Khulna Office:

 The annual budget of Khulna City Corporation (KCC) for the fiscal year 2025-2026 was announced on Thursday (Sept 11). The proposed budget amount was Tk 719,50,36,000 will be spent in different sectors of the city corporation, which was Tk 981,99,78000 in the outgoing fiscal.

Administrator of KCC, also Divisional Commissioner of Khulna Md Firoz Sarker formally announced the proposed budget at a press conference held at the conference room of Nagar Bhaban in the city. Chief Executive Officer (in-charge) of KCC Sharif Asif Rahman presided over the event.

Khulna, the southwestern divisional city situated on the south side of riverbank Bhairab and Rupsha is home to more than 1.5 million people living within a 45.65 square km area across 31 wards.

No new tax has been imposed in the new budget termed by the Administrator as a development-oriented one depending on realization of the outstanding municipal taxes and expanding sources of income.

The corporation has set a target of Tk 455.93 crore for revenue collection of the ongoing fiscal. In addition, the corporation hopes to get 263.56 crore from the government’s development grants including especial grants and foreign funded projects, the administrator said.

The proposed budget has allocated Tk 133.28 crore for several approved projects of different donor organizations including Asian Development Bank (ADB), German Development Bank (KFW), UNDP, UNICEF, Bill & Melinda Gasts Foundation, World Bank, GIZ, BRAC, etc, the city administrator added.

Firoz Sarker said, “The new budget will provide necessary fund to ensure better living of Khulna city dwellers by solving menacing water logging problem, eradicating breeding places of mosquitoes, containing price spiral of essential commodities, recovering all canals from grip of encroachers, construction of new and repair of damaged roads and modernizing drainage system.”

Administrator while announcing the proposed budget said, “We need full-length support of the government for successful implementation of the adopted projects.” He sought cooperation from the city dwellers, civil society, as well as journalists to attain the goals within the proposed budget this fiscal.

After the budget declaration, the administrator replied to the questions from the audience regarding the development and problems of the city corporation.

Sheikh Ashraf-uz-zaman, Mostafa Jamal Poplu and Nur Islam Roky among others spoke on various problems and prospects of the new budget.

Administrator also gave assurance that the ward administrator would try their level best to help develop the city and ease the sufferings of the people. Officials’ concerned, local journalists, leaders of different professional, elite and senior citizens were also present at the press conference.