The CID has launched an investigation against Daraz Bangladesh Limited, an e-commerce-based company, for allegedly smuggling thousands of crores of Taka using foreign bank virtual cards. Meanwhile, some top officials of Daraz have been interrogated twice on money laundering charges. In the interest of investigation, the Daraz authorities have been called again next week with the necessary documents.
CID officials say they have information that Daraz has illegally laundered huge sums of money in the name of selling digital products. While asked to Daraz for showing the documents of digital product sales, they have not been able to show anything yet.
Humayun Kabir, special superintendent of police at the CID’s Financial Crimes Division, told the media on Monday (November 29th) that an investigation into Daraz’s money laundering was ongoing. After two rounds of talks with the Daraz authorities, they have been asked for some documents. Legal action will be taken in this regard after investigation.
Another CID official said that during interrogation, Daraz claimed that they acted as a platform for selling goods. Unauthorized digital products sold from Daraz platform were imported by other organizations. They themselves did not import these directly from abroad. But the investigation has shown that Daraz has taken all the money into its merchant account as opposed to selling digital products. Digital products are a big part of their daily sales. Officials from CID and Bangladesh Bank’s Financial Intelligence Unit (BFIU) are analyzing Daraz’s merchant account data.