Staff Reporter :
The High Court on Sunday allowed a petition filed by the court-appointed Board of Directors of the controversial e-commerce company Evaly Limited for withdrawing money worth Tk 2,35,16,803 kept in two accounts of the organization and to utilize the amount for the purposes of the company.
It has also allowed the board to sell and/or rent out the 22 vehicles of the company, now dumped in a warehouse, and to utilize the income for the same purpose.
The court directed the Inspector General of Police (IGP) to deploy necessary number of police force at the office of the building of the Evaly Limited in Dhanmondi to control or manage the crowd of the customers or creditors there.
The court also asked the Bangladesh Bank and the National Board of Revenue (NBR) to prepare and submit a report in the court detailing where the Evaly’s former Chairman Shamima Nasrin and MD Mohammd Rassel had spent the money of their customers.
The High Court bench of Justice Muhammad Khurshid Alam Sarkar passed the order after hearing a petition filed by Md Mahbub Kabir Milon, court-appointed managing director of the company. Lawyer Morshed Ahmed Khan appeared in the court on behalf of the Evaly board of directors, while Barrister Syed Mahsib Hossain appeared for the customers of the company.
Following a petition filed by a customer the same High Court bench on September 22 in 2021 directed the concerned bodies to be restrained from selling, transferring or otherwise dispose of the assets of the Evaly Limited till disposal of the case filed with the High Court.
Evaly Limited, Registrar of Joint Stock of Companies and Firms, Bangladesh Financial Intelligence Unit (BFIU), Consumer Right Protection Bureau, Nagad managing director, Bkash chairman, Bangladesh Competition Commission, E-CAB Association of Bangladesh, Bangladesh Association of Software and Information Services (BASIS), Bangladesh Bank and Commerce secretary have been asked to comply with the order.
Later the court on October 18 in 2021 formed a 5-member body to oversee the overall management and the company affairs of the Evaly Limited.
The court appointed Justice Shamsuddin Chowdhury Manik, a former judge of the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court, chairman of the company and Mahbub Kabir Milon, an additional secretary of the government, ex-officio managing director.
But due to the embargo imposed by the High Court, the court-appointed board of directors could not operate the accounts of the company and to sell or rent or otherwise dispose of the assets of the Evaly Limited. In this circumstance the board filed the petition to bring modification of the order that was passed on September 22 in 2021.
The court-appointed board of directors in their petition said, “The ex-managing director and CEO of the company Mohammd Rassel and ex-chairman Shamima Narsin have siphoned substantial amount of money from the bank accounts of the company to their personal bank accounts. However the court appointed board could not ascertain in the exact amount because there were many cash withdrawals.”
As such, it is necessary to pass order to ascertain and recover all the money they had siphoned from the company accounts.
