The National Board of Revenue (NBR) on Wednesday asked banks to freeze bank accounts of former Bangladesh Bank deputy governor SK Sur Chowdhury, an alleged associate of money launderer PK Halder, and his wife Suparna Sur Chowdhury, on suspicion of tax evasion.
The Central Intelligence Cell office also asked banks to submit a compliance report, seeking the last outstanding balance of their accounts.
The NBR directive came four months after it sought detailed information on all types of accounts and transactions of five persons, including Sur Chowdhury, and Bangladesh Bank Executive Director Md Shah Alam and their spouses.
On February 3, Rashedul Haque, former managing director of International Leasing and Financial Services (ILFSL), another close associate of PK Halder, confessed to a Dhaka court that the two senior BB officials had assisted them in carrying out the financial scams.
Md Shah Alam was stripped of the responsibility of monitoring two central bank departments for his alleged connection with Halder, following the confessional statement.
Also Read - NBR seeks account information of SK Sur, Shah Alam and spouses
After that, the High Court asked the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) why SK Sur Chowdhury and Shah Alam were not yet arrested for assisting PK Halder in embezzlement and laundering huge amounts of public money from four non-bank financial institutions.
Earlier on February 23, the National Board of Revenue (NBR) had also sought the same information after allegations came to light of their involvement in defrauding a host of non-bank financial institutions (NBFIs) of at least Tk3,500 crore by banker Proshanta Kumar Halder, also known as PK Halder.
The BFIU asked banks and NBFIs to provide information, including details of current accounts, savings accounts, term-loan accounts, foreign currency accounts, credit cards, lockers, savings and investment schemes, beneficiary owners’ accounts, or any other account maintained by Chowdhury and his wife Suparna Sur Chowdhury, and Alam and his two wives Shaheen Akhter Shalley and Nasrin Begum, within seven working days.
Both Alam and SK Sur Chowdhury were on the payroll of Halder and they helped to hide the irregularities and corruption at ILFSL, People’s Leasing and Financial Services, Reliance Finance, and FAS Finance and Investment, as per Haque’s confessional statement.
