The London-based Homeland Life Insurance’s five foreign directors were unable to substantiate the legitimacy of their share certificates. Instead, they have issued a legal notice claiming that the Insurance Development and Regulatory Authority, not the Insurance Regulatory Authority, is the only court with the authority to look into the share issue. However, the IDRA investigation team stated that the case is sub juice and did not suggest taking any legal action. The inquiry report has made this information public.
The investigating team delivered this report to the IDRA chairman on May 8 of last year, pertaining to Homeland Life’s five foreign directors’ holdings. Abdul Hai, Abdul Ahad, Jamal Mia, Kamal Mia, and Jamal Uddin are these five directors.
It’s important to note that the media has reported on the legality of the share certificates held by the five foreign directors of London-based Homeland Life Insurance. According to an Ekattor TV report, Homeland Life’s five directors’ share certificates are fraudulent. With these phony credentials, they have served on the company’s board of directors for 17 years. The business is providing them with a number of financial advantages.
Furthermore, Homeland Life’s original chairman, Kazi Enam Uddin Ahmed, obtained a loan by mortgaging all five directors’ shares to ICB Islami Bank (previously Oriental Bank). As a result, an inquiry committee was established by IDRA, the insurance industry’s regulatory body.
The inquiry report states that Homeland Life was established on September 15, 1996. The decision to sell the shares was made during the third board meeting on December 8 of that year. Additionally, the purchase and sale of shares in the names of five directors was approved at the sixth board meeting.
Nevertheless, no signature verification was done, and the board meeting’s resolution to transfer shares was not approved by the Department of Insurance at the time.
The investigative report states that between April and September 2014, Homeland Life’s five foreign directors’ share certificates were stolen. The loss of these share certificates on the same day was deemed suspicious and unusual by the IDRA investigating team.
However, the 96th board meeting of the firm was held on July 14, 2016, and it was resolved to issue duplicate share certificates in order to replace the lost ones.
Out of the five directors, Jamal Mia, Abdul Ahad, and Kamal Mia were unable to produce any duplicate share certificates issued against them, according to the inquiry report on the matter.
The copies of the share certificates they showed to the investigation team were issued on September 5, 2022.
In addition, Abdul Hai’s share certificates are duplicates according to the lawyer’s opinion.
And Jamal Uddin provided 16 copies of share certificates. Out of these, 3 are duplicate certificates issued against the lost share certificates. The remaining 13 share certificates were issued on September 5, 2022.
The investigation team reviewed the information in the share certificate disbursement register. The review states that the investigation team did not find any match between the duplicate share certificate numbers submitted by 5 directors in the share certificate disbursement register with the share certificate disbursement register minutes of the directors in 1996.
After reviewing the share disbursement register, the investigation team also said in the report that many shareholders/directors did not receive their share certificates. This includes Kazi Enam Uddin Ahmed, the founding chairman of Homeland Life.
After reviewing the share disbursement register, the investigation team said in the report that if Kazi Enam Uddin Ahmed did not receive his share certificates, how did he take a loan from the bank by mortgaging his share certificates?
In addition, no one except Abdul Hai accepted the duplicate share certificates issued by Homeland Life in 2016. The investigation team did not even find any page number in the share certificate disbursement register.
Therefore, the investigation team believes that this share disbursement register was made later.
The report states that Kazi Enam Uddin Ahmed took a loan from the former Oriental Bank on February 28, 2005 by mortgaging 80,000 shares of Homeland Life. However, the authorities were not informed about the matter.
The investigation team says that if Kazi Enam Uddin Ahmed had not taken the share certificate, he would not have been able to take the loan by keeping it as collateral in the bank. However, the investigation team could not be sure about Kazi Enam Uddin’s 80,000 shares.
In this case, the investigation team says that Kazi Enam Uddin died in 2005. His family currently lives in the United States. As a result, they had to rely on information from Homeland Life Insurance and the former Oriental Bank to prepare the investigation report.
In this regard, Jahangir Alam, director and spokesperson of the Insurance Development and Regulatory Authority (IDRA), told Insurance News BD that an explanation was sought from the insurance company regarding the investigation report regarding the share certificates of 5 directors of Homeland Life. Although two letters were sent, they have not provided any explanation so far.
It was not possible to get any information or statement from the 5 accused directors in this regard due to their legal notice. In this context, a decision will be taken in a meeting of the authorities to determine the next course of action. However, no meeting has been called in this regard so far. We hope that the authorities will take legal action in this regard very soon.
