The BEA leaders described the government's philosophy of free market economy as unacceptable.

They also blasted the National Board of Revenue for its move to whiten money.

Dr Abul Barakat, the BEA general secretary, read out a written statement on behalf of the association at the press conference held at the Dhaka Reporters Unity office.

BEA President Dr Quazi Kholiquzzaman Ahmad was present.

The reduction in import duty on some essential items, including lentil and edible oil, is not enough to cut down inflation, they remarked, fearing that a strong syndication in the supply chain, which is still in existence, might take such a zero duty facility to their advantage and make windfall profits.

They suggested market monitoring and good financial governance to yield positive results in this regard.

"It is not possible for the government to check the rice and wheat prices following the open market slogan, because prices of these items have increased in the world market," said Dr Barakat.

The BEA identified 10 reasons for continued price-hike, which include an active integrated syndicate, breakdown of supply chain, inadequate stock of food grains in government silos, weak monitoring of the demand-supply situation and adverse situation in the international market.

Wondering what type of money would be whitened by government's recent move, Dr Barakat said, "Any amount of undisclosed money should be treated as black money."

However, the BEA chief said if such money can be utilised in production sector, it would bring something good.

There should be a strong mechanism by which government can check inflation, Dr Kholiquzzaman said, adding that the Consumer Rights Protection Act could be a tool to check syndication.

Resenting the government's decision to raise the kerosene price, he said this is totally against the concept of poverty reduction.

The BEA termed the proposed new duty structure for import 'a drawback for the local industries.' It said due to the slash of infrastructure development surcharge, import duties of around 2,600 items would decrease, but in most cases there would be nothing good for the poor people.

Dr Barakat questioned the rationale of the proposed withdrawal of zero duty facility from nearly 400 items, mostly industrial raw materials and capital machinery. "Even the government proposed to withdraw zero duty from garments and textile machinery," he lamented.

Expressing dissatisfaction over the proposed big Annual Development Programme (ADP), the BEA said when the Tk21600 crore ADP of the current fiscal gets half of its projects implemented, then the bigger new ADP would be too tough to implement.