JPMorgan Chase's embattled chief executive Jamie Dimon will be hauled before Congress on June 7 to explain recent huge trading losses, legislators announced Friday.

The Daily Star/ Bangladesh/ 27-May-2012

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina launches an online tax payment system at a programme at Bangabandhu International Conference Centre in Dhaka yesterday.

Anybody with a debit or credit card and internet access can pay tax from home, instead of queuing for hours at a bank.

The National Board of Revenue (NBR) yesterday introduced an online tax payment system at a function at Bangabandhu International Conference Centre in Dhaka.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina first paid her advance income tax online for 2012-13.

For the next one week, people will be able to pay tax only through Sonali Bank. Another 25 banks will join the system in 15 days or one month, said Kanan Kumar Roy, coordinator of the e-payment system and director general of the Directorate of Inspection (Taxes) of the NBR.

“More banks will join the system later,” he said.

NBR's e-payment website, www.nbrepayment.org, is easy to use, secure and completely free of charge. Only registered users can make e-payments and get the full functionality of the site.

There will be separate sections for income tax, VAT and customs duty in the profile form of each taxpayer.

The website will ask for card number and password once a user enters his account. Then the income tax will be automatically deducted from the card and the user will be able to see the amount deducted on the screen.

The system is also integrated with Sonali Bank (the settlement bank), QCash (e-payment processor), customs database and integrated budgeting and accounting system of the Controller General of Accounts Office.

The NBR introduced an online return submission system last year on a trial basis in two zones and the tax administrator aims to enable all taxpayers to submit returns online by 2013.

The Daily Star/ Bangladesh/ 27-May-2012

In order to increase its deposit figure along with liquidity, Rajshahi Krishi Unnayan Bank (RAKUB) has approved a new monthly savings scheme.

The approval was given in the 381st Meeting of the Board of Directors of the Bank held at its headquarters with Chairman Prof Dr Shah Nawaj Ali in the chair here today.

Managing Director of the Bank Pradip Qumar Dutta, Directors Abdul Mannan, Dr Rustam Ali Ahmed and Indu Bikash Mondal attended the meeting.

The meeting reviewed overall activities of the Bank and took some important decisions relating to its commercial and administrative matters.

It stressed the need for ensuring transparency and accountability side by side with farmer-friendly banking services for the sake of making the Bank more proactive.

In addition, the Bank should expedite its consumer services for increasing qualitative and quantitative credit flow to potential fields for boosting agricultural output.

General Manager (Operation) Habibur Rahman, General Manager (Audit, Accounts and Recovery) Nishit Qumar Saha and General Manager (Rajshahi division) Abdul Khaleque Khan and Council- Secretary Abu Bakar Siddiqui were also present.

The meeting discussed on how to make the Bank’s operational and commercial activities more dynamic through strengthening the credit support for both farm and non-farm prospective fields.

So, the pro-farmers banking in the specialized Bank must be ensured for cherished development of the region after the optimum use of its existing natural resources.

The meeting emphasised on intensifying the Bank’s activities.

They also discussed to supplement the government’s effort to expand social safety net and ensure poverty reduction and food security.

The Daily Sun/ Bangladesh/ 27-May-2012

The head of the International Monetary Fund yesterday urged Greeks to pay their taxes, saying she is more concerned about sub-Saharan Africans in poverty than Greeks hit by the economic crisis.

Christine Lagarde told the Guardian newspaper in an interview published online Friday, “As far as Athens is concerned, I also think about all those people who are trying to escape tax all the time. All these people in Greece who are trying to escape tax.”

The IMF managing director said Greeks should “help themselves collectively” by “all paying their tax”, adding that she thought “equally” about those deprived of public services by the crisis and those involved in tax avoidance.

Caught in a fifth straight year of recession, Greece is struggling to apply a tough austerity overhaul in return for EU-IMF loans, but has already made drastic cuts to public services.

On children affected by the cuts, Lagarde said their parents needed to take responsibility.

“Parents have to pay their tax,” she was quoted as saying.

“I think more of the little kids from a school in a little village in Niger who get teaching two hours a day, sharing one chair for three of them, and who are very keen to get an education,” she added.

The Daily Sun/ Bangladesh/ 27-May-2012

The government is likely to sign a deal with a Spanish company tomorrow to set up the much-talked-about World Bank (WB) funded 335 megawatt Siddhirganj power project, a senior government official said.

“We are at the final stage of signing an Engineering, Procurement and Construction (EPC) deal with Spanish firm Isolux Ingenieria tomorrow,” Mostafa Kamal, managing director of Electricity Generation Company of Bangladesh (EGCB), said.

Kamal, also chief of the implementing agency, told daily sun Friday that the WB will provide the major portion of the project cost while the rest will come from the domestic sources or other donor agencies.

The government has sought donors’ assistance to mobilise the remaining amount to implement the mega power project, he said.

Earlier, the WB had backtracked from its committed 100 percent financial support for the combined cycle power project supposed to be commissioned within 30 months of the deal signing.

In a letter on 12 January this year, the WB advised the EGCB to look for alternative sources or depend on government funds to mobilise the rest of the project cost.

The WB has already approved the draft agreement with the Spanish company, sources said. The cost of the revised project will rise to $415.1 million from previously estimated $221.1 million, the EGCB boss said.

The WB had committed to provide $221.10 million to implement two units of the peaking power plant at Siddhirganj, each with the capacity of generating 150MW of electricity.

But it disagreed on a proposal to procure equipment from German firm Siemens over graft allegations. The WB then proposed the government to turn the project into a 335-450MW combined cycle one and assured Bangladesh of providing the full amount required for the project.

According to officials, state-owned EGCB invited a tender in October 2010 for the power plant.

The project undertaken in 2004 was delayed due to a long procedure of tendering and re-tendering as the authorities failed to satisfy the WB.

The tender was first invited in 2009 when it was a 300MW-capacity peaking plant project. But the EGCB had to cancel it in response to the WB suggestion.

Later, as per Power Division’s instructions and WB’s suggestions, the EGCB upgraded the project to a 335-450MW combined cycle power plant and quickly invited a tender in November 2010.

The Daily Sun/ Bangladesh/ 27-May-2012