"It will never be possible to stop waste of government funds without punishing them," Perc said in its 340-page report, submitted to Finance and Planning Minister M Saifur Rahman on Sunday.

The government-appointed body blamed the waste of the prime minister's relief fund on lack of transparency and said a hefty sum was drained, as it was used politically and given to false recipients, allowing the same person to get cheques under the names of different organisations.

Perc, formed to suggest measures to streamline public expenditure, underscored a guideline to have proper accounting of the spending.

During Ramadan, the holy month of restraint, a poor country like Bangladesh wastes a lot of money on the prime minister's and president's iftar parties that the report described as politically-directed and wasteful.

Perc that completed its term on December 31 said the poor could have benefited from the fund and the government could have spent the sum on annual allowance for senior citizens or widows on the eve of the Eid-ul-Fitr.

The report also says government agencies waste hefty funds by using cars for extra hours and the ministries tend to buy luxury cars, as there is no purchase policy.

AIRPORT ROAD

Perc cited the Airport Road beautification project under the communications ministry as the worst-case example of state fund waste.

The report voiced surprise that Communications Minister Nazmul Huda expressed ignorance about the project when Prime Minister Khaleda Zia asked him about it at a meeting that came amid a glut of news reports on the wasteful plan.

A meeting chaired by the prime minister on January 1, 2003 decided to spend Tk 20 crore in two years on the facelift of the 6km stretch of the Airport Road from Zia International Airport to the Staff Road Rail Crossing.

The communications secretary wrote to the principal secretary on March 9, requesting him to ask the Planning Commission to grant the ministry Tk 6 crore for 2003 and Tk 14 crore for 2004 for the project.

The Roads and Highways Department (RHD) laid out a similar project, estimating the cost at up to Tk 40 crore to spend on road beautification and increasing its stretch to 7km.

The Planning Commission that received the proposal on May 6 found inconsistencies between the RHD plan and the prime minister's decision and two pre-Ecnec (Executive Committee of National Economic Council) meetings in June and September slashed the cost down to Tk 25 crore.

The original proposal outlined a cost of Tk 1 crore for renovations to 12,000 square metres of Airport Road dividers and the revised plan retained the component without showing its cost, Perc said.

"It means both the ministry and RHD knew during revision of the proposal that the renovations to the road dividers would not be undertaken," Perc said.

From early September before the revised proposal was approved, the RHD started demolition of the dividers on the road.

"The design and construction (of the dividers) were of international standards … they were suitable for long-time use. It was illogical to replace them with new dividers," Perc said.

Again on September 16, the revised proposal was placed at Ecnec for approval, but the road divider component was excluded from it this time, meaning the dividers would not be demolished.

But the demolition was going on in earnest the same day and Khaleda visited the site and instructed the authorities to stop it.

"When the communications minister was asked about the divider demolition, he said he was in the dark about the matter. His ignorance is really surprising, especially when the task is undertaken by an agency under his ministry on an important road and newspapers published reports with photographs," Perc said.

Perc also blamed the communications secretary for being inconsistent and said he approved two project proposals on May 7, 2003 -- one on upgrading the Banani-Tongi-Joydevpur Road to an eight-lane highway and the other on the Airport Road facelift.

The next day, he suggested at an inter-ministerial meeting that the two projects should not be separately undertaken.