Tk 55 crore of customer savings has no trace in postal department!
Parul Begum, who tried to commit suicide after not finding the whereabouts of her deposit of Tk 2 lakh in Rajshahi's Tanor post office; While further investigating, it has been found that Tk 55 crore have been embezzled from various post offices across the country, informed the state minister for telecommunication Zunaid Ahmed Palak
The State Minister said that according to the investigation, accused Moksed Alam embezzled Tk 1 crore 84 lakh from 51 people including Parul Begum. Moreover, money from different post offices have been embezzled amounting 29 crores from Chittagong GPO, 9.5 crores from Noakhali Post Office, 2 crores to 4 crores each from Barishal Medical College Post Office and Patuakhali Post Office, 1 crore 84 lakhs from Jashore, 73 lakhs to Shyampur Post Office, 73 lakhs from customers from Dinajpur Post Office Tk 12 lakh of savings certificate was embezzled by getting signed on white paper.
In such a situation, the Minister of State for Posts and Telecommunication held a virtual meeting regarding the matter of embezzlement of customer's money at Tanor post office on Sunday. He said that Tanor Digital Post Office Postmaster Moksed Ali will be handed over to the police and this lost money will be returned along with filing a complaint with the Anti-Corruption Commission.
State Minister Palak instructed Director General of Posts Tarun Kanti Sikder, who was present in the meeting, to file a complaint against the accused to the Central Bureau of Investigation within two hours. At the same time, he advised customers to make complaints on national hotline number 333 by miking in 9 thousand 300 post office areas in customer awareness and spreading it on Facebook.
Also, by talking to a2i and BCC for permanent solution to all post related problems, Palak told the director general to develop core banking software, through postal resource planning (PRP) software, the entire process should be brought to paper-less management so that there is no opaque process. In this case, to ensure transparency and accountability, this PRP software proposal will be submitted next week. Even if 10 crore taka is spent for this purpose, it will be possible to prevent irregularities and corruption of 100 crore taka.
Palak said, out of 40,000 postal workers, maximum 40 can be dishonest. Everyone should be aware so that the whole department does not become a part of bad name for them. If action is not taken against the culprits now, the acceptability of the postal department will decrease. Eventually, everyone will suffer.
When the State Minister asked the Director General of the Department of Posts for a detailed explanation about the upazila post office of Tanor, the Department of Posts informed, 'Parul Begum purchased a family savings card worth two lakh taka at the upazila post office of Tanor. After the expiration of the term, he deposited two lakh taka with the Upazila Postmaster Mohammad Moksed Ali, hoping to get profit again and used to take the profit as usual every month. But while depositing Tk 2 lakhs for the second time, he did not purchase any savings paper officially or deposit money in FD, SB in post office. Just made financial transactions on mutual trust. Since the money has been deposited in mutual trust, the liability does not fall on the postal department. Despite this, the Minister of State instructed Parul Begum to take necessary measures against the concerned Upazila Post Master to take necessary measures against the concerned Post Master in collecting personal transaction money from the concerned Post Master. In the review of this issue held in continuation of this, the Minister of State gave directions to find out and prevent such anomalies everywhere in Bangladesh and ensure transparency and accountability. At the same time, he stressed on the need to create awareness that no one should transact any money without the government receipt.
