Tk 100cr tax anomalies found so far; HC asks govt to sue Destiny for construction on beach
The National Board of Revenue (NBR) yesterday asked banks to freeze the accounts of Destiny 2000 Ltd, a major arm of Destiny Group, to check whether it had been involved in tax anomalies, said an NBR official.
The tax authority has so far detected anomalies of over Tk 100 crore in tax and VAT by two concerns of the Destiny Group, including Destiny Tree Plantation, after examining some bank accounts, according to NBR officials.
Destiny Group has 37 sister concerns.
The NBR had also noticed that Destiny Multipurpose Cooperative Society Ltd, another major concern of Destiny Group, violated tax related rules.
In its ongoing probe, the Anti-Corruption Commission has so far detected that the directors of Destiny Group transferred nearly Tk 100 crore of the organisation to their personal bank accounts, the officials said.
Meanwhile, the High Court yesterday directed the authorities concerned to immediately file a case against Destiny Group and its three engineers for constructing structures on the Cox’s Bazar beach without the environment clearance.
Hearing a writ petition, the bench of Justice AHM Shamsuddin Choudhury Manik and Justice Jahangir Hossain Selim asked the director of Department of Environment (DoE) of Chittagong division and assistant director of DoE of Cox’s Bazar to jointly file the case under the Bangladesh Environment Conservation Act, 1995.
The highest punishment of such offence is three years’ imprisonment.
Manzill Murshed appeared for the petitioner.
After a Bangladesh Bank investigation, probe bodies of the ACC and NBR found “illegal banking” activities by Destiny Multipurpose Cooperative Society Ltd.
The tax administration had earlier asked banks to freeze more than 15 accounts of some concerns of the Destiny Group and its top officials to investigate tax related irregularities.
To investigate whether there had been any act of money laundering, the central bank earlier asked all banks to provide it with information about the accounts of the company’s 14 directors, including its president and the chairman, and all sister concerns.
-With The Daily Star input
