Dhamaka owes Tk303cr to customers, Tk167cr to traders
Dhamaka Shopping logo. Image: Collected
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Dhamaka Shopping logo. Image: Collected
The Bangladesh Bank discovered that SMD Jasim Uddin Chishti, managing director of controversial e-commerce platform Dhamaka Shopping, transferred Tk 84 crore of customer prepayments to his own personal bank account.
A recent central bank inspection also revealed that Chishti had loaned Tk 25 crore to other companies he owned and embezzled another Tk20 crore in the name of purchasing software.
The company, which has suspended operations, collected Tk 736 crore from customers and only paid Tk 557 crore to companies that sold products on its platform.
However, despite this huge amount of money owed to customers and traders, Dhamaka Shopping only has 45.28 lakh Tk in its bank account, according to another report from Bangladesh Bank.
Dhamaka owes Tk 303 crore to customers and a further Tk 167 crore to traders, a total debt of Tk 480 crore, according to the inspection report, which the central bank forwarded to the Commerce Ministry on December 26.
Money paid by its clients was looted by senior Dhamaka officials and their relatives, the report said, adding that there was a good chance that they had embezzled huge sums of money while carrying out transactions. on paper without interacting at all with the trading companies.
The Bangladesh Bank has reason to doubt that Dhamaka’s COO, Sirajul Islam, and his brother Md Selim Hossain, and many others, were involved in the company-led Ponzi scheme.
The central bank further said in its report that it would be easier to reveal the truth if all dishonest beneficiaries and sellers, who received money without providing products, are brought to justice.
Dhamaka Shopping had more than two lakhs of registered customers and some 11,000 vendors supplied products to the business.
According to the report, Dhamaka sold products worth Tk 724 crore to customers for Tk 402 crore, which created a shortfall of Tk 322 crore. Chishti also transferred a significant portion of clients’ money to his personal account on behalf of loans to various institutions and software purchases.
Although three Dhamaka officials, including Sirajul Islam Rana, were arrested in a fraud case filed by a client in September last year, Jasim Uddin Chishti is still a fugitive abroad, police sources said.
Analyzing data from two of the merchant companies that supplied products to Dhamaka, the Bangladesh Bank said much of customers’ money was returned to customers in cash and checks without delivering any goods. In other words, sales only happened on paper.
“A number of customers, who initially received discounts from Dhamaka, gradually received cash and checks from sales companies. It is necessary to deepen the investigation into the involvement of Dhamaka Shopping and its sellers with these beneficiaries, ”adds the report.
Dhamaka Shopping is an e-commerce business of Invariant Telecom Bangladesh Limited, a company of the Microtrade group. The other group companies are Invariant Technologies, Microtrade Food and Beverage and Microtrade ICX Ltd.
