Bangladesh has two issuing authorities. Bangladesh Bank holds the sole right to issue bank notes under the Bangladesh Bank Order, 1972, and its notes are the liability of its own Issue Department. The Bangladesh Currency Order, 1972 lets the Government issue small notes separately, and treats them as fully current as government coin. Bangladesh Bank's own record shows the five taka note becoming a government currency note on 5 January 2017, signed by the Senior Finance Secretary.
Bangladesh Bank holds the sole right to issue bank notes in Bangladesh, granted to it by statute. The smallest notes in the country are nevertheless issued by the government, over the signature of a finance official rather than the Governor. Both things are true at once, because the two kinds of note are created by two different laws and are owed by two different parts of the state.
Key Takeaways
- Article 23 of the Bangladesh Bank Order, 1972 gives Bangladesh Bank the sole right to issue bank notes payable to bearer on demand.
- The Bangladesh Currency Order, 1972 separately empowers the Government to issue small notes, and does so "notwithstanding anything contained in any other law".
- That Order makes a government note current in the same way as a government coin, not as a promise by the central bank.
- A bank note is a liability of the Bank's Issue Department. A government note is not.
- The line has moved. Bangladesh Bank's own record shows the five taka note first issued as a currency note on 5 January 2017.
Which notes come from which issuer
The Bangladesh Bank Order, 1972 gives the Bank the sole right of issue, and read on its own that would mean one issuer of notes.
The Bank's own record of the five taka note says something else. The entry for the note issued on 5 January 2017 reads: "For the first time, the note was issued as Currency note and signed by Mr. Mahbub Ahmed, Senior Finance Secretary." That is the central bank recording, in its own catalogue, that this denomination stopped being one of its notes and became one of the government's.
The practice continues. The redesigned five taka note that entered circulation on 19 May 2026 carried the signature of Finance Secretary Dr Md Khairuzzaman Mozumder, and was distributed from Bangladesh Bank's Motijheel office and then from its other offices. The Bank distributes it. The government issues it.
So the signature on a note is not decoration. It tells you which authority put the note out.
| Denomination | Issued by | Whose signature | Under which instrument |
|---|---|---|---|
| One taka and two taka | The Government | A finance official rather than the Governor | Bangladesh Currency Order, 1972, Article 3, in the form substituted in 1989 |
| Five taka | The Government, since 5 January 2017 | Senior Finance Secretary Mahbub Ahmed on the 2017 issue, Finance Secretary Dr Md Khairuzzaman Mozumder on the issue of 19 May 2026 | Bangladesh Bank's own catalogue record. The published Currency Order does not name this denomination |
| Every larger denomination | Bangladesh Bank | The Governor | Bangladesh Bank Order, 1972, Article 23 |
What the statute gives the central bank, and what it leaves out
Article 23 of the Bangladesh Bank Order, 1972 is short. "The Bank shall have the sole right to issue Bank Notes made payable to bearer on demand in Bangladesh."
Every word of that is doing work. The right is sole, and it is a right to issue bank notes, defined by their being payable to bearer on demand. It is not a right over every piece of paper that circulates as money.
The Order itself proves the point a few lines later. Article 24 lists what is legal tender in Bangladesh and names three separate things: "all Bank Notes, Coins and Currency Notes". The drafters were working with three categories, not one, and the same article says all of them "shall be guaranteed by the Government".
The Bangladesh Currency Order, 1972 supplies the second category. Article 3, in the form substituted in 1989, opens: "Notwithstanding anything contained in any other law for the time being in force, the Government may issue Bangladesh one Taka notes and Bangladesh two Taka notes." The opening words are there precisely so the government's power does not have to be squared with the Bank's sole right. Parliament put one beside the other and said which one wins where they touch.
Whose debt is a banknote?
This is the question that actually separates the two, and the Bank Order answers it in a place you would not look for it.
Article 26 requires the issue of bank notes to be conducted in an Issue Department, separated and kept wholly distinct from the Banking Department, whose assets are not subject to any liability other than the liabilities of the Issue Department. Article 32 then defines those liabilities: "The liabilities of the Issue Department shall be an amount equal to the total of the amount of the Bank Notes for the time being in circulation."
Read the two together and a bank note is a debt of the Bank, recorded on a ring-fenced part of its balance sheet, matched by assets that exist to answer for it and nothing else. Ring-fencing an issue behind its own pool of assets is not unique to Bangladesh: it is also what a currency board runs on, though there the assets are reserves of an anchor currency and the point is holding a fixed rate.
A government currency note is not on that balance sheet at all. The Currency Order says such notes "shall be current in Bangladesh in the same manner and to the same extent and as fully as Taka coin called Government Taka issued under the provisions of the Bangladesh Coinage Order, 1972". A coin is not a promise anybody has to honour on demand. It is a token the state has declared to be worth what it says.
For a holder the practical difference is nothing. Both are legal tender for the amount expressed on them, both are guaranteed by the Government under Article 24, and the Currency Order applies the same Penal Code counterfeiting provisions to government notes that apply to currency notes and bank notes. The difference is a matter of which organ of the state owes you, not of what you can buy.
Why a government keeps a small issue of its own
The coin comparison is the answer, and the sequence of amendments shows it operating.
The Bangladesh Coinage Order, 1972 lets the government coin money "of such denominations not higher than" a stated ceiling. That ceiling was two taka. Section 2 of the Bangladesh Coinage (Amendment) Act, 2015 substituted the word "five" for the word "two", and section 3 of the same Act inserted "five Taka coins" into the list of government coins current in Bangladesh.
The government's own coin denomination ceiling moved to five taka in 2015. Bangladesh Bank's record shows the five taka note issued as a currency note in January 2017. The note followed the coin.
That is what the arrangement is for. At the bottom of the range, a note is standing in for small change. It wears out fast, it is handled constantly, and nobody is holding it as a store of value or presenting it for redemption. Treating it as token money issued by the treasury, on the same footing as a coin, fits what it does. The central bank's machinery of an Issue Department with matched assets is built for a different job.
The statute book and the notes do not name the same denominations
One honest complication belongs here rather than in a footnote.
The Bangladesh Currency Order, 1972 as published on the official Laws of Bangladesh site names two denominations, the one taka note and the two taka note, with its only amendments dated 1989. The five taka note has been issued as a government currency note since January 2017, and the amendment that plainly relates to it, the 2015 Coinage Act, raised the government's coin ceiling.
So the published text of the Currency Order and the notes in circulation do not list the same set. Anyone stating flatly that the Currency Order authorises three government denominations is reading something into it that the text on the official site does not say. What can be said from primary sources is narrower and still enough: three low denominations circulate as government notes, the five taka joined them in 2017, and the statutory ceiling on government-issued small money was raised in 2015.
How this differs from several banks printing one currency
It is worth separating this from the more familiar oddity, which is several commercial banks issuing one sovereign currency.
That arrangement asks how a private company can be trusted to print money, and it is answered with backing assets, inspection and penalties. The issuer is outside the state, so the whole design is about making an outsider safe.
Bangladesh's arrangement asks nothing of the kind. Both issuers are the state. There is no private party to secure, no backing regime to police, and no question of anybody failing. What is divided is not trust but responsibility: which part of the state has issued this money, and on whose books it sits. Two countries, two oddities, and almost nothing in common between them.
Where to look next
The AUD to BDT page carries the live reference rate and a short block on what kind of money the taka is. Issuing a note is only the first thing that has to happen before it is any use outside the country that printed it, and what has to exist before a currency can cross a border sets out the three layers underneath a cross-border payment: settlement infrastructure, a price at which to convert, and permission. For the arrangement that inverts this one, where many governments share a single currency, one currency, twenty-one governments covers how the euro area decides policy and who issues its notes.
Sources
- Bangladesh Bank, Taka Five note - the 5 January 2017 issue as a Currency note signed by Senior Finance Secretary Mahbub Ahmed, and the issue dated 19 May 2026
- Bangladesh Bank Order, 1972 (President's Order No. 127 of 1972) - Articles 23, 24, 26 and 32: the sole right of issue, the three legal tender categories guaranteed by the Government, the separate Issue Department and its liabilities
- The Bangladesh Currency Order, 1972 (President's Order No. 84 of 1972), Laws of Bangladesh - the power to issue one and two taka notes notwithstanding any other law, their currency as government taka coin, the Penal Code counterfeiting provisions, and an amendment history ending in 1989
- The Bangladesh Coinage Order, 1972 (President's Order No. 83 of 1972), Bangladesh Code - the ceiling on government coin denominations, and the 2015 Amendment Act substituting "five" for "two" and adding five taka coins
- Bangladesh Sangbad Sangstha, new design Tk 5 currency note, 19 May 2026 - the redesigned note, the Finance Secretary's signature it carries, and its distribution from Bangladesh Bank's Motijheel office
General information about how banknotes are issued in Bangladesh. Not financial advice, and not a recommendation of any product or institution. Reviewed by the Tradergy editorial team, September 2026.
Common questions
Which taka notes are government notes?
The small ones. The Bangladesh Currency Order, 1972 empowers the Government to issue one taka and two taka notes. Bangladesh Bank's own record of the five taka note states that on 5 January 2017 it was issued as a currency note for the first time, signed by the Senior Finance Secretary, and the five taka note released on 19 May 2026 again carried a Finance Secretary's signature.
What is the difference between a currency note and a bank note?
The issuer. A bank note is issued by the central bank under its own right of issue, and is a liability of the bank's Issue Department. A currency note is issued by the Government. In Bangladesh the Currency Order makes government notes current in the same way as government coin, which is a different legal thing from a promise by a bank.
Is a government note worth less than a central bank note?
No. The Bangladesh Bank Order, 1972 lists bank notes, coins and currency notes together as legal tender for the amount expressed on them, and says all of them are guaranteed by the Government. For anyone spending money the two are interchangeable. The difference sits on a balance sheet, not in a shop.
Does Bangladesh Bank still have the sole right of issue?
Article 23 of the Bangladesh Bank Order, 1972 gives the Bank the sole right to issue bank notes made payable to bearer on demand. The government's notes are issued under a separate law that opens with the words "notwithstanding anything contained in any other law for the time being in force", so the two rights sit side by side rather than in conflict.
Why would a government issue notes at all?
Because at the smallest denominations a note is standing in for a coin. The Currency Order says government notes are current in the same manner and to the same extent and as fully as government taka coin. That is the clearest signal of what they are: token money issued by the state, printed on paper because paper is cheaper than metal.