Govt aims to build cashless society in 3-4 years: Joy

ZOOMBANGLA DESK: Prime Minister’s ICT Affairs Adviser Sajeeb Wazed Joy today said the government aims to build a cashless society within the next three or four years as part of it’s target to bring cent percent people under bank account service.

“Our next target is to build a cashless society,” he told the launching ceremony of ‘Binimoy’, an interoperable digital transaction platform (IDTP), at a city hotel this morning.

Joy said currently around 5 to 6 crore village people don’t have bank accounts. If Awami League is voted to power again in next elections, 100 percent people of Bangladesh will have bank accounts and they will lead cashless lives during “our government’s next term”, he added.

He said network infrastructures have been developed, government services have been digitized, technology has advanced, large IT companies have been built in Bangladesh, laptops, mobile phones and computer memory chips are being produced here and export of those is going to begin.

“Now our focus is to build a cashless society. We have already started working but it will take 3 to 4 years,” he said.

He said the entire future world will be cashless as everyone has smart phone or mobile phone in his or her hands.

Explaining problems of transactions in cash, Joy said in most of the cases people of Bangladesh, especially in villages, make transactions in cash.

“But transactions in cash have problems. One is cash can be stolen; another is people face harassment in getting government services or allowances. Financing in terrorism and corruption is also held in cash transaction,” Joy mentioned underscoring the need for building a cashless society to enable people to have easier and faster life.

Highlighting the tremendous achievement of the country in the field of ICT, he said: “Entire planning, implementation and everything of ‘Digital Bangladesh’ have been done with our own initiatives. No foreign agency did any kind of planning whether it is long, short or project planning to implement Digital Bangladesh. We did the entire works.”

The premier’s ICT adviser added: “Some projects were implemented by foreign agency but we did the planning and project management. So, we implemented the Digital Bangladesh entirely.”

He said fiber optic cable has been reached almost throughout the country, almost down to the union level.

For this step, Bangladesh has been lauded as no other country in the world could take fiber optic cable up to union level, he mentioned.

He said now 50 percent government services have been brought under digitization and hopefully 100 percent government services will be digitized within a few years.

“Maximum around 90-95 apps, websites have been developed and designed in Bangladesh through native companies,” he said.

State Minister for ICT Zunaid Ahmed Palak and ICT Division Senior Secretary NM Zeaul Alam addressed the inaugural function as the special guests.

Bangladesh Bank (BB) Governor Abdur Rouf Talukder chaired it while BB Director Mezbaul Haque made a presentation explaining the features of the platform.

‘Binimoy’ is a breakthrough platform for establishing digital financial transactions, which is a timely initiative among the far-reaching steps taken by the government to build a digital Bangladesh initiative, said a press release today.

In recent years, the government has taken steps to make all bank, MFS operator and PSP accounts interoperable. It will facilitate transactions between consumers, merchants, PSPs, e-wallets, banks, financial institutions, government agencies and private organizations.

Binimoy will make all forms of financial transactions cost-effective, simple and transparent, including the payment of employee wages, the sending of remittances, the payment of taxes or VAT, the payment of utility bills and e-commerce transactions.

Binimoy is a web-based platform that will be integrated as a service into the apps of banks, mobile financial services and payment system providers.

Velwire Limited, Microsoft Bangladesh, and Orion Informatics Limited collaborated on the development of the platform as part of the Innovation and Entrepreneurship Development Academy (IDEA) programme of the ICT Division and Bangladesh Bank.

Velwire Limited will uphold the responsibilities of Binimoy platform.

Bangladesh Bank in a notice last Thursday issued guidelines regarding the cost of Interoperable Digital Transaction Platform (IDTP).

As mentioned, sending money from bKash to Rocket will cost Taka 5 (per thousand). And sending money from MFS services (bKash, Rocket etc.) to the bank (per thousand) will cost Taka 10.

On the other hand, sending money from MFS to Payment Service Provider (PSP) account will cost Taka 5 per thousand.

The release further informed that transactions on the platform will be available from tomorrow (Monday). (BSS)