, June 19 -- Public health experts on Thursday criticised the proposed national budget for FY2025-26, calling it anti-public health, and said the government could generate up to Tk 20,000 crore in additional revenue from the tobacco sector if it adopted recommendations from anti-tobacco advocates-potentially saving the lives of 1.7 million Bangladeshis, including nearly 900,000 youths.

Experts said this during a post-budget press conference organised by research and advocacy organization PROGGA (Knowledge for Progress) and Anti-tobacco Media Alliance (ATMA).

Citing the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS), PROGGA and ATMA said Per Capita Income (provisional) of people has increased by about 11.5 in the last one year which suggests that...