The deputy commissioners on Sunday, the opening day of their three-day annual conference, were urged to help hold the forthcoming national polls in a fair manner.
Following a business session on the day at the conference being held in Dhaka city, interim government adviser to the ministries of planning and education Wahiduddin Mahmud told reporters that the government requested the district administrators to help organise a free and fair national elections.
He mentioned that the main task of this government was not to settle everyone鈥檚 demands but to help the country transition towards a well-governed democratic system.
鈥楾he DCs can be our most powerful tool in this transition by helping to hold a fair election,鈥� he added.
Interim government chief adviser Professor Muhammad Yunus inaugurated the DC conference in the morning at his Tejgaon office while the business sessions were held at the Osmani Memorial Auditorium later on the day.
The conference takes place at a time when the government is planning for the next national polls in December.
Regarding education sector, Wahiduddin Mahmud said that the deputy commissioners were instructed to reorganise the managing committees of the non-government schools and colleges with government officials and retired teachers, complete the half-done local-level projects and monitor the sector to check widespread irregularities and corruption.
Professor M Sayedur Rahman, special assistant to the chief adviser for the health and family welfare ministry, told reporters after another session that they urged the DCs along with the law enforcement agencies to stand by the government actions against illegal hospitals and clinics.聽聽
On the first day, two business sessions were held on the proposals made for the ministries of planning, education and health and family welfare where the advisers and senior ministry officials took part in discussions with district administrators. 聽聽聽
Divisional commissioner of Dhaka Sharf Uddin Ahmed Choudhury, Chattogram deputy commissioner Farida Khanom and Panchagarh deputy commissioner Md Sabet Ali also addressed the opening session. 聽
The DCs also held a closed door session with the chief adviser after the opening session.
Wahiduddin Mahmud, after the business session on proposals for planning and education ministries, alleged that they were facing problems with the ongoing local level projects as contractors of many of these projects, after taking money, left abandoning the projects half done. 聽
鈥榃e told the DCs to continue the projects like construction of roads and repairs of bridges and schools on their own initiatives,鈥� he said, adding, 鈥榯hey can inform the ministries concerned or the planning ministry directly about these projects.鈥�
About the half done projects, abandoned by the contractors, the adviser said that they instructed the DCs to resume the pro-people projects.
Regarding managing committees of the non-government schools and colleges, he said that these committees often had huge problems particularly over power strife.
鈥楶rimarily we dismissed all committees and appointed administrators while it is difficult for the DCs and the UNOs to bear so many responsibilities,鈥� he said, adding that for that they were instructed to take some local neutral and honest people like government officials and retired teachers in these committees despite much political pressure.
Wahiduddin said that the education ministry also issued another circular saying that the school managing committee members must have at least bachelor degree and the college managing committee members would require at least master degree.
The adviser also suggested that the deputy commissioners while posted somewhere could create something exemplary, including establishing or developing a park or a tank, so that residents could remember them for a long time.
Adviser Wahiduddin Mahmud also said that no infrastructure should be named after the advisers.
Replying to a question, he said that those textbooks that were most important would be reached to the students by the current month of February.
He added that in the next budget, allocations for the education, health and social safety sectors would be increased, while the government would also try to raise the teachers鈥� pay. 聽
After the second session on proposals on health ministry ended, Professor Sayedur Rahman said that they took special steps to appoint 5,000 physicians against the vacant posts to improve health services.
He said that the DCs gave input on some inconsistencies, including dysfunctional infrastructure, lack of human resources, and overloaded facilities like hospitals overburdened with patients.
The adviser to the health and family welfare ministry Nurjahan Begum in reply to a question said that they discussed the plaguing issue of adulteration both of food and medicine.
鈥楾here is law for tobacco but no enforcement,鈥� she said. 聽
Some other important issues discussed on the day were鈥攎aking land acquisition process for government projects easier, making different designs based on locations for infrastructural projects, working collaboratively with non-governmental agencies in developing the health sector, and ensuring sufficient medicine supply in community hospitals.聽
Deputy commissioners and divisional commissioners from across the country have sent in writing as many as 1,245 proposals out of which 354 were included in the working paper, as per the Cabinet Division officials.
Today on the second day of the conference, apart from the 11 scheduled working sessions, the DCs will meet the chief justice at the Supreme Court auditorium.
The conference will conclude tomorrow.