Our Correspondent :
A team of Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) -12 has busted an illegal cigarette factory inside a cinema hall under Shibganj municipality in Bogura. The RAB team has also seized a huge amount of illegally manufactured cigarettes from the factory named SM Tobacco under the ownership of Suraiya Sarker. The cigarettes were manufactured evading tax to the government.
Senior Assistant Police Superintendent Swajal Kumar Ghosh led the drive. It also seized 240,000 sticks of illegally manufactured cigarettes and held 6 of the employees of the factory.
RAB-12 official Swajal Kumar Ghosh said, “SM Tobacco has long been manufacturing illegal cigarettes inside the cinema hall next to the Children’s Park in the municipality. Based on secret information, RAB conducted the drive, he added.
Sources said that SM Tobacco has been marketing Senor Gold Special, Dubai, Enjoy, MG Gold and other cigarettes in Bogura and adjacent districts. The prices of those cigarettes is between Tk20-25. But the government has set Tk39 as the least price for a packet of cigarette.
The detainees said that they manufacture cigarette according to the quantity of the raw materials, and the cigarette company representatives take delivery of those cigarettes.
Syed Mokaddes Hossain, assistant commissioner of the Bogura Board of Revenue, said, “They (SM Tobacco) were doing business with licenses. We will investigate what they were doing evading tax.”
The factory has been sealed and we have recovered illegal goods, he said, adding that criminal case will be filed agaist them.
According to the National Board of Revenue, an assistant revenue officer is on full-time duty at a cigarette factory to ensure collection of government revenue. Only after his approval, the cigarettes could go out of the factory.
Not just in factories or warehouses, the illegal cigarettes are also produced in rice mills, and even in oil mills. Manufactured cigarettes from these factories spread in districts across the country without VAT challan through courier services, which is illegal.
Swajal Kumar Ghosh said that a special case will be filed against SM Tobacco under the Special Power Act for manufacturing and marketing illegal cigarettes.
The NBR website shows that the name of proprietor of SM Tobacco is Suraiya Sarker.
