Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina on Sunday urged her cabinet colleagues and secretaries to be more active and sincere in implementing the projects and development programmes.

"You have to show result according to the budget allocation" she said adding the development activities should be visible in the rural areas as there is no meaning of our politics if we fail to bring positive change in the lives of the people.

The Prime Minister was addressing a function in her office on the occasion of signing of the Annual Performance Agreement of the government with different ministries for the current fiscal year.

Urging all to take oath to build Bangladesh as a dignified nation the Prime Minister said "In this tenure we have only about three years time in hand. We want to take the country to a position from where none would be able to play drake and duck with the fate of the people," she said.

Forty eight ministries/divisions have signed Annual Performance Agreements (APA) with the government for the year 2015-2016 aimed at implementing the development goals of the government under an effective, efficient and dynamic administrative system.

Annual Performance Agreement (APA) is a 'record of understanding' between a Minister representing the people's mandate, and the Secretary of a Ministry/Division to carry out activities of the ministries/divisions from process-oriented to result-oriented, ensuring institutional transparency, accountability, proper utilization of resources and above all enhancing institutional efficiency.

It's the second consecutive year such agreements were signed which has been designed to materialize the Vision-2021 of the present government through ensuring good governance in all spheres of the governance.

The annual performance agreement designs the annual strategic objectives and working plan of the ministries and ascertains the indicators for evaluation of the performance. It helps qualitative and quantitative assessment of the activities of the ministries objectively, and ascertain the responsibility of the officials.

Finance Minister Abul Maal Abdul Muhith, Cabinet Secretary M Musharraf Hossain Bhuiyan, PM's Principal Secretary Abul Kalam Azad spoke among others on the occasion while secretary (Reforms and Coordination) of the Cabinet Division Nazrul Islam gave a presentation on the pros and corns of the APAs.

The Prime Minister said successes of the ministries/divisions and accomplishments of the national development are intertwined. Overall national development might be affected once a ministry fails to maintain the pace or progress with others. In view of this, she said, result-oriented performance management system is essential.

"Despite this unprecedented economic success, we have no time to be complacent. We have to go far way to implement the Vision-2021 and make Bangladesh as a developed one by 2041," she said adding "We have to expedite the pace of development and take more difficult challenges."

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina said Bangladesh could be a developed nation if it could continue the track that Bangabandhu government had initiated after independence. But the course of development of the country experienced setback after killing of the Father of the Nation by local and overseas conspirators.

Appreciating the services of the government official in implementing the development works according to the annual performance agreements last year, the prime minister hoped that they would be able to show their efficacy this year also.

Sheikh Hasina said Bangladesh as an independent nation wants to live keeping its head high without begging support from others. Bangladesh could become a low middle income country because of its pragmatic and specific planning, she said.

The Prime Minister said once Bangladesh was in a disgraceful position as we were lagging behind in every sector. Now Bangladesh has a honoured position as we could show our capacity in most of the development indicators including food production, poverty alleviation and women empowerment, she said.

Sheikh Hasina said her government wants to serve the people as their servant not their master. "Changing the lots of the people particularly of the rural people is the first and foremost goal of her government," she said.

Laying importance on quick and proper implementation of the projects taken for current fiscal year, the prime minister said, "Ministries should not sit idle after signing of the APAs. You have to set priority and start work now."