Home ›› 19 Oct 2021 ›› Front
The High Court has formed a five-member interim board for the controversial e-commerce platform Evaly, which will be led by former Appellate Division judge AHM Shamsuddin Chowdhury Manik.
Other members of the board are former LGRD secretary Mohammad Rezaul Ahsan, Chartered Accountant Fakhruddin Ahmmed, and Supreme Court lawyer Khan Mohammad Shameem Aziz.
Justice Muhammad Khurshid Alam Sarkar passed the order on Monday after Barrister Sayed Mahsib Hossain stood for the plea filed by a customer named Md Farhad Hossen seeking court directives for winding up Evaly and a refund.
The High Court also appointed Mahbub Kabir, an officer on special duty and former additional secretary of the railway ministry, as the managing director of Evaly.
After the hearing, Barrister Mahsib, quoting the High Court, told journalists the new board would call its first meeting as soon as possible after getting the court’s written order.
“It will function as a normal company board. It has been directed to take charge of the company along with all records and papers. The company’s all assets will be handed over to the board.”
He said the board would figure out the assets and liabilities of Evaly and, if necessary, would take steps to do the audit.
“After the audit, if the board considers that the company is not competent to continue, the members will decide to wind it up,” he added.
Several cases have been filed against Evaly Chief Executive Officer Mohammad Rassel and his wife Shamima Nasrin, the company’s chairman, on embezzlement and cheque fraud allegations.
The couple was arrested on September 16.
On September 30, the High Court directed the Registrar of Joint Stock Companies and Firms to submit Evaly’s papers.
It also put a moratorium on the sale or transfer of all movable and immovable properties of Evaly, which started its journey in December 2018.
According to its audit report for the fiscal year 2019-20, the company incurred a loss of Tk 2.29 lakh within six months of operation.
At the end of FY19 and FY20, the amount of loss rose to over Tk 2.38 crore and Tk 103 crore respectively.
However, the company claimed its intangible assets were worth Tk 54 lakh at the end of June 2019.
It also claimed at the end of June 2020, the intangible assets increased to Tk 12,12,55,000 and now stand at Tk 4,38,45,00,000.
According to the report, Evaly has received an advance of Tk 1.65 crore from customers till June 30, 2020. It owes over Tk 9 crore to its suppliers.
Earlier, in two different submissions to the commerce ministry, Evaly stated that it owes Tk 311 crore and Tk 206 crore to its clients and merchants respectively.
