A high-profile inter-ministerial meeting with Finance Minister M Saifur Rahman in the chair directed the SOEs that are profitable and have no other hindrances to float their shares on the stock market within the next month.

"A month's target has been set for the companies which are better placed to float their shares," Saifur told reporters after the meeting, "while two months have been allotted to those for whom the process is seen to be a little complicated."

The meeting also asked the ministries concerned to plan how to make the SOEs in oil, gas, telephone, power, fertiliser, bank and insurance sectors ready for public subscription within the next two months and report back.

Among others, Eastern Cables, Osmania Glass, Atlas Bangladesh, National Tubes, Eastern Lubricant and Padma Oil can hit the market in a month's time, a meeting source quoted a Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) high official as telling the meeting.

The state-owned oil companies will also be ready for floating by September, Adviser to Energy Ministry and Board of Investment Executive Chairman Mahmudur Rahman told the press. Before that they have to restructure their capital base, he added.

A reform programme is going on in the gas sector, which will be completed by December, said Mahmudur, adding, "Then we will consider how to bring in private-sector capital in the gas companies."

Yesterday's decision was seen by many a quarter as a positive development that might break the decade-long standstill in the privatisation process of the SOEs.

Saifur said some directors of the SOEs are reluctant to go with the move. "They are afraid, if shares of the companies are offloaded, their directorship will also go," he remarked, explaining the sluggishness in the privatisation drive.

The meeting discussed in detail how to ready the SOEs in oil, gas, telephone, power, fertiliser, bank and insurance sectors for public subscription. It decided that those SOEs have to be turned into public limited companies and made profitable, before going for their privatisation, meeting sources said.

The meeting directed the ministries concerned to work out plans for making the losing concerns profitable within two months' time. After that another meeting will be held to discuss those plans and decide how to proceed for the partial privatisation.

Privatisation Commission Chairman Enam Ahmed Chow-dhury, Governor of Bangladesh Bank Dr Saleh Uddin Ahmed, SEC Chairman Dr Mirza Azizul Islam, and the secretaries of ministries concerned including Finance Secretary Siddiqur Rahman Chow-dhury were present at the meeting.