khan, director and chairman, audit committee of the Bank, along with other directors M. A. Kalam, Shabbir Ahmed, Nur Uddin Javed, Bazal Ahmed, Nurul Islam Chowdhury, Setara Begum and Riyadh Zafar Chowdhury were also present at the event.

 Among others, additional managing directors Shafiqul Alam and M. Shahidul Islam, deputy managing directors Mamun-Ur-Rashid, Mirza Mahmud Rafiqur Rahman and M. A. Abdullah along with other officials of head office and different branches of Chittagong of United Commercial Bank Limited were present.

Akhtaruzzaman Chowdhury said, “Apart from the best banking service for clients, UCB is involved in various areas of Corporate Social Responsibilities and everybody’s assistance is highly desired to broaden our service more.”

Source: The Independent/ Bangladesh/ 12th Dec 2011