Edn, health, tech sectors to get Tk 21,367cr

The finance minister, AMA Muhith, allocated Tk 21,367 crore for education, health and technology sectors in the proposed national budget for the 2009-10 financial year terming them integral part of total development planning. The amount is 19 per cent of the total budget.
In current fiscal year, the allocation for education and technology was Tk 12,258 crore which was over 12 per cent of the total budget.
Muhith, proposed to allocate Tk 300 crore in the next fiscal year for free distribution of text books at the secondary level to achieve the target of removing illiteracy from the country by the year 2014.
Tk 3,904 crore has been proposed for disbursing monthly payment orders (MPO) to non–government school teachers. This covers 62 percent of the revenue budget of ministry of education.
The finance minister proposed to allocate Tk 112 crore for additional MPO subvention to non-government institutions for FY 2009-10.
The minister announced that the entire MPO listing system will be reviewed to identify fake institutions (institutions without teachers or students).
In order to enroll more students in vocational and technical courses, the minister proposed to allocate Tk 322 crore for 2009-10 fiscal, which constitutes an increase of 56.3 percent over the allocation of current fiscal year.
Keeping in his mind to build a digital Bangladesh, the finance minister has proposed an allocation of Tk 100 crore to meet the emergency expenditure in the ICT sector.
Muhith said that the government has started reviewing the health policy and announced that some 13,500 community clinics will be established across the country.
He also proposed to earmark Tk 498 crore for procurement of birth control related materials and equipment.
In his budget speech, the finance minister announced that all hospitals at Upazila and district levels will be modernized and upgraded to 50-bed and 250-bed hospitals respectively to render better services to the patients.

Courtesy of newagebd