Tanvir on 29-day remand

Arms case filed against the Hall-Mark boss
Tanvir Mahmud, managing director of Hall-Mark Group of Industries, and Tushar Ahmed, general manager of the company, were each placed on a 24-day remand in three cases over the Sonali Bank loan scam yesterday. The Hall-Mark MD was also placed on an additional five days’ remand in an arms case.
The Metropolitan Magistrate’s Court of Dhaka passed the orders upon petitions by

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Hall-Mark MD arrested after daylong drive

Sonali Loan Scam
Hall-Mark MD arrested after daylong drive
Tanvir Mahmud, managing director of Hall-Mark Group, and another top official of the controversial firm, were nabbed by the Rapid Action Battalion last night in the
capital’s Pallabi in connection with the Sonali Bank loan scam.
The other official is Tushar Ahmed, general manager (commercial), also husband of

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Hall-Mark seeks fresh Sonali loan

Claims it can export garment worth Tk 500cr in 2 months if granted Tk 25cr loan
Controversial business group Hall-Mark has sought a fresh loan of Tk 25 crore from the Sonali Bank, claiming the credit would help it export garment worth Tk 500 crore in two months, said sources in the bank.
Like before, the company provided false and fabricated information relating to its export potentials.
Meanwhile, leading businessmen have questioned how could the Hall-Mark Group,

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Sonali directors put blame on management

Hall-Mark Loan Scam
Sonali directors put blame on management
Immediate-past directors of Sonali Bank yesterday tried to wash their hands of the Hall-Mark loan scam and blamed the Tk 2,686 crore swindle squarely on the bank’s management.
A four-member parliamentary probe committee held a meeting with the bank’s nine former directors for nearly three hours at the Jatiya Sangsad Bhaban

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Shortcut to fortune

Hall-Mark’s way of building empire with short-term loans
Controversial business group Hall-Mark in wilful violation of banking rules has invested in long-term projects the money it took in short-term loan from state-run Sonali Bank.
The group that began making garments in 2007 now owns 80 factories, at least 40 of which are on paper though. Most of the ones that exist were built with the

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Sonali board members blame management

Hallmark Scam
Sonali board members blame management
Four members of the board of directors of Sonali Bank on Wednesday alleged the bank management was involved in the Hallmark money swindling, claiming their non-involvement in the loan scam.
Members of the board of directors Suvas Chandra Singho Roy, Jannat Ara Henry, KM Zaman Romel and Sattayendra Chandra Bhakta made the allegation after being interrogated by

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Sonali Bank won’t file criminal case

Tk 2,686cr Hall-Mark Scam
Sonali Bank won’t file criminal case
Wants ACC to deal with criminal charges
Sonali Bank has decided not to file any criminal case against the controversial Hall-Mark Group, which swindled Tk 2,686 crore out of the bank’s Ruposhi Bangla Hotel branch using forged documents.
“Legal advisers have suggested that we don’t file any case, as the Anti-Corruption Commission is investigating the issue,” bank’s Managing Director Pradip Kumar Dutta told

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Hallmark Group ignores Sonali Bank notice

Refunding money
Hallmark Group ignores Sonali Bank notice
The Hallmark Group ignored a Sonali Bank notice to refund a half of the money it had embezzled from its branches as the 15-day deadline ends today.
The Hallmark Group embezzled Tk 2,668.38 crore from the branches of Sonali Bank.
On September 4, Sonali Bank issued a letter asking the Hallmark Group to refund

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Turn in bank details

Hall-Mark Scam
Turn in bank details
Central bank asks 32 Sonali officials; scam buster not allowed to probe suspicious loan
The central bank yesterday asked 32 Sonali Bank officials, including a former managing director, to submit their bank statements within 10 days.
The statements will be sent to the Anti-Corruption Commission for legal action if it is found that they have illegal incomes, a Bangladesh Bank

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Value inflated abnormally

Hall-Mark’s Mortgaged Land
Value inflated abnormally
Savar police, admin always turned a deaf ear to complaints of land-grabbing against Hall-Mark in Janata Housing project
The controversial Hall-Mark Group now claims an abnormally inflated price for the 47 acres of land it has mortgaged to Sonali Bank for the Tk 2,686-crore loan it has taken using forged papers.
Through public advertisements over the last few days, the company has been claiming the market price of the land is Tk 2,000 crore, which is nearly four times the official

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More time needed to file cases against bank officials, Tanvir: Sonali MD

Sonali Bank managing director Pradip Kumar Dutta on Thursday said that the bank needed more time to file criminal cases against some of its officials and Hallmark Group’s managing director and chairman in connection with swindling of more than Tk 3,606 crore from the bank.
The bank has already appointed two lawyers and continued the process to file the cases, he

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18 companies of Hallmark Group obtained TIN but did not submit tax returns

The National Board of Revenue has found that 18 associate companies of the Hallmark Group did neither submit tax returns nor paid taxes for any fiscal year though the companies have obtained tax identification numbers as business entities, NBR officials said on Monday.
The NBR will serve notice very soon to the companies asking why they did not submit tax

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Sonali to sue culprits

Tk 3,606cr Swindle
Sonali to sue culprits
The finance ministry yesterday asked the Sonali Bank to file criminal cases against the officials of the bank and Hall-Mark Group involved in the recent loan scam.
The bank and financial institutions division of the ministry in a letter directed the bank’s management to take “departmental and legal action” against the top

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Nonsense!

Hall-mark scam
Nonsense!
Muhith ridicules media outcry; experts shocked
Finance Minister AMA Muhith’s comments yesterday on the Sonali Bank loan scam — that the swindle of Tk 4,000 crore was a trivial amount –surprised many, including a former minister, an economist and a banker.
“Here, my banking crisis — which is not a crisis at all,” Muhith said.
“It is a matter of Tk 3,000 or Tk 4,000 crore. Nonsense! But you [media] are harming the

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Adviser’s shadow in Hallmark scam

Modasser Ali denies allegation; anti-graft body quizzes 5 Sonali Bank officials
The Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) has information that Syed Modasser Ali, an adviser to the prime minister, allegedly influenced Sonali Bank authorities into granting a huge amount of loan to the controversial Hallmark Group illegally, said ACC sources.
“The information came from different sources and we are examining it. However, we do

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