THE government task force identifying external and political interference and aid dependency as reasons for the poor performance of the Bureau of Statistics corroborates what independent experts have for long said. The national statistical office has largely failed to live up to its mandate for being plagued by interference. The task force, formed in April 2025 against the backdrop of doubts about data produced during the Awami League regime, released its report on World Statistics Day on October 20. The report says that the BBS independence has been systematically curtailed by the Statistics and Informatics Division. Despite the office鈥檚 legal mandate to collect and disseminate official data, its operations have for long been constrained by administrative overreach, political sensitivities and external funding conditions. Such interference has not only delayed key publications such as the Household Income and Expenditure Survey, published seven years after the completion for political convenience, but also compromised the accuracy and credibility of the data that underpin policy discourse. The consequences have been detrimental. When official data are distorted by political or bureaucratic interference, the consequences reach far beyond technical error. They undermine the architecture of evidence-based governance.
The revision, for an example, of Bangladesh鈥檚 GDP size, slashing by $9 billion from its earlier estimate, has exposed serious weaknesses in data verification and autonomy. Similarly, the sharp increase in food inflation to a 13-year high, released only after the change of government in August 2024, has showed how data integrity were previously suppressed. When statistics are filtered to serve political convenience, policy formulation becomes guesswork and public faith in state institutions erodes. The task force鈥檚 call for sweeping reform should, therefore, be treated as a matter of national urgency. It has recommended, among others, revising the allocation of business between the planning ministry and the statistical office and amending the Statistics Act 2013 to restore BBS鈥檚 autonomy. The recommendations to rename the bureau as Statistics Bangladesh and create the position of chief statistician also appear more than symbolic gestures as these can insulate data generation and dissemination from administrative and political pressures. The proposed trust and transparency council of statistics, tasked with oversight and accountability, would further institutionalise independence provided it, too, remains free of partisan influence. Autonomy, however, cannot thrive without capacity. The recommendations for doubling the office鈥檚 structural wings, creating hundreds of upazila-level positions and ensuring dedicated funding for surveys need to be implemented to strengthen the Bureau of Statistics.
A country鈥檚 social and economic aspirations hinge on reliable information, without which policy-making fails. A robust, interference-free statistical office is not just a technical necessity but a democratic imperative. The government must, therefore, empower the agency to operate autonomously beyond political and bureaucratic control and donor prescriptions.