Bangladesh Bank has advised the clients of scam-hit BASIC Bank to withdraw their deposits from that bank using their own judgement.

Md Syful Islam, general manager of the Financial Integrity and Customer Services Department of Bangladesh Bank, sent a letter to the finance division last week, saying BASIC Bank clients could withdraw their deposits.

In June, Chairman of the Bangladesh Steel and Engineering Corporation Md Imtiaz Hossain Chowdhury had sought advice from the finance division as well as the Bangladesh Bank on withdrawing its fixed deposit return (FDR) from the bank.

On the Bangladesh Bank advice, the BSEC in a second letter last week alleged that the central bank had avoided its responsibility in resolving the matter.

“We are worried about saving the corporation’s FDR fund in the wake of misappropriation of a large amount of money at BASIC Bank,” the letter reads.

The BSEC also suspects that its officials might be harassed by the Anti-Corruption Commission because of its large FDR fund at BASIC Bank when the ACC starts investigating the scam.

According to a Finance Ministry report, the deposits at BASIC Bank declined by Tk997.56 crore in six months this year as depositors gave the state-owned bank the cold shoulder after Bangladesh Bank had detected huge irregularities at the bank.

Bankers say the depositors lost confidence in the BASIC Bank after the central bank unearthed that it disbursed more than Tk4,500 crore in loans in the last few years violating rules and regulations.

The ministry report, submitted to the parliamentary standing committee on public undertakings on Thursday, shows that deposits at BASIC Bank dropped to Tk12,451.78 crore as of June 30 from Tk13,449.34 crore in December 31, 2013.