BANGLADESH COAST GUARD – NEEDS OF STREAMLINING OVERLAPPING FUNCTIONS AND BRINGING REFORM IN DECISION-MAKING STRUCTURE

This article provides a critical analysis of the Bangladesh Coast Guard (BCG), arguing for the urgent need to streamline its overlapping functions with other maritime agencies and to reform its decision-making structure. It examines the various roles and responsibilities of the BCG and highlights the problem of jurisdictional overlap and poor coordination with the Bangladesh Navy and other bodies. The study posits that this leads to an inefficient use of scarce national resources and can hamper effective maritime governance. The research also explores the need for reform in the BCG's internal decision-making structure to enhance its operational effectiveness and accountability. The paper concludes by proposing a set of concrete reforms aimed at creating a more clearly defined role for the BCG as the country's primary maritime law enforcement agency and at establishing a more integrated and coordinated national maritime security architecture.

The Bangladesh Coast Guard (BCG) was established to play a vital role in securing the country's maritime interests, but its effectiveness has been constrained by a number of organizational and structural challenges. This paper provides an in-depth analysis of these challenges and a clear agenda for reform. The first part of the study is a detailed examination of the problem of overlapping functions. It maps out the various maritime security and law enforcement tasks and shows how the responsibilities for these tasks are often ambiguously divided between the BCG, the Bangladesh Navy, the marine police, and the customs authorities. The paper argues that this lack of a clear division of labor leads to duplication of effort, on the one hand, and critical gaps in enforcement, on the other. The core of the article is a proposal for streamlining these functions. It advocates for a clear demarcation of roles, with the Navy focusing on its core military mission of national defense and the BCG being designated and empowered as the lead agency for all maritime law enforcement tasks within the country's Exclusive Economic Zone. The second major area of focus is the need for reform in the internal decision-making structure of the BCG itself to make it a more agile and responsive organization. The paper concludes that these reforms are essential for transforming the BCG into a more modern and effective force that can adequately protect Bangladesh's growing maritime economy.