73,000cr siphoned off annually by gold smuggling

Bangladesh Jewelers Association (BAJUS) has demanded vigorous campaign by all law-enforcement agencies, including the Customs, to stop money laundering and smuggling, and the ongoing crisis and problems in the jewelry industry market across the country.

"In a recent assessment, we found that gold worth Tk 200 crore is being smuggled into the country every day. So, the smuggling of gold causes money laundering of Tk 73,000 crore annually," Enamul Haque Khan Dolan, Chairman of BAJUS Standing Committee on Anti-Smuggling and Law Enforcement, told a press briefing at its head office in the capital on Saturday.

BAJUS said that the ongoing war situation between Ukraine and Russia has put the entire world economy in the face of a major disaster. As a result, global commodity prices have increased. Various countries of the world are suffering due to the extreme impact of inflation. The prices of other foreign currencies, including the US dollar, are constantly increasing in the country. This has affected the global gold market.

They also said that the country's jewelry industry has faced a multi-faceted crisis in recent times due to persistent overvaluation and crisis of the US dollar, as well as inflated prices of other foreign currencies and reckless smuggling. The price of the US dollar in the country has gone up to 118 rupees. In such a situation, domestic and foreign syndicates of smugglers have spread instability in the gold market. By creating an artificial crisis, the price of gold is constantly being increased in the local bullion market. The wholesale market of gold has become hostage to the syndicate of poddars. The poddars have deep ties with smuggling syndicates. Basically, several syndicates of these smugglers are believed to be involved in gold smuggling abroad. Many believe that gold smuggling syndicates have a connection with the ongoing dollar crisis and money laundering in the country. In such a situation, it is necessary to ensure strong action and punishment by all the law enforcement agencies of the country, including customs, against the smugglers involved behind the gold market instability. There is no alternative to drastic measures to bring order to the gold market.

Apart from this, law enforcement agencies have a glorious role in maintaining peace and order in the society. The forces are working tirelessly to maintain order and fair business environment in the state. They have been conducting various operations consistently so that no miscreants, smugglers can conduct anti-national and illegal activities. Many smugglers have been prosecuted. It increases the revenue of the government. It has requested the concerned to issue necessary instructions to all government agencies so that no smugglers can bring gold or ornaments into the country and smuggle them abroad.

Bajus's basic idea is that at least 200 crore worth of illegal gold ornaments and bars are being smuggled to Bangladesh every day by water, land and air routes by misusing the hard-earned foreign currency of expatriate workers. Which at the end of 365 days or one year stands at about 73 thousand crores. In the ongoing dollar crisis in the country, the government should take initiatives to stop money laundering and smuggling of 73 thousand crore rupees.

In this case, Bajus' proposal is to form a separate government monitoring cell involving Bajus to identify gold smugglers. Besides, stricter laws should be amended to suppress smugglers if necessary. Also, Bangladesh Bank and National Board of Revenue-NBRK should conduct a survey with Bajus to find out what is the impact on dollar crisis and smuggling due to the abuse of facility of bringing gold bars and ornaments under Baggage Rule.

BAJUS suggestions-

# No ornament can be sold without hallmark. Bajus will inform the law enforcement agencies by accusing the company that has hallmarked the jewelry if the jewelry is found to be of substandard quality.

# There are 4 standards of gold across the country, namely 18, 21, 22 and 24 (99.5) as per government guidelines. No gold or jewelry can be sold below this standard. It is specially noted here that in case of pure gold, the value below 99.5 is not acceptable under any circumstances. In this case, all hallmarking companies are required to test gold as per government guidelines.