Financials of S. Alam family under probe

Banks and financial institutions (FIs) have been asked by the revenue authority to submit account- and credit-card details of the S. Alam family members on suspicion of concealment of financial information.
Saiful Alam, the owner of upstart S. Alam Group of business, is suspected as one of the masterminds behind major financial-sector scams in Bangladesh.
Tax Zone-15 under the National Board of Revenue (NBR) has sent letters to all branches of the commercial banks, NBFIs, Bangladesh Post Offices and the Department of National Savings across the country with this directive.
S. Alam's mother Chemon Ara, wife Farzana Parveen, brother Abdullah Hassan and his son's bank accounts would be scrutinised after getting the details, officials said.
Tax Commissioner in Zone-15 Ahsan Habib says he has called for the bank accounts as part of his duty assigned under Section 200 of the Income Tax Act 2023.
On Wednesday, Mr Habib gave the green signal to the Deputy Commissioner of Taxes (circle-325) under the zone to collect bank details of the S. Alam family.
The zone has also written to as many as 91 financial intuitions for furnishing full names of the companies under the group's ownership, Taxpayer Identification Number (TIN) and all addresses of their businesses and residences.
Farzana Parveen and Abdullah Hassan are directors of S. Alam Luxury Chair Coach Service and S. Alam Cold Rolled Steel Mills Ltd.
S. Alam's mother, Chemon Ara Begum, is also a director of S. Alam Luxury Coach Service in the transport sector.
In the letter, signed by Mr Habib, the taxmen have sought transaction details of the persons' accounts, either in their name or their father, mother, son, daughter and siblings either in joint or single account name or in the name of any business organisation.
Taxmen say the bank-account search would help identify whether the funds have been diverted from the bank accounts of S. Alam to his family members.
Alam's tax return is under the Large Taxpayers Unit (LTU) of the NBR. Officials at the LTU say they have yet to issue such search orders to check S. Alam's bank accounts in financial institutions.
Allegations have it that S. Alam has registered some companies in the name of his relatives to evade taxes.
In June last, the VAT wing of the NBR raised a Tk 35-billion evasion allegation, inclusive of Tk 70 billion worth of consequent fines, against two edible-oil companies of the expansive S Alam Group.
However, legality of this VAT demand was questioned by a High Court bench just a day after the raising of such allegations.
The court also asked them as to why the commissioner of the Chattogram Commissionerate should not be asked to dispose of the matter by strictly following sections 73 and 85 of the Value Added Tax and Supplementary Duty Act 2012.
The HC bench of Justice Zafar Ahmed and Justice Sardar Md Rashed Jahangir issued rules upon two writ petitions filed by the two companies.
The bench also fixed July 15 to hold a hearing on the rules. However, the situation changed after the fall of the Sheikh Hasina government in the face of a student-mass upheaval.
Talking to the FE, Syed Musfequr Rahman, Commissioner at Customs, Excise, and VAT Commissionerate of Chattogram, said there is no scope to review the VAT demand as it has been finalised as per law.
"We have replied to the court accordingly. The company may have to go to tribunal for resolving the issues," he added.
As per the VAT law, an aggrieved taxpayer has to pay 20 per cent of the VAT demand to lodge any complaint against the final tax demand of the NBR.
In that case, the S. Alam Group was supposed to pay Tk 7.0 billion to lodge the complaint with the tribunal.
Mr Rahman said the group tried to manage the court to avoid payment of the money and get relief from payment of its hefty evaded taxes.
A number of enterprises and banks have been taken over under the corporate tag of S. Alam Group over the years during the over 15 years of Sheikh Hasina rule in a row, reports say.
Since taking over the ownership and management control of Islami Bank PLC in 2017, the group and its associate bodies have borrowed around Tk 500 billion from the bank alone in a period of more than seven years "without following due diligence", says a latest report.
The amount would be to the tune of one-third of the now-risk-ridden bank's total loan stock.

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