Finance Minister Abul Maal Abdul Muhith tabled the Bill on Tuesday and it was passed by voice vote.
With the Bill placed in Parliament, Jatiya Party MP Mujibul Haq Chunnu proposed that there should have a public opinion poll over the bill to see if it should be passed.
“This bill has triggered controversy at home and abroad. So, there should be opinion poll over it,” he said.
Objecting to Chunnu’s comment, Muhith said, “It is true that there has been much talk (controversy) but those who argue against it do not know what's in the Bill.”
“There are constitutional obligations regarding the Bill.”
The present government took the initiative to amend and scrap ordinances passed during military rule like the 1983 Grameen Bank Ordinance. The Grameen Bank Ordinance of 1983 is one of them.
For this move, Yunus strongly criticised the government and said it was a plot to curb the Bank’s independence.
Opposition BNP sided with Yunus and demanded the Bank be kept as it is.
The US has also sided with the Bank and Yunus.
Lauding Yunus, Chunnu said, “He is a much-talked-about a person. He was criticised during the 1/11 period. But he has brought about a radical change in liberating women in Bangladesh.”
"He has contributed to women’s self-reliance,” he added.
Muhith said, “Dr Yunus is a wise and revered person. He is a pride of our country. He has brought Nobel for our country.”
“This success of his (Yunus) should be attributed to the government initiative and luckily, my role.”
Muhith was the Finance Minister during HM Ershad’s military rule when Grameen Bank Ordinance-1983 was proclaimed.
নবম সংসদের একটি মুহূর্ত, যেখানে উপস্থিত ছিলেন শেখ হাসিনা ও খালেদা জিয়া।
Terming the proposed bill ‘finance bill’, Ershad’s Jatiya Party MP Chunnu proposed that the amendments to the Ordinance should have the President’s consent, but this was rejected by voice vote.
As per Section 81 and 82, a finance bill needs to have President’s consent before it is placed in Parliament.
Pointing to the Sections, he said, “It is a finance bill. This bill should have been consented by the President. But there is no mention of increasing and decreasing tax in this bill.”
“So there is no need to get the President’s consent to it.”
"No big changes have been brought to the Bill. The limit of age for service of the Managing Director should be 60.”
“As per that law, the High Court has announced him ineligible (for the managing director post at the Bank). If I am requested to change this, I will increase the age ceiling to 65.”
“But that should not be made right now, let’s wait till arguments and counter arguments take place.”
As per the new Act, the Managing Director, chosen from the panel of up to five candidates preliminarily approved by Bangladesh Bank, will be appointed for three years.
However, the Act stipulates that the bank's Board of Directors will comprise 12 members - three chosen by the government and nine chosen by stakeholders.
The MD will head the Board of Directors, but he would not have any voting rights.
The Grameen Bank Ordinance-1983 made the microcredit institution accountable only to the government and not to the Bangladesh Bank.
As such, the Grameen Bank earlier had only submitted a financial report every year to the government. Now it will have to submit another to the central bank after the Bill becomes law.
The new law provides for increasing the Grameen Bank's authorised capital to Tk 10 billion from Tk 3.5 billion and paid-up capital to Tk 3 billion from Tk 500 million.
It stipulates that the government holds 25 percent of the Bank’s share and for other shareholders own the remaining 75 percent.
The new act also gives the government the right to raise paid-up capital in time.
According to the Grameen Bank Ordinance-1983, a person must face one year in jail and Tk 2,000 in fines if he or she gives any wrong information.
As per the amended Act, the fine has been increased to Tk 10,000.
The Ordinance states that a person must face six-month imprisonment and Tk 1,000 in fines if he or she uses the Bank in any advertisement or in any other way without the Bank’s approval.
The new act has increased the imprisonment up to one year and the fine to Tk 100,000.
Yunus has been on bitter terms with the government after the latter had removed him from his post on the ground that he was past the service age.
Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus had been the MD since Grameen's inception in 1983, until the government removed him from the position in March 2011.
The central bank had removed him from his post in March 2011. Yunus later went to the court against it but he lost the appeal and resigned from his post.
Yunus shared the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006 with Grameen Bank "for their efforts in poverty alleviation" through microcredit.
Grameen Bank and Yunus faced widespread criticism after a documentary on the Norwegian national TV in 2010.
The documentary had accused Yunus of transferring foreign funds from one account to another without informing the donors.
The government later formed an inquiry commission to review the activities of the bank following the allegation.
The commission has recently submitted its report, recommending that bank be decentralised.