Equipment of 16k imported at 2 crore and 63 lakh
State-owned Power Grid Company of Bangladesh Limited (PGCBL) imported 68 kilograms of bolts, nuts and washers for towers from India for $2,39, 695 which is about 2.63 crore in Bangladeshi currency. Which is 1,619 times of the contract value.
According to the purchase agreement PGCBL submitted to the customs authorities, The actual price of the shipment at $2.18 per kg is supposed to be $148.
The consignment arrived at Mongla Sea Port in April last year but the customs officials did not allow it to be cleared due to unusual high price.
Chinese firm TBEA Co. Ltd, contractor of expansion and empowerment of Eastern Grid Network project under PGCBL, imported these goods from skipper Ltd. of India. These will be used for laying power lines and building towers in Chattogram, Cumilla and Feni regions.
According to customs documents and purchase agreement information, PGCBL had previously spent $3,89,252 to import 178.8 tones of the same product. That is, at the rate of 2.18 dollars per kg.
Seeking to explain the abnormal price, the company wrote to the Mongla Customs House commissioner on June 5 last year, "This time the price is high even though the import volume is less. It is because more goods were sent by mistake in the previous shipments."
The company also said that the average price of import was within the limit of the purchase agreement.
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