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Sonali s Shady Affairs

Lending to 5 cos under question

Reveals audit report

Sajjadur Rahman
Sonali Bank's branch at the Ruposhi Bangla Hotel lent over Tk 30 crore to five companies, including the fictitious Anwara Spinning Mills of Hall-Mark Group, by way of bill purchase without clients' applications, an audit report revealed.
The branch released the funds solely against vouchers, insubstantial for any loan. This led to embezzlement of funds from the bank, according to the report.
The irregularities were detected by a functional audit by Syful Shamsul Alam & Co on the branch, recently.
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Furthermore, the branch extended credit to different concerns of the controversial Hall-Mark Group — Hallmark Fashion, Boby Fashion, Wallmart Fashion, T and Brothers Knit Composite and Dress Me Fashion — without forwarding the relevant renewal applications to the International Trade Finance Division (ITFD) of the bank.
“The ITFD of Sonali Bank did not raise any question as to how the borrowers were allowed the credit facility after expiry of sanction in March-April 2011,” said the report.
Sonali Bank's Ruposhi Bangla branch came under the spotlight recently after a Bangladesh Bank investigation found the branch at fault for disbursing Tk 3,547 crore, ofwhichTk2,686 crore was to Hall-Mark Group, in unscrupulous ways.
After Sonali Bank failed to detect the gross irregularities in its internal inspection an external audit firm came into the scene.
The report found the branch to have created inland bill purchases (IBP) — Tk 10.70 crore for Anwara Spinning Mills, Tk 12.69 crore forExpertecLtd,Tk6.61 crore for LNS Accessories and Tk 13.67 lakh for Blue See -without having received any applications from the parties.
“This means there was no buy and sale — it was a complete fraud,” a senior official of a private commercial bank told The Daily Star.
IBP is essentially a credit facility that takes place when a bank gives guarantee to its client for purchase of goods and services from the local market.
As per the bank's circular, prior to accepting the documents for the letter of credit (LC) the branch is required to inspect whether the physical exchange of goods took place between the parties concerned.
The Ruposhi Bangla branch manager, however, did not carry out any of the essential steps, which, ultimately, was conducive to the embezzlement of overTk 30.14 crore.