Nine-day Eid holiday for public servants?

Government employees are again set to enjoy a longer vacation at a stretch this Eid-ul-Azha with the weekend and other public holidays getting coincided, according to UNB.

According to the government holiday calendar of 2019, 14 August (Wednesday) is the only workday in between 9 and 17 August. So, the officials who are allowed to enjoy optional leave on that day, they will eventually get a nine-day holiday.

If the government declares 14 August as a special holiday as it did it twice in 2016, all the public servants will be able to enjoy a nine-day holiday.

Before the Eid vacation, the last workday for the public servants will be on 8 August (Thursday) while they will enjoy the weekly holydays on 9 and 10 August (Friday and Saturday).

The three-day Eid holiday will start on 11 August (Sunday) and end on 13 August (Tuesday), paving the way for a genuine five-day vacation for the public servants.

They will also enjoy a holiday on 15 August (Thursday), on the occasion of National Mourning Day commemorating the assassination of father of the nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, while the next two days are weekly holidays.

In 2016, the public servants enjoyed an extended vacation during Eid-ul-Azha as the government declared 11 September as the special holiday while the Eid celebrated on 13 September, creating the scope for a six-day vacation.

However, the government employees had to work on 24 September to make up for 11 September.

In the same year, the government allowed the public servants to enjoy a nine-day vacation during the Eid-ul-Fitr as prime minister Sheikh Hasina approved 4 July (the day after the Shab-e-Qadr) as a holiday by exercising her administrative power.