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Bangladesh
emerged as an independent country in 1971 following a
nine months long struggle for liberation. Awami League,
the majority party of erstwhile Pakistan, took over the
charge and formed the Government. The first and foremost
responsibility of the Awami League Government was to
frame a Constitution. The government framed a
Constitution within the shortest possible time and the
Constitution was unanimously accepted in the Parliament
on 4th November 1972. The Constitution of 1972 is termed
as unique one because of the provisions of its
transparency, accountability and scope of peoples’
participation in the decision making process. Article
7(1) of the Constitution provides, "All powers in
the Republic belong to the people, and their exercise on
behalf of the people shall be effected only under, and
by the authority of, this Constitution". Regarding
people's participation Article 11 of the Constitution
provides, "The Republic shall be a democracy in
which fundamental human rights and freedoms and respect
for the dignity and worth of the human person shall be
guaranteed, and in which effective participation by the
people through their elected representatives in
administration at all levels shall be ensured".
In
1973 a national election was held under the new
Constitution and Awami League won the majority and
formed the Government. The Father of the Nation
Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, tried his best to
establish parliamentary democracy in the country. His
effort for forming Parliamentary committees in 1974
could be termed as milestone in the democratic culture
of this country. The 1st Parliament of
Bangladesh (1973-75) was among the first few Parliaments
in parliamentary democracies to put into practice the
concept of having a standing committee on each of the
ministries. In the 2nd Parliament (1979-1982)
41 standing committees were formed including 36 standing
committees on ministries. In the 3rd
Parliament (1986-1987) only 6 standing committees were
formed. In the 4th Parliament (1988-90) 43
standing committees were formed including 32 standing
committees on ministries. After the election of 1991 and
the passing of 12th amendment the
parliamentary democracy started functioning again in
this country. In the 5th Parliament
(1991-1996) 50 parliamentary committees were formed
including 36 standing committees on ministries. Though
the committees were formed with good intention but their
performance was not satisfactory, because all these
ministerial standing committees were headed by the
ministers of the respective ministries. The present
government made a revolutionary change in the committee
system by appointing non-ministers as Chairmen of the
committees. At the present system a minister being a
member of parliament is a member of the respective
ministerial standing committee and a non-parliament
member minister is not a member of the respective
ministerial committee. This change made the committee
system more transparent and accountable.
If
we go through the committee system in India and Britain
we can see that in the British House of Commons
Departmentally-related 'select' committees (equivalent
of standing committees on ministries) were first set up
in 1979. In the Indian Parliament the departmentally
-related standing committees were set up only in 1993.
Unfortunately after the killing of the Father of the
Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman in 1975 the
Constitution was suspended for several years in between
1975-1990. The proclamation of martial law in 1975 and
1982 disturbed the smooth development of parliamentary
democratic system in the country.
Finance
Committees in Bangladesh
In
order to examine draft bills and legislative proposals,
to review the enforcement of laws and propose measures
for such enforcement in relation to any matter referred
to it by Parliament as a matter of public importance,
investigate or enquire into the activities of
administration of ministry and to perform any other
function assigned to it by Parliament Article 76 of the
Constitution of Bangladesh provides the scope for
formation of standing committees of Parliament from
among its members. These committees are:
A)
A Public Accounts Committee;
B)
A Committee of Privileges; and
C)
Such other standing committees as the Rules of
Procedures of Parliament require.
From
the functional point of view these committees may be
classified as:
1)
Finance Committees;
2)
Other committees; and
3)
Standing Committees on Ministries.
The
following standing committees in respect of financial
matters of the government form finance committees:
A)
Public Accounts Committee (PAC);
B)
Committee on Estimates (CE) and
C)
Committee on Public Undertakings (CPU).
The
present attempt is made to analyse the scope, functions,
practices and effectiveness of Parliamentary Finance
Committees in Bangladesh. In the discussion comparison
has been made with the committee system in India. The
reason for selecting Indian committee system is due to
the fact that in the last 50 years Indian parliamentary
system has proven to be one of the most effective.
Financial
management in the government is as needful as oxygen in
human living. Hence D.D white (Introduction to the Study
of Public Administration, 1955) stated, "Finance
and administration cannot be divorced, every
administrative act has financial implications as
inseparable as a man and his shadow". It is
believed that imprudent financial management alienates
the people from the government, ultimately endangering
latter's existence. Since the finance committees perform
the functions of watchdogs to oversee financial
management, these committees are of great importance. In
order to make things transparent no minister is eligible
to become member of these committees. If we go through
the history of the parliamentary committee system in
Bangladesh we can see that all these three committees
were present from the 1st Parliament in 1973.
Only in the 3rd Parliament (1986-87) these
finance committees were absent. The functions, scope,
practice and effectiveness of the above committees are
discussed below in brief.
Committee
of Public Accounts (CPA)
The
CPA is commonly known as Public Accounts Committee
(PAC). It is responsible for examination of the annual
audited accounts of the public expenditure. It consists
of not more than 15 members of the Parliament other than
ministers. The functions of the PAC are laid down in the
Rules of Procedure rule No.233. The main functions of
the Public Accounts Committee are to oversee:
A)
that the moneys shown in the accounts as having been
disbursed were legally available for, and applicable to,
the service or purpose to which they have been applied
or charged;
B)
that the expenditure conforms to the authority which
governs it; and
C)
that every re-appropriation has been made in accordance
with the provisions made in this behalf under rule
framed by competent authority .
It
is the practice in the Bangladesh Parliament, as also in
Indian Lok Sabha and Pakistan National Assembly that the
yearly reports of the Auditor-General relating to public
accounts of the Republic stand referred to the Public
Accounts Committee as soon as they are laid in the
House. After the Comptroller and Auditor-General
submits, as he is required to under a constitutional
provision, his reports to the President of the Republic,
the President causes them to be laid before Parliament,
generally through the Minister for Finance. Public
Accounts Committee is not an executive body. It can only
call attention to an irregularity or to failure to deal
with it adequately and express its opinion thereon and
record its findings and recommendations. This committee
can closely scrutinise the reports of Comptroller and
Auditor General and fortifies the Principal Accounting
Officers against the temptation of financial
irregularities.
In
India, the impact of the Public Accounts Committee is
deemed to be significant. To illustrate, a report
presented by the committee a few years ago was as under.
The Public Accounts Committee (1993-94) in its
sixty-fifth report on "Central Pollution control
Board-Audit Review" have identified certain vital
areas relating to pollution control in general and the
functioning of pollution control Board, in particular
requiring immediate governmental attention. Besides, the
committee also extensively dealt with the threat caused
by pollution to the world famous historical monuments in
Agra-Mathura region particularly the Taj Mahal and the
related issues. The committee also desired that the
Government should take measures on priority basis for
pollution control in other areas, which have been
identified as environmentally sensitive from the
historically important point of view or due to other
consideration. In pursuance of the recommendations of
the committee, government adopted measures of installing
pollution control equipment for large and medium scale
industries. The Ministry of Environment and Forest has
constituted an approach to conservation of man -made
heritage from the environmental angle.
Committees
on Estimates (CE)
The
Committee on Estimates is to examine the estimates
presented before the Parliament as to whether they are
prepared with maximum possible efficiency and economy.
This committee is also composed of not more than ten
Parliament members other than minister. Rule 235 has
assigned the following functions to this Committee:
A)
to report what economies, improvement in organization,
efficiency or administrative reform, consistent with the
policy underlying the estimates, may be effected;
B)
to suggest alternative policies in order to bring about
efficiency and economy in administration;
C)
to suggest the form in which the estimates shall be
presented to the House.
The
term 'estimates' means “annual detailed statements of
the public expenditure proposed to be undertaken by the
Government in a financial year.” In Bangladesh annual
financial statements of public expenditure are broken
into several demands for grants, each of which is
presented in Parliament in the form of a resolution on
the basis of heads of accounts. Ordinarily, a separate
demand is made in respect of each ministry but the
Finance Minister is authorised by the rules to include
in one demand, grants proposed for two or more Ministers
of Departments or make a demand with respect to
expenditures which cannot be readily classified under
one Ministry or the other. Several demands for grants of
the same nature are referred to as estimates in
Bangladesh context. One thing is to note that Standing
Committees on Ministries do contribute to the
formulation of policy with respect to the concerned
Ministry, but the Committee on Estimates appears to be
the only one that has been formally entrusted with the
function of formulating alternative policy for
consideration of the government.
The
Estimates Committee in India has had a positive and
constructive approach. The committee made several
reports of public interest one of which in 1991-92 about
the fall of capital market (seventh report on ‘Role of
controller of capital issues, development of capital
market and status of small investor’). The committee
recommended that the Capital Issue Control Act 1947
should be repealed without further delay. The committee
also suggested that the office of the controller of
capital issues should be abolished and much of its
functions to be transferred to Securities and Exchange
Board of India. Government of India readily accepted the
recommendation on 29th May 1992. The timely
intervention of the Estimate Committee together with
government's immediate action helped Indian capital
market to regain.
Committee
on Public Undertakings (CPU)
The
Committee on Public Undertakings constituted by the
Parliament is meant for examination of the working of
the public undertakings. It shall consist of not more
than ten Parliament Members other than minister. The
functions of the committee are specified in Rule 238 of
the Rules of Procedure as follows:
a)
to examine the reports and accounts of the public
undertakings specified in the Schedule
IV;
b)
to examine the reports, if any, of the Comptroller and
Auditor-General on the public undertakings;
c)
to examine, in the context of the autonomy any
deficiency of the public undertakings, whether the
affairs of the public undertakings are being managed in
accordance with sound business principles and prudent
commercial practices; [the Committees shall report to
Parliament on remedy of irregularities and lapses of the
public undertaking and recommend measures to free the
institution from corruption and, if considered
necessary, a part of its report in this respect may be
sent to the Government before the report is placed
before Parliament;] and
d)
to exercise such other functions vested in the Committee
on Public Accounts and the Committee on Estimates in
relation to the public undertakings specified in the
Schedule IV as are not covered by clauses (a), (b) and
(c) above and as may be allotted to the Committee by the
Speaker from time to time: provided that the Committee
shall not examine and investigate any of the following,
namely:
(i)
matters of major Government policy as distinct from
business or commercial functions of the public
undertakings;
(ii)
matters of day-to-day administration; and
(iii)
matters for the consideration of which machinery is
established by any special statute under which a
particular public undertaking is established.
Practice
of Financial Committees in Bangladesh
The
three financial committees are by common consent the
most important and influential of all the parliamentary
committees in Bangladesh. These committees keep a vigil
over government spending and performance. In order to
exercise their functions, these three committees employ
a number of techniques. They call for memoranda from
ministries, departments and undertakings as well as from
representatives of non-official organizations and
experts. They issue questionnaires. They undertake
on-the-spot studies of the organizations concerned. They
conduct oral examinations of official and non-official
witnesses. Hence, even though they are called financial
committees, they exercise a mixed financial and
administrative scrutiny of executive departments and
public undertakings.
The
Estimates Committee, for example, has a wide scope in
that it can, suo motu, examine the entire administration
of the Government, including financial, administrative
and policy matters. The examination by the Estimates
committee is something in the nature of an 'achievement
audit'. The committee is fully within its jurisdiction
to criticise any policy decided by the Executive. Even
in respect of policy formulated by Parliament, the
committee may draw its attention to any defects or
drawbacks and suggest reconsideration.
By
its very nature, the surveillance of the financial
committees over administrative actions and governmental
spending constitutes a review of past performance. The
committees come on the scene only after the
administration has become accountable to Parliament.
They aim at correction and prevention of recurrence of
mistakes by looking into past actions. For example,
there is a considerable time lag between the spending of
public money and investigation by the Public Accounts
Committee. The cases dealt with in P.A.C. reports are
from one to six years old. A bad case may come to light
after several years of its occurrence and the atmosphere
in which decisions were taken may have changed. Officers
and Ministers may have changed and it may be difficult
to ascertain the truth at that late stage. Also the turn
of a particular Ministry, department, or undertaking
comes only after several years, and there are some whose
turn has not come at all. Thus scrutiny by the financial
committees is only a test check that occasionally comes
into operation.
Although
technically and legally the recommendations of
Parliamentary committees are not binding, the Government
generally accepts most of them. The Government is
expected to indicate the action taken on recommendations
within six months after the submission of a report, but
generally it takes longer. The replies received from the
Government are examined by the committee, and a
follow-up report called "Action Taken Report"
is submitted to the House.
Effectiveness
of Parliamentary Standing Committees
Beginning
with only 11 committees in 1973, there has since been a
steady increase in the number, functions and frequency
of meetings of such committees. In course of time, these
committees have become part and parcel of the
parliamentary committee system in the country.
Parliamentary standing committees are particularly
useful in dealing with the matters on account of their
special or technical nature. Such type of matters is
possible to be considered better in detail by a small
number of Members rather than by the Parliament itself.
Thus the system helps to save the time of the House for
discussion of important matters and prevents Parliament
from getting lost in details. This system also helps
Members of Parliament to get themselves acquainted with
the parliamentary business and law- making procedures.
The
recommendations of parliamentary committees are
generally accepted and implemented by the government. If
the government holds a view different from that of the
committee for not implementing the
recommendations/suggestions, the matter is considered by
the committee and a further report, if deemed necessary,
may be presented to Parliament. When a difference of
opinion between the committee and the government remains
unsolved, the case is referred to the Speaker for
guidance in India but there is no such provision in our
Rules of Procedure.
An
important point to be emphasized is that one should not
forget the limits under which the committees are
required to function. The committees should function
within the ambit of the jurisdiction and should not try
to cross the limits laid down in Constitution or the
Rules of Procedures. In a democratic set-up the
legislature or the executive should not transgress the
boundaries demarcated for them under the Constitution.
The legislature has to see whether or not the executive
is functioning according to the policy framed or within
the ambit of its authority delegated to it by the
legislature or the Constitution. It can certainly
criticise the functioning of the government and suggest
remedial measures for any default, negligence or
unauthorised act of the government. The committees can
express their views and make recommendation in the form
of a report, but it does not fall within the purview of
their business to direct any authority or the government
to do or not to do any particular acts or to do certain
act in a particular way. This should be taken care of,
specially by the committees during the study tour. In
this regard, the following observations of the select
committees of the House of Commons is most pertinent:
"The control means influence, not direct power;
advice not command; criticism, not observation;
security, not initiation and publicity, not secrecy.
To
assess the impact of the standing committees on the
policies of the government of Bangladesh is, to some
extent, difficult. The parliaments have not lived long
enough to make such assessment. Moreover, there have
been several shifts from one form of government to
another including martial law etc. Only from the tenure
of the 5th Parliament, particularly with the re-adoption
of parliamentary democracy, the committees have started
their work with all seriousness. The committees have
been meeting almost regularly and the process of
reporting to Parliament has been commenced. Yet it can
be safely asserted that there has been a positive impact
of committee deliberations on government policies. The
minutes of summary of deliberations of each meeting bear
testimony to this.
The
committee discusses various problems and advises the
government on various matters including development
matters. The advice of the committee is taken into
consideration by the government. These committees not
only perform the functions of watch-dogs but also work
as a bridge between the government and the parliament.
The members of the committee have scope to point out the
problems of their constituencies and solve them. The
committee presents its report to parliament from time to
time and the people get an opportunity to know the
activities of the government from these reports.
Recommendations
Bangladesh
started parliamentary democratic system in 1973 but the
proclamation of martial law in 1975 and 1982 became a
hurdle to the smooth development of the Parliamentary
system in the country Though we started committee system
in 1973 we are not able to perform satisfactorily. If we
compare the committee system in India with ours, we can
see how effectively they are working. Forming
parliamentary committees alone will not ensure the
democratic process. The committees need to function
effectively and efficiently and government should
provide proper support to these committees. The
committee should work on a non-partisan attitude when it
is in session. The decision of the committee should be
unanimous for the healthy development of the
parliamentary practices. All political parties should
advise their representatives to work in the committees
in a non-partisan manner. The present committees are
suffering from different shortcomings. In order to make
the committee system more effective following measures
could be taken without further delay.
1)
Status of Committee Chairpersons
Committee
chairpersons should be offered due status. Such status
must be defined and specified. Without due status a
Parliament Member as chairperson can not influence a
Minister as member.
2)
Logistic Support
The
parliamentary committee should be given full logistic
support in order to maintain the continuity and smooth
operation of the committee system. At present the
committee badly suffers from logistic support. Most of
the committees have no proper accommodation as yet.
3)
Implementation of the committee Reports
Government
can play vital role for the smooth running of the
committee system. Government should place factual
reports and data before the committee for proper
consideration and timely intervention. Government should
pay due regard to the recommendations and observations
made by the committees. Committee recommendations are
strictly speaking not binding on government but they are
undoubtedly entitled to great weight and consideration
on the part of the government.
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