ACC seeks wealth statements of 17 senior NBR officials

Anti-Corruption Commission.

Dhaka, Aug 19 – The Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) has sought wealth statements from 17 senior officials of the National Board of Revenue (NBR) over allegations of accumulating illegal assets.

The decision was taken at a commission meeting, ACC Director General Md Akhter Hossain said at a press briefing at the ACC headquarters on Tuesday.

He said the move came under section 26(1) of the Anti-Corruption Commission Act 2004 and rule 17 of the ACC Rules 2007 which require the officials to submit details of their assets and liabilities in the prescribed format.

Officials asked to submit wealth statements include Tax Commissioner (Tax Zone-3) MM Fazlul Haque, Tax Appellate Tribunal Commissioner Lokman Ahmed, Additional Tax Commissioner (Intelligence) Sahela Siddique, Additional Tax Commissioner Md Mamun Mia, Additional Commissioner of VAT Intelligence Hasan Tariq Rikabdar,Joint Tax Commissioner Monalisa Sahreen Sushmita, Joint Tax Commissioner of Tax Academy Md Morshed Uddin Khan, Additional Tax Commissioner (Tax Zone-8) Mirza Ashiq Rana, Deputy Tax Commissioner (Tax Zone-16) Md Shihabul Islam, Additional Commissioner Abdul Rashid Mia, Commissioner of Railway Customs Md Kamruzzaman, Commissioner of Customs, Excise & VAT (East) Kazi Mohammad Zia Uddin, Additional Commissioner of Customs Sadhan Kumar Kundu, NBR Joint Commissioner Md Tariq Hasan, former Additional DG of NBR’s Central Intelligence Cell Md Alamgir Hossain, NBR Member Md Lutf ul Azim, and NBR Member (Income Tax Policy) AKM Badiul Alam.

In July, the ACC initiated an inquiry against them following allegations that some unscrupulous NBR officials were colluding with businesses to facilitate large-scale tax and duty evasion in exchange for hefty bribes.

According to the complaints, officials helped some companies underreport taxes, causing massive revenue losses for the government  while also pocketing large sums of money themselves.

Some officials reportedly harassed taxpayers by filing false tax-evasion cases when bribes were not paid.

In cases of advance or excess tax payments, refunds were allegedly released only after taxpayers paid “half the amount” in kickbacks to responsible officers.

Several officials allegedly amassed wealth through bribery, favoritism, and abuse of power while serving at different stations across the country. - UNB