Dhaka, July 2 (bdnews24.com) – The food ministry has drafted a policy for the 100 Days Employment Generation programme which will start in mid-October, a senior government official said.
The government in the budget for fiscal 2008-09 allocated Tk 2,000 crore for the programme to ensure jobs for up to 22 lakh rural unemployed poor people for at least 100 days.
Finance secretary Mohammad Tareque said that the money retrieved in the anti-corruption drives would be spent on the project.
The programme will be designed as an employment guarantee scheme. Every worker, under the programme, will receive Tk 100 a day even if the government fails to give him a job.
Tareque Wednesday told bdnews24.com: "The money retrieved in the anticorruption drive is now government money. The government can spend it the way it wants."
On June 10, Bangladesh Bank governor Salehuddin Ahmed told reporters that Tk 1,246 crore retrieved in anticorruption drives had been deposited with the bank.
The draft policy for the project will be placed at a ministerial meeting Thursday for approval.
The finance secretary said the programme was to start on Oct 15. The first phase will continue until mid-January 2009, with the second part continuing for two months from mid-March 2009.
The project covers up to 2,200 unions in 44 districts. The areas hit by river erosion and
monga
will get priority.
The upazila disaster management committee will implement the project to be monitored by a steering committee led by the food and disaster management secretary.
According to the draft policy, the government will invite applications from the unemployed rural poor. The selected people will be employed in various jobs of infrastructural development.
The government will pay unemployment allowances to those selected but not employed within 15 days from the start of the project.
They will get Tk 100 per day for first 30 days and Tk 50 a day for 60 days.
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