Despite Prime Minister Tarique Rahman’s recent orders for action against delayed government development projects, the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (Ecnec) is reviewing a project that remains unfinished after nine years, despite an original two-year timeline.
Now, yet another extension has been proposed.
The “Madrasa Education Management and Information System (MEMIS) Support” project, managed by the Directorate of Madrasa Education, launched in July 2017 with a two-year completion target.
Over the past nine years, the project has undergone two revisions and three deadline extensions. Ecnec is currently considering a third revision proposal.
Under this new proposal, the budget would more than triple, rising from the originally approved Tk10.12 crore to Tk38.07 crore. The revision also seeks a two-year extension, pushing the deadline to December 2027.
The project aims to build a comprehensive database covering 38 lakh students, alongside roughly 30 lakh teachers and staff across 15,000 madrasas.
It will also digitalise Monthly Pay Order (MPO) activities and enable direct salary transfers via a Government-to-Person (G2P) system. To achieve this, 16 cloud-based software modules are under development.
The Directorate of Madrasa Education blamed the delays on the Covid-19 pandemic, complications with Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT) integration, payment gateway setups, the pay-bill module, the creation of an independent Ebtedayee module, and general ground realities.
Meanwhile, a second madrasa education initiative is also up for Ecnec review.
This project, which involves setting up multimedia classrooms in 653 madrasas, is largely complete.
Approved in July 2017 with an initial budget of Tk30.65 crore, it was originally scheduled to wrap up in December 2019.
Since then, the budget has increased through three amendments, and the deadline has been extended four times.
According to the Planning Commission, physical progress reached 100 per cent by June 2025. Nevertheless, a further one-year extension until June 2026 has been proposed.
The directorate informed the Planning Commission that while multimedia equipment was supplied to 541 madrasas and invoices were processed by June 2025, smart TV panels for the remaining 112 institutions were delayed at the Chattogram Port due to a customs and revenue staff strike.
While tech-based teaching is underway with the delivered equipment, the contractor remains unpaid because the project was excluded from the Annual Development Programme (ADP) for the 2025-26 fiscal year, the period in which it is set to expire.
Md Zahurul Islam, Deputy Director (Development) at the Directorate of Madrasa Education, told TIMES, “The project’s duration has been proposed for extension solely to facilitate the payment of pending bills.”
