Move to freeze bank A/Cs of 123 factories, 385 directors

Doulot Akter Mala | Published: March 22, 2015 00:00:00 | Updated: November 30, 2024 06:01:00

Government's revenue authority has sent a request for freezing the bank accounts of some 123 factories and their 385 directors on charge of abusing duty-free facility on import of raw materials.
Officials said the factories facing action from the customs under the National Board of Revenue (NBR) are mostly from the apparel sector.
They found 82 of the factories at fault from the sector in question.
Customs Bond Commissionerate, Dhaka, has detected the factories, mostly located in Dhaka Division, which allegedly abused the duty waiver on import of raw materials.
Such misdealing, according to the customs calculations, caused a loss of around Tk 3.38 billion in taxes to the public exchequer.
Dhaka bond commissioner Dr Md Shahidul Islam sent letters, dated March 16, to Bangladesh Bank (BB) and all commercial banks to freeze the bank accounts of the factories and directors.
In the letter, Dr Islam requested the commercial banks to allow only active bond licence holders for opening letter of credit and issue 'proceed-realisation certificates' in their favour.
Talking to the FE Saturday, he said the Customs Bond Commissionerate (CBC) found the abuse in an intensive survey conducted in the last one and a half years to find out widely alleged irregularities in availing the bonded-warehouse facility.
Of the non-compliant companies, the CBC has found highest duties, worth Tk 1.33 billion, due from Rayhan Packaging Industry for abuse of the bonded-warehouse facility.
Vega Garments owes Tk 455 million while Masud packaging Industry Ltd Tk 260 million to the government.
In the existing customs rules, export-oriented factories can avail the duty-free facility on import of raw materials on condition of export of the finished products manufactured with the inputs.
Exporters have to comply with certain conditions on availing the bonded-warehouse benefit. There is a restriction on selling the products produced with duty-free imported raw materials on the local market.
In case of non-compliance with the conditions, the exporters have to pay the duty-taxes that a commercial importer of those materials are required to pay. Â
The CBC survey found some 6,197 export-oriented factories having bond licences. Of them, 3,909 are active importers and exporters while the rest 2,288 as do-nothings.
The CBC commissioner said some 80 per cent of the factories, or 2,490, are from the RMG sector. Â
He said the customs wing has demanded Tk 31.63 billion in duty-taxes in the last two years while some Tk 13.01 billion was claimed by the customs against abuse of bonded ware-house facility in the past 13 years.
Dr Islam expressed his optimism about checking the abuse of the bond facility as the system has been automated and will be linked with the asycuda world system.
In the last two years, the CBC has suspended the bond licences of 1,778 factories and cancelled licences of 202 for violating conditions tagged with bond licence.
He said, "The CBC has already suspended import-export activities of some 476 non-existent companies which disappeared after availing duty-free import."
The CBC has updated its website that contains all the relevant information relating to the activity of the commissionerate.
doulot_akter@yahoo.com