A decision has been taken to re-audit all types of loans of Islami Bank Bangladesh PLC while under the control of S Alam Group, a criticized business organization based in Chittagong. This decision was taken in the first meeting of the bank’s new board of directors on Tuesday (August 27).
Chairman of the new board, former managing director (MD) of Sonali and Rupali Bank. The first meeting of the bank’s board of directors was held under the leadership of Obaid Ullah Al Masood.
An official who was present at the meeting said, “In the last seven years, who took the loan and in what process, the initiative has been taken to audit all types of loans by finding out whether these loans have proper collateral or not.”
Last week, Bangladesh Bank dissolved the board of Islami Bank, which was ‘under the control’ of S Alam, and appointed five new independent directors.
An independent director who was present in the meeting said that apart from the loan audit of Islami Bank, it has been decided to look into where the treasury department of the bank has invested money and dollars. Besides, an initiative has been taken to check whether the recruitment of manpower in the last seven and a half years has been done in a proper process or not. For this reason, it has been decided to appoint 3 separate external auditors.
According to central bank sources and Islami Bank documents, Islami Bank’s total loan portfolio as of August 18 is Tk 1.5 lakh crore. And the total amount of deposits is one lakh 53 thousand 274 crores. Out of these loans, S Alam Group has received a benefit of Tk 74 thousand 972 crores. This amount is half of the total loan of the bank.
In the name of 7 companies of S Alam Group, there is a direct loan of Tk 14 thousand 427 crore from the bank.
Note that Islami Bank was one of the leading private banks and the highest remittance earner in 2016. S Alam Group started acquiring shares of Islami Bank through various newly registered securities companies from that year. The acquisition was completed within the next year.
