After the detection of massive corruption ranging from money laundering to fake recruitment, a large-scale misuse of fund has been discovered in the controversial Destiny Multipurpose Cooperative Society Ltd.
The latest fund misuse involves printing of its 8.5 lakh shareholders’ certificate from abroad when printers in the country say they have the latest technology for the job.
The printing — done in Hong Kong on Australian paper — has caused the cooperative a loss of Tk 11.39 crore in shareholders’ money, says a government report.
An investigation of the Department of Cooperatives (DoC) has found that the top managers of DMCSL spent about Tk 14 crore on the certificates.
DoC documents show there are 1.76 lakh registered cooperatives in the country but none of them ever printed certificates abroad.
“Destiny has set a record by printing its share certificates in a foreign country,” said Amiya Kumar Chattapadhyay, additional registrar of DoC, which regulates cooperative societies in the country.
“Maybe some top Destiny officials used it as a means of laundering shareholders’ money,” said a DoC official preferring not to be named.
A shareholders’ certificate, issued by a company to its investor, bears the latter’s name and address, number of shares he owns and the share value.
Contacted, Destiny Group Chairman Rafiqul Amin said, “We printed the certificates from Hong Kong on high quality Australian paper to avoid forgery.”
“The paper is chemically-treated and each certificate cost $2 [Tk 164],” said Rafiqul, the immediate past chairman of Destiny cooperative.
Printing them in the country would cost between Tk 30 and 50 each, depending on the quality of the paper, said Ashraful Islam, general manager of SR Printing Press at Paltan in the capital.
Rafiqul Amin said DMCSL, registered in 2005, initially printed the certificates locally. “Later, we found that some people were claiming dividends against fake certificates. This prompted us to print on high quality paper in 2010.”
However, DoC officials say claiming money using fake documents is not easy. Because detailed information of the shareholder, including his photo, is kept in the office file for identity check.
Courtesy of The Daily Star
