Nobel laureate Prof Muhammad Yunus has committed seditious offence by plotting a conspiracy against the Bangladesh government and therefore, he is liable to punishment, experts say.

Grameen Bank founder Yunus used his links with the then US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to pressurize the government to drop a pecuniary irregularity investigation against him. 

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s US expatriate son Sajeeb Wazed Joy was asked to convince his mother and the government to stop the investigation against Yunus. Joy was threatened with Internal Revenue Service (IRS) audit if he fails to help drop the investigation. 

Recently, the issue came to the fore and sparked controversy at home and abroad. 

Many think that the role of Yunus in using foreign state machinery to put pressure on the government is tantamount to seditious offence.

Hillary should not have interfered in the antenatal affairs of other country. Hillary has shown utter disregard for the international law.

 Dr Tureen Afroz, prosecutor of International Crimes Tribunal, said “According to international law, no country should interfere in internal affairs of other countries. If allegation against Hillary is found to be true, it can be said that she violated the international law.”

 If Yunus is found to be involved in conspiracy against the state, he should be tried for act of treason and be punished, she noted.

 Prof Giasuddin Molla, a political science teacher of Dhaka University and president of Rastrabigyan Samity, said Yunus wanted Hillary to pressurise Bangladesh government to drop investigation against him. “Yunus donated a huge amount of money to Clinton Foundation. He conspired against an elected government of Bangladesh. He should be punished.”

 Recently, US Senate Committee on the Judiciary has taken initiative to verify the allegation that Hillary Clinton used her official position to interrupt an ‘independent investigation’ against Yunus.

 In a letter, committee chairman Senator Chuck Grassley required the State Department to make former deputy chief of mission at the US Embassy in Dhaka Jon Danilowicz available for an interview with the committee members as part of the move to verify the allegation against Hillary.

On June 1, Chuck Grassley wrote the letter to Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, asking him to provide some information by June 15 in this regard.

 Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s son Sajeeb Wazed Joy living in the US was threatened with Internal Revenue Service (IRS) audit if he fails to help drop investigation against Dr Yunus. Grassley wrote: “If the secretary of state used her position to intervene in an independent investigation by a sovereign government simply because of a personal and financial relationship stemming from the Clinton Foundation rather than the legitimate foreign policy interests of the United States, then that would be unacceptable.”

 Yunus was removed from Grameen Bank as its managing director on the grounds of his exceeding the retirement age in 2011. He also faced an allegation of laundering bank fund abroad.

The Nobel laureate filed a writ petition with the High Court challenging the legality of his removal but lost the legal battle.

 According to the letter, Joy had a number of interactions with high-level State Department officials during 2010-2012 period. He faced pressure to drop the investigation.

 Some of the individuals he met include former ambassadors in Dhaka James Moriarty and Dan Mozena, Deputy Chief of Mission Danilowicz and USAID Administrator Rajiv Shah.

 Dr Yunus, Grameen Bank founder, is very close to the Clinton family. Yunus’ companies reportedly donated $100,000 to $250,000 to the Clinton Global Initiative and $25,000 to $50,000 to the Clinton Foundation. After Hillary became US Secretary of State, his relation with the Clinton family deepened.

 On May 11 this year, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina said Clinton called her office in March 2011 and demanded that Yunus be restored to his position of chairman of Grameen Bank.

 However, the Bangladesh government has welcomed the move of the US Senate Committee to look into Hillary Clinton’s alleged hands in the interference in an ‘independent investigation’ against Dr Yunus.

Finance Minister AMA Muhith said the proposed hike in the excise duty on bank-account balance wouldn't be changed, thereby deflating widespread criticism of his budgetary measure.     

"It is not new. The banks have been paying (excise duty) for long number of years. Only the rate and threshold have been changed," he said Tuesday after the launch of Foreign Aid Management System (FAMS) in the city.

Mr Muhith mentioned that the excise-free limit on bank balance has been enhanced to Tk 100,000 from the previous threshold of Tk 20,000.

"I have just raised the threshold and the rate of the duty now."

In the national budget for the next fiscal, the government has proposed Tk 800 as excise duty instead of the current amount of Tk 500 for the bank balance over Tk 100,000.

Economic Relations Division (ERD) organised the launching ceremony of software for FAMS at its office in Dhaka with its Secretary Kazi Shofiqul Azam in the chair.

Planning Minister AHM Mustafa Kamal, State Minister for Finance and Planning MA Mannan, State Minister for ICT Junaid Ahmed Palak, Chief Coordinator for the SDG Affairs M Abul Kalam Azad and ERD Additional Secretary Farida Nasreen also spoke on the occasion.

Asked about the newly proposed uniform 15 per cent VAT, the finance minister said the assembly would discuss the budget and take decision it thinks better.

To a query about lower projection of the estimated GDP growth by some development partners, Mr Muhith said he is hopeful of achieving 7.2 per cent growth in the  outgoing financial year (FY), 2016-17.

"During September-October period of the next fiscal, we will get the final estimation of the GDP. I am confident that the country's GDP will be 7.2 per cent."

About the Centre for Policy Dialogue's criticism on the proposed national budget, Muhith uttered his oft-repeated snide epithet: 'Rubbish'.

He did not elaborate further on the policy think-tank's critical appreciation of different measures proposed in the Tk 4.0 trillion-plus budget for the next fiscal.

In his speech at the FAMS launching ceremony the finance minister said Bangladesh is no more the 'basket case' nation dubbed by the then US Secretary of State, Dr Henry Kissinger, as Bangladesh's dependency on foreign aid has dropped drastically.

In early years after the independence of Bangladesh, its debt-to-GDP (gross domestic product) ratio was about 8.0, which has now fallen to only 1.5.

"Till early 1980s, nearly 90 per cent of the national budget income had come from the foreign assistance. But the scenario started changing when the VAT was introduced in 1991 in the country," he noted.

Planning Minister Mustafa Kamal said the foreign aid the ERD mobilizes should have been economical for the country.

"When the ERD goes for negotiations, the ERD should keep the highest priority on the economic return from the aid," he added.

About the GDP growth's lower projections by some donors, Mr Kamal said they had given the data based on the reality, not on the assumptions. "So, our statistics is correct."

ICT state minister Mr Palak said they would convert 90 per cent of government service to online from the current 40 per cent by the year 2021.

Meanwhile, AMA Muhith launched the ERD's FAMS software where the state of the foreign assistance committed by different external development partners and lenders for different projects of the country, their disbursement, repayment of the debts and other information will be available.

The government ministries and agencies concerned will easily access the software for working on foreign aid.

The ERD with a support of a local private firm --genweb2-has developed the software for digitizing the foreign-aid administration.

Total amount of investments by the country’s Islamic banks stood at Tk 1770.93 billion at the end of the first quarter of this calendar year. 

According to Bangladesh Bank’s latest report, investments, loans in conventional sense in Islamic banking sector increased by 4.82 per cent over the previous quarter.

Some Tk 1689.57 billion was invested by the Islamic banks during the immediate quarter, the last (October-December) of 2016.  

The investment of January-March period was also 18.55 per cent higher than the same period of the past year. 

The central bank review report showed that the share of total investment of Islamic banks accounted for 24.10 per cent among all the banks in the country.

It also showed that eight full-fledged Islamic banks made 95.47 per cent of the total Shariah banking investment.

The scheduled banks made the rest 4.53 per cent of the Shariah banking investment— 2.71 per cent and 1.82 per cent by their Islamic banking branches and windows respectively. 

Islami Bank Bangladesh Limited alone invested 35.58 per cent of the country's total Shariah investment in the first quarter of this calendar year.