Special Correspondent

Severe financial manipulation, non-existent assets, vanished bank funds, and deliberately hidden legal liabilities have pushed Rupali Life Insurance PLC to the brink of insolvency.

A deep dive into the company’s latest financial disclosures and confidential auditors' reports reveals a systematic operation of deceiving policyholders, regulators, and general investors.

By fabricating millions in phantom assets, the management has manufactured artificial profits to pay out illegitimate dividends to directors and shareholders.

This accumulated fraud has left the company facing a severe liquidity crisis, severely damaging public trust in the country's broader insurance sector.

At the center of this institutional decay is the company's long-standing leadership and former Chairman, Mahfuzur Rahman Mita—the highly influential former Awami League Member of Parliament (MP) from Sandwip—whose tenure has been deeply mired in allegations of corruption, political muscle-flexing, and unbridled financial malfeasance.

According to official financial statements, Rupali Life Insurance claimed total assets worth Tk 618 crore.

However, a meticulous review by the audit team and financial analysts has exposed that at least Tk 120 crore of these recorded assets have absolutely no physical or verifiable existence.

Under standard accounting principles and regulatory guidelines for corporate governance in insurance, these non-existent assets should have been immediately written off from the company’s Life Fund. Instead, under the political shadow of the management, the company kept the Tk 120 crore on the books as valid assets, using them to manufacture an artificial surplus of Tk 22.13 crore.

This fabricated profit was then utilized to declare and distribute hefty dividends to directors and shareholders, heavily benefiting the insider circle of the former Awami League MP. In reality, if the Tk 120 crore in phantom assets is removed from the equation, the company's actual Life Fund drops to just Tk 377 crore. When contrasted against its total policyholder liabilities of Tk 472 crore, the company is not running a surplus at all; rather, it faces a staggering net financial deficit of Tk 98 crore.

Financial experts and senior chartered accountants warn that creating synthetic surpluses out of thin air is a serious financial crime. This practice masks the true, fragile health of the firm while siphoning out its core capital, running the imminent risk of rendering the entire fund completely hollow.

One of the most alarming red flags in the financial ledger is the state of the company’s bank deposits. Rupali Life claimed to hold a total of Tk 91.51 crore across various banks, specifying Tk 69.03 crore in Special Notice Deposits (STD) accounts and Tk 22.48 crore in current accounts.

However, when auditors directly cross-checked these figures with the respective banking institutions, they could physically verify only Tk 47.51 crore. The remaining Tk 44 crore had vanished from the accounts, completely unsupported by legitimate receipts, transactional trails, or legal documentation.
This massive deficit forced the audit team to issue a serious 'Qualified Opinion' in their formal report. Compounding the alarm, this missing cash is not a recent anomaly. Similar discrepancies regarding bank balances were repeatedly flagged by auditors between 2016 and 2023—overlapping squarely with Mahfuzur Rahman Mita's influential grip on the firm—yet no corrective measures or regulatory interventions were ever implemented due to the political clout surrounding the board.
Rupali Life’s Financial.

No concerned official was available to comment on the above allegations. An e-mail was also sent to the company's official mail from The Country Today seeking comments but nobody responded.