The official, who requested anonymity, said the investigations have already established that eight Birgunj-based firms used fake customs declaration form to siphon off IC from the banking system. “They had even forged customs seals and signature of customs officials,” said the official.[break]
As their activities contravene with multiple laws, the department is preparing to file a charge sheet seeking actions as per multiple laws. The firms facing DRI´s wrath include Laxmi Traders, Rehan Traders, Maha Laxmi Enterprises, Shyam Galla Store, GS Traders, Maxwell Computers, Digital World and Jay Mata Di International. On the basis of 2,341 fake customs declarations forms produced at 15 branches of nine banks, the firms managed to issue demand draft to pay for the imports they never made. These demand drafts helped the firms siphon off IRs 1.24 billion from the banking system.
DRI had traced the racket when it raided those firms some six months ago and took their day book and other documents under control.
Interestingly, the DRI investigation has not yet established a clear involvement of customs officials as well as customs agents.
“We interrogated customs agents whose code numbers were mentioned in the declaration form. However, it was revealed that citation of their code numbers again was one of the fraudulent tricks that unscrupulous traders resorted to,” said the source. Similarly, the customs officials could not be implicated because all those customs declaration form were never issued by the customs office.
However, the official said some of the officials of the banks that made the payments could be implicated in the case, particularly as existing norms require bank staffers to cross-check authenticity of documents before issuing payment drafts.
“A single person was found to have withdrawn over Rs 600 million from a bank by producing multiple fake customs declaration mentioning the same date of imports. The withdrawals were carried out for a number of days. That should have rung warning bells,” said the source.
But investigating officials have failed to assert whether it (bank´s laxness) was due to negligence or ill-intention of staff. Given the situation, DRI is soon holding discussions with the senior officials of Nepal Rastra Bank - the central monetary authority - over its action against the bank staffers.
“We have enough facts to challenge the intention of some of the bank staff. Also we want to make sure banks act more responsibly and take steps to avoid such laxness in the future,” said the source, indicating that the fate of the bank staff would be decided only after hearing NRB´s opinion.
The banks that were investigated by DRI are Citizens Bank International, NIC Bank, Everest Bank, Nepal SBI Bank, Nepal Bank Limited, Siddhartha Bank, Laxmi Bank, Nepal Investment Bank and Nepal Bangladesh Bank.
Moreover, the source said DRI is planning to file case against those found involved in the IC misappropriation racket by mid-March.
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