Central bank to investigate Evaly’s financial mismanagement

File photo

Bangladesh Bank is now in the charge of investigating the financial mismanagement of Evaly, a digital business firm. At the same time, the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) of the police will reinvestigate and take necessary measures regarding Evaly. The investigation will be done through the organised crime investigating branch of the CID.

The commerce ministry sent letters to Bangladesh Bank governor Fazle Kabir and the home ministry’s public security secretary Mostafa Kamal Uddin on 18 February. In separate letters, the commerce ministry asked the Directorate of National Consumer Rights Protection to oversee Evaly's activities and the WTO cell of the commerce ministry to instruct the Evaly to conduct business in compliance with the law. Four departments have been given the responsibility to work with the Evaly.

Earlier in September, the commerce ministry sent separate letters to the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC), Bangladesh Competition Commission (BCC), Bangladesh Financial Intelligence Unit (BFIU), National Board of Revenue (NBR), Public Security Division of home ministry, the Directorate of National Consumer Rights Protection and the Registrar of Joint Stock Companies and Firms (RJSC) to take necessary initiatives after investigating the financial management of Evaly.

Among them, only the Public Security Division of the home ministry has submitted the report to the commerce ministry on 12 January. The decision of a fresh investigation has been taken on the basis of recommendation of that report. This was also mentioned in the four letters sent in this phase. The subject of these letters is the same -- 'complaints regarding Evaly’s activities against consumers’ right.

The report stated failure to deliver products on time after taking payment in advance constitutes criminal breach of trust and fraudulence as per the Penal Code 1860 and the Consumer Rights Protection Act 2009. Punishment of such offence is rigorous imprisonment for one to three years.

Evaly doesn’t return the money of cash back offers to customers and keeps it in their 'wallets'. Besides, the company does not allow the customers to use 100 per cent of their money. Such an offence can result in seven years' imprisonment, the report mentioned.

The report further said Evaly does not communicate properly with its customers through its hotline number, support email, Evaly apps and social media platforms, which is also a criminal offence.

If a product is not delivered, Evaly is required to refund the customer’s money. Instead, however, the company keeps it, violating five sections of the Penal Code 1860, two sections of the Consumer Rights Protection Act 2009 and a section of the Digital Security Act 2018.

When asked about the letters regarding the complaints against Evaly, the managing director of Evaly, Mohammad Rasel told Prothom Alo, “Investigations are not bad at all. Let the Bangladesh Bank investigate the matter. We also want them to investigate. However, an e-commerce site cannot run only by cash on delivery system. We are dreaming about a society without cash money at the same time, yet we are declaring to do business in cash. This contradiction does not comply with digital business.” He demanded conducting both systems – in advance payment and cash on delivery.

Also Read

Duties of different divisions

In the letter sent to the governor of the Bangladesh Bank the commerce ministry said, “Bangladesh Bank has been instructed to investigate whether there is any discrepancy in the financial management of Evaly.”

When asked about this, Md Serajul Islam, the executive director and spokesperson of the Bangladesh Bank, said, “Bangladesh Bank will take initiative to investigate the matter soon.”

The organised crime investigation branch of CID has been instructed to investigate the allegations against Evaly in the letter sent to the Public Security Division of the home ministry.

The commerce ministry has instructed the Directorate of National Consumers’ Right Protection to send a report to the ministry every month, monitoring how many orders Evaly gets and how much they deliver. It has also been instructed to assess whether they maintain consumers’ right.

Speaking to Prothom Alo, Bablu Kumar Saha, director general of the consumers’ right division, said, “We are dealing with the complaints against the Evaly with utmost importance.” They will also reply to the letter from the commerce ministry soon, he added.

Meanwhile, the WTO cell of the commerce ministry has been asked to instruct the Evaly to conduct business in compliance with the policies of the E-commerce Association of Bangladesh (ECAB), Directorate of National Consumers’ Right Protection and the Ministry of Commerce.

WTO cell’s director general Hafizur Rahman told Prothom Alo, “E-valy will be instructed to start the cash on delivery system soon.” He also said that work is underway to prepare e-commerce management guidelines.

Also Read