Business Desk :
Bangladesh Bank will discontinue five government retail services offered to the public, including savings certificates and prize bonds, from 30 November. The decision aims to reduce security risks, modernise the building, and improve vault facilities, said Arif Hossain Khan, Executive Director and spokesperson of the central bank. The Ministry of Finance has been informed, and a public notice will be issued soon.
Currently, Bangladesh Bank provides ten government services through 28 counters, but the bank has decided to close twelve counters dedicated to services such as handling savings certificates, selling prize bonds, exchanging defective notes, payment against documents, and providing change against challans.
One internal counter will remain open to manage official requirements related to these services.
The decision follows several meetings and inspections in recent months. On 22 June, Governor Ahsan H Mansur inspected the cash division and highlighted security concerns.
A subsequent committee report stated that the main building of Bangladesh Bank falls under Key Point Installation (KPI) regulations, housing highly sensitive operations including currency issuance, vault management, foreign reserve oversight, and banking supervision. The report noted that excessive public gatherings in such areas pose security risks, citing past incidents of fraud, disputes with security personnel, and attempts to breach reserves.
The report also emphasised that services like savings certificates and prize bonds can be easily handled through more than 60 commercial banks across the country and that no central bank in the world directly provides such retail services.
Although the sale of new savings certificates will stop, services related to existing certificates will continue until maturity. Operations such as updating bank accounts, changing mobile numbers, nominee changes, early encashment, and legal procedures for previously issued certificates will proceed as usual.
