The government has issued directives to fix fares for domestic and foreign airlines in rupees instead of dollars. But due to various excuses, Biman Bangladesh Airlines is not implementing this directive. Instead, the company is charging more than the government-mandated exchange rate for the dollar. As fares are fixed in dollars instead of money, air ticket prices are gradually increasing. Passengers and traders have to spend extra money to pay the fare. Therefore, the Bangladesh Freight Forwarders Association (BAFA) has demanded that the fare be fixed in Tk.
BAFA has sent a letter to the adviser of the Ministry of Civil Aviation and Tourism on October 21 to determine the fare of goods (cargo) and passenger transport from Bangladesh in local currency. The letter highlighted the disparity in the dollar exchange rate. Apart from this, Biman Bangladesh Airlines was demanded to solve this problem in a quick time.
According to Bafa, at present, freight and passenger transport fares from Bangladesh by air and sea are determined in dollars. It is a violation of the global norms. Because, in other countries of the world, even in the neighboring SAARC member countries of Bangladesh, international transport fares are quoted in local currency.
Bafa said that once transport fares were fixed and quoted in Bangladeshi taka, for unknown reasons when transport fares were mentioned in US dollars, the issue of determining the exchange rate of dollars with taka came up. Therefore, to solve the problem of determining the current exchange rate, Bangladesh Bank in 2008 instructed Biman Bangladesh Airlines to determine the exchange rate of transport fares published in dollars in taka. However, there are rare examples of state airlines setting foreign currency exchange rates in any country in the world.
In the post-corona period, the value of rupees gradually decreased against the dollar in the country. Passengers and businessmen are spending extra money on air fares. The Ministry of Civil Aviation and Tourism has issued a notification on April 16, 2023 with instructions to determine passenger and transport fares in local currency to reduce the additional cost of passengers and businessmen in paying air fares. Similarly, the Bangladesh Civil Aviation Authority (BABICHAK) issued the same directive on May 28 last year. Both the ministry's notification and Babychak's directive were supposed to come into effect from July 1 last year. But Biman Bangladesh Airlines changed the date of implementation of the directive five times. Finally, it has set the implementation date from January 16 next year. People associated with BAFA fear that this date will also change.
Nurul Amin, vice-president of Buffer and managing director of Tower Freight Logistics Limited, told Ajker newspaper, “Biman is repeatedly rescheduling the decision to set the freight (cargo) and passenger fares in local currency i.e. taka.” Related parties including BAFA are affected by this. Therefore, I request the urgent intervention of the advisor of the Ministry of Civil Aviation and Tourism. Until the implementation of the directives of the Ministry and Babychak, I demand that Biman declare their fixed exchange rate in accordance with the bank's exchange rate.
