One after another financial scams have been dominating the newspapers pages since the beginning of the present AL led grand alliance government. After capital market looting, Padma Bridge Project scam, the biggest infrastructure project in South Asia, Unipay2u looting, now Hallmark scam brought out another big black cat from the bag of government.

The World Bank cancelled a 1.2 billion US dollar loan last June, citing about 300 crore taka bribe against high profile government officials. Hallmark scam has been described the ever biggest corruption in Banking history of Bangladesh. Newspaper reports said more than 1 billion US dollar has been taken away by cheating from the state run bank. Huge amount money has been paid against false vouchers, LC (letter of credit), companies of Hallmark group. Five thousand 6 hundred documents of Sonali Bank have been recovered from Hallmark headquarter. Finger has been raised to the high profile govt leaders including Modasser Hossain, one of the advisers of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina. Apart from this, Bangladesh Bank (BB) officials, Chairman, Members of Board of Directors of the state run bank, all of whom were appointed by political consideration are allegedly involved in this scam, reported the media.

Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (Buet) remained shut down since ......as the students, teachers boycotted classrooms against corruption and anarchy of Vice Chancellor led administration. The demand of the protesters now is to resign of Vice Chancellor and his deputy.

Hallmark scam, Finance Minister Abul Mal Abdul Muhith’s apology on Hallmark remark, Buet stalemate, Bangladesh Bank (BB, central bank of Bangladesh) and Anti Corruption Commission (ACC) activities on Hallmark scam were the common news items in different newspapers on September 7.

New Age published four reports on Hallmark scam in page1. 2 DC (double column) and 1 SC (single column) . Daily Star published 3 items on Hallmark in front page. They made lead story titled `Sonali Loan Scam// 27 banks under BB, ACC scanner, while New Age made it second lead in DC. Both the newspapers gave DC treatment of Muhith apology.

In the lead nesws Daily Star reported `The Bangladesh Bank and the Anti-Corruption Commission are separately investigating the roles of 27 state-owned, private and foreign banks in the Sonali Bank loan scandal. The Sonali Bank's Ruposhi Bangla Hotel branch had lent Tk 3,606 crore to Hall-Mark, T and Brothers, Paragon Group, Nakshi Knit, DN Sports and Khan Jahan Ali. The central bank earlier found half of the loans were based on forged local and foreign export bills. It is now inquiring into the 59 branches of the 27 banks to know whether they were partners in any irregularity that helped the Ruposhi Bangla branch buy fake acceptance bills.
The ACC also has asked these banks to urgently submit documents relating to purchase and acceptance bills issued between 2010 and May this year, the period of the Tk 3,606 crore swindle.
Sources said Mir Md Zainul Abedin Shebly, a deputy director of the commission, last month wrote to the managing directors and chief executives of the banks for the papers.

“Some of the banks have already provided us with the documents,” said an ACC official, preferring not to be named.
According to the anti-graft body, some clients of the 27 banks have banking records with money illegally borrowed from the Ruposhi Bangla branch by Hall-Mark Group and five other companies.
The banks include state-owned Sonali, Janata, Agrani, Rupali and BASIC banks.
The other twenty-two banks are Shahjalal Islami Bank, Social Islami Bank, Mercantile Bank, National Credit and Commerce Bank Ltd, United Commercial Bank, One Bank, Al Arafah Islami Bank, Jamuna Bank, IFIC, City Bank, Uttara Bank, Prime Bank, State Bank of India, National Bank of Pakistan, Bank Al Falah, Premier Bank, National Bank Ltd, Mutual Trust Bank, BRAC Bank, Islami Bank, Exim Bank and Southeast bank.
A top Sonali Bank official said soon after the Ruposhi Bangla branch lent a huge sum of money to Hall-Mark, it was detected that a number of foreign and local banks had been demanding money from Sonali Bank against acceptance bills.
An issuance of these acceptance letters means the branch confirmed with the 27 banks that its client Hall-Mark and five other companies had received due supplies from the clients of some branches of those banks against letters of credit (LC) opened earlier, sources said.
And, the branch would pay the money of the delivered goods to Hall-Mark and others within the next 30 days of issuing the acceptance letters.
Usually, business clients of the banks do not wait 30 days for the payment of their delivered goods; they want cash as quickly as possible. So they propose their banks to purchase the acceptance letter.

According to banking provisions, banks give their clients 75 percent of the total amount of acceptance letters, a procedure called purchasing “inland bill” of own clients in exchange of an interest rate.
When a bank transfers the payment after 30 days of issuing their acceptance letters, the bank at the receiving end pays the rest -- 25 percent -- to their client who earlier had sold out the acceptance letter.
The ACC official, on condition of anonymity, said as the Ruposhi Bangla branch issued many such acceptance letters to some branches of 27 banks, the commission decided to look into the matter.
Since May, the branch has already paid $111 million (more than Tk 800 crore) against foreign bills it had accepted or purchased.
But, against the inland bills purchases, the 27 banks have been demanding money, which the branch is yet to pay, the official said.
A BB official said the central bank had received complaints from different banks that Sonali Bank was not paying their dues against local export bills.
So far, 59 branches of those banks have claimed their dues against the bills. The central bank will investigate whether officials of those branches were involved in any anomaly.
A BB official said they had already inquired into some of the branches and found the involvement of state-run Janata Bank and Agrani Bank in the scam. Detailed investigation is going on in other branches.
In one case, the Janata Bank corporate branch opened two accounts in the name of two companies. For both the accounts, Tanvir Mahmud, managing director of Hall-Mark Group, was the introducer.

A central bank official said funds were transferred to the accounts of these companies, although the branch did not inspect whether the two companies existed.
The BB also carried out a special inspection on the activities of the principal branch of Agrani Bank.
The corresponding banks, which are making claims to the Ruposhi Bangla branch, have a responsibility to see whether the accounts of fake companies were opened with them, the official added.

Officials also believe private banks might have been used as platforms for the swindling.
Another central bank official said irregularities over purchase and acceptance of local and foreign bills took place inside branches, banks and with other banks.
And irregularities were behind a number of major scams in the banking sector in the country.
The official said the central bank was investigating not only Hall-Mark issues but also wrongdoing over purchase and acceptance bills.
The ACC, too, has asked for documents on all bill purchases against acceptance letters to examine whether there was any other scam involving any other client of the Ruposhi Bangla branch.

The Same news was published in New Age titled `Hallmark Scam, ACC finds links of 30 more local, foreign banks’ . The report said, The Anti-Corruption Commission has found evidence of involvement of at least 30 more local and foreign public and private banks in the alleged swindling of about Tk 3,547 crore by Hallmark Group from the Ruposhi Bangla Hotel branch of Sonali Bank, a commission official told New Age.

The 30 banks involved in illegal transaction of money include the Janata Bank, Agrani Bank, Rupali Bank, Uttara Bank, Shahjalal Islami Bank, Jamuna Bank Limited, Al Arafah Islami Bank, Prime Bank, Bank Al Falah, Islamic Bank Bangladesh Limited, Southeast Bank, National Credit and Commerce Bank Ltd (NCCBL), United Commercial Bank Limited (UCBL), One Bank Limited, National Bank of Pakistan, State Bank of India, BRAC Bank Limited, Mutual Trust Bank, Mercantile Bank, Premier Bank, City Bank, Social Islamic Bank Limited, National Bank Limited, IFIC Bank Limited and the EXIM Bank Limited, said the official.
He said that the commission started sending letters from August 14 to the accused banks asking for necessary data from them.
Letters were also served on the banks that have already provided documents to the commission including Southeast Bank, NCC Bank, IFIC Bank and EXIM Bank.

The accused banks’ branches used to purchase bills of different organisations from Sonali Bank Ruposhi Bangla branch and used to help Hallmark and the other five companies to withdraw the money through pay-orders and demand drafts, the officials said.
The ACC inquiry team will summon the suspected officials of the above banks and ascertain their involvement with the biggest financial scandal in the country’s banking sector.

The commission already grilled 31 people over their alleged connections with the Hallmark-Sonali Bank loan scam. A six-member inquiry team of the commission had interrogated them. The commission, after receiving a letter from the Bangladesh Bank on July 15, formed the six-member inquiry committee headed by its deputy director Mir Joynal Abedin Shibli.

Deputy director Akhter Hamid, assistant director Mashiur Rahman and Nazmus Sadet, and deputy assistant directors Majibur Rahman and Joynal Abedin are on the inquiry committee. On August 30, the Sonali Bank had listed 17 of its officials for their suspected links to the Hallmark scam. Earlier on August 19, the Bangladesh Bank asked Sonali Bank to suspend 31 of its officials by August 30 for their alleged involvement in the illegal lending of Tk 3,547 crore to little-known Hallmark Group and five other companies.

A BB letter sent to the managing director and chief executive officer of Sonali Bank said that Saiful Shamsul Alam and Co, a chartered accountancy firm, recently completed a functional audit of the illegal lending by the state-owned bank in which 32 of its officials were found to have been involved.
Except Muhith’s apology the other news on Hallmark scam Daily Star published in SC was `Sonali board refuses to take scam responsibility’

Except Muhith’s apology the other 2 news New Age published on Hallmark scam were `Docs contradict Sonali board claim’ and `Muhith says he will talk less’
Other news took place in front page on Septeember 7 were `major changes in army-s/c, buet stalemate drags on - dc, ticfa deal soon, hope Dhaka –Washington – s/c Shariar terms long grilling-sc, ict asks matia to explain remarks-sc

In The Daily Star other news item in front page on that day were US worried about GB, destiny must refund money, Abduction of 4 youths in savar// 2whistle-blowers held as suspects. Daily Star did not do the army reshufle news. On the other hand New Age avoided US worried news on Grameen Bank of professor Younus.