High Court directs ACC to identify the  E-commerce scammers  and the amount of money they laundered

The High Court wanted to know how much money was smuggled abroad through e-commerce companies. At the same time, the High Court directed the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) to determine who were involved in the smuggling. In addition, the court has instructed to identify the serious losses incurred by e-commerce customers due to whose negligence. In terms of three writs on Monday, May 23, Justice Md. Mojibur Rahman Mia and Justice Khizir Hayat passed the order along with the High Court bench rule. Lawyers Humayun Kabir Pallab, Mohammad Shishir Monir and Anwarul Islam Badhan appeared for the writ petition. Deputy Attorney General Bipul Bagmar represented the state. Earlier, on April 21, the same bench of the High Court fixed May 22 for the order. But even though a report was supposed to be submitted to the court on behalf of Bangladesh Bank, they could not submit it in the form of affidavit, so they took ‘Not Today’. The court then ordered a hearing for today. On September 20 last year, a Supreme Court lawyer Anwarul Islam Badhan filed a writ petition seeking directions to establish an independent e-commerce regulatory body in line with the national digital commerce policy to protect the interests and rights of consumers in online commerce. On September 22 of the same year, another writ petition was filed by Supreme Court lawyer Mohammad Humayun Kabir Pallab on behalf of the two e-commerce customers. It directed the formation of a retired Supreme Court-led inquiry committee to look into the losses and serious financial losses of millions of customers in e-commerce marketplaces such as Evaly, Alesha Mart, E-Orange, Dhamaka, Daraz, Qcoom, Aladdin's Pradeep and Dalal Plus. In addition, 33 aggrieved consumers filed a writ petition seeking directions to form an expert committee comprising economists, IT professionals, businessmen and other stakeholders to come up with specific proposals to protect the rights and interests of e-commerce customers. The applicants did not get any product or refund even after paying Tk 16 crore on various e-commerce platforms. For this reason, he filed a writ petition seeking directions to get compensation. The rule states that e-commerce customers have suffered serious losses and financial losses due to the negligence of any person or authority, why the defendants should not be instructed to identify those persons or authorities and how much money has been laundered from e-commerce or if it has been laundered at all. He wanted to know why he would not be instructed to calculate the amount and identify those involved in the smuggling. At the same time, the rule seeks to determine why the failure and inaction of defendants in taking necessary steps or preventive measures to protect the rights and interests of e-commerce consumers should not be declared illegal and why an independent regulatory body should not be directed to oversee the functioning of e-commerce platforms. The Bangladesh Financial Intelligence Unit (BFIU) has completed a partial investigation into 17 of the 50 e-commerce companies accused of embezzlement and fraud. The BFIU has submitted a report in this regard to the High Court as per the directions of the court. Their lawyer for the BFIU told the High Court that the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) was investigating where the money of several organizations, including E-Valy, E-Orange, Qcoom, had gone and whether it had been smuggled. Earlier, on November 25 last year, he submitted a report to the court from the concerned authorities in the wake of the High Court order. According to the report, the accompanying documents of 67 accounts of 13 banks and financial institutions of e-commerce company Evaly.com have been analyzed. According to the transaction details in the accounts, a total of 3898 crore 82 lakh taka has been transacted. Of this, about 1956 crore 19 lakh taka has been deposited till September 2020 and about 194 crore 63 lakh taka has been withdrawn. From these accounts from June 2019 to August 2020, Selim Reza, Farid Hossain, Tariq Rahman Rakibur have withdrawn Tk 50 crore in cash. Thousands of crores of taka have been transacted in 36 accounts.