Dhaka, June 26 -- The National Board of Revenue (NBR) Reform Unity Council turned down the finance ministry's proposal to hold a dialogue scheduled for today.

At a press conference held at the NBR headquarters on Wednesday, the Council leaders said that its representatives were not included in the list of invitees and therefore they would not participate. "We are always in favour of a dialogue. In fact, we participated in a meeting on 20 May with the adviser and other stakeholders. However, despite having 13 representatives, our side was only given 10 minutes to speak in a 55-minute meeting," the Council said.

"Even though the discussion was far from being productive, the adviser publicly claimed that it had been fruitful. That experien...