KARACHI: MCC Appraisement East has arrested the mastermind of the NBP Pact-Deposit fraud along with a Grade-III officer of NBP posted at Customs House Branch. The accused were involved in illegal removal of pay-orders from Securities section of MCC Appraisement East and depositing these pay-orders into PD accounts of the unauthorized delinquent importers illegally.
Pact Deposit/Personal Deposit (PD) account is a facility by which government allows the users of WeBOC system including traders as well as customs agents to deposit their funds with the government in advance. The funds so deposited are utilized by the owner of PD account for payment of duty and taxes towards his customs liabilities arising in the WeBOC system during the course of import/export by him. These PD accounts are maintained on the basis of NTN of WeBOC user.
Mohsin Abdul Ghaffar is the mastermind of this scam, who has been arrested . Six FIRs have been lodged in this case so far. Mohsin had come to Customs Court for submitting application for a protective bail, however PA Hamood-ur-Rehman and Adil Rasheed managed his arrest.
Mohsin with the connivance of Rehan Grade-III officer of NBP was running this multi-million scam. He was the acting manager of NBP Customs House branch and senior officers were working under him, sources said.
Sources said that senior officers of NBP are involved in this scam. So far four NBP officials have been arrested already.
Collector Appraisement East Ashad Jawwad has advised the R&D section to expedite the investigations into this multi-million scam. PA Hamood-ur-Rehman, AO Azam Shah, AO Saleem Qaimkhani and Preventive Officer Malak Hashim have been appointed as the Investigating Officer (IO) in this case.
Pay-orders submitted by legitimate importers/traders to the Securities Section of MCC Appraisement East were allegedly deposited into PD Account of M/s Khan Traders and other such accounts. This act of unauthorized deposit of said pay order was made possible with active connivance of accused officer of National Bank of Pakistan.
It is pertinent to mention here that at the time of deposit of funds into PD account by the National Bank of Pakistan, the WeBOC system asks NTN number of PD Account Holder in which funds are to be deposited. After entering NTN number by the bank official the WeBOC systems displays name of PD Account Holder.
It is responsibility of concerned functionary of National Bank of Pakistan to check the PD Account Holder name displayed by the WeBOC system and the name of authorized importer on pay order. Only, if both names are matched, the pay order may be accepted for PD account deposit otherwise it is not allowed.
Officers of National Bank of Pakistan Karachi caused to submit false information into WeBOC system electronically in order to defraud the government from its legitimate assets and committed a fiscal fraud.