Govt unveils Tk 790,000 crore budget for FY26

Bangladesh today unveiled a Tk 790,000 crore national budget for the fiscal year 2025-26, beginning in July, with a lower borrowing target.

Finance Adviser Salehuddin Ahmed presented the budget in a televised speech that went on air at 3 pm. This is the first budget of his career and also the first by the interim government, which was sworn in last August after Sheikh Hasina was ousted in a mass uprising.

The proposed outlay is nearly 1 percent lower than the Tk 797,000 crore budget for the outgoing fiscal year ending this month.

The interim government, led by Chief Adviser Prof Muhammad Yunus, aims to collect Tk 564,000 crore in revenue and borrow Tk 226,000 crore from local and foreign sources to steer the economy out of troubled waters and place it on a path to sustained recovery.

Ahmed plans to borrow Tk 125,000 crore from domestic sources and Tk 101,000 crore from foreign lenders. The budget deficit stands at 3.6 percent of Bangladesh's gross domestic product, down from 4.6 percent projected for the current fiscal year.

In his proposal, he allocated Tk 560,000 crore for operating expenditure and Tk 230,000 crore for development expenditure in FY26.