The central bank made the assertion on Tuesday afternoon after a national daily published a report citing an inspection by the Customs Intelligence and Investigation Directorate or CIID.
Bangladesh Bank Executive Director Rabiul Hassan and General Manager Awlad Hossain Chowdhury spoke at the news conference.
“The purity of the gold kept by the customs detectives was 40 percent, but it was recorded 80 percent due to the similarity between the number 4 in Bangla and 8 in English,” Awlad said.
A registered goldsmith from Shokh Jewellers made the mistake, he claimed.
“The mistake Bangladesh Bank did was merely a clerical error in recording the purity of gold,” Awlad said.
The CIID found the anomalies while inspecting randomly sampled gold from 963kg deposit in the central bank’s vault from January to April last year, Bangla daily Prothom Alo reported on Tuesday.
CIID kept gold coins and rings weighing 3.3kg in the vault on Aug 23, 2015, but during the inspection it found adulteration in the gold, which caused the state a loss of over Tk 11.1 million, according to the report.
The state suffered another loss of over Tk 19 million by showing 22 carat gold as that of 18 carat, the report claims.
The CIID inspection report was sent to the central bank via the National Board of Revenue.
They found the anomalies during inspections lasting more than a year, CIID Director General Md Shahidul Islam told bdnews24.com.
“I hope that the Bangladesh Bank, as a statutory body, will find the people involved in the irregularities and penalise them,” he said.
“Maybe the customs detectives’ machine showed 22 carat but it was 18 carat when we measured it,” he said.
They have sent their reply to the CIID, Awlad, who is in charge of the vault, said.
“We had proposed measuring the gold by machines at the Atomic Energy Commission, but the customs intelligence conceded when we made it clear to them,” he said.
The central bank informed NBR Chairman Md Mosharraf Hossain Bhuiyan about the issue on July 11, Awlad said.
There is no scope of unauthorised entry to the central bank’s vault which has a six-stage security system, according to Rabiul.
“Even the governor and deputy governors have to get permission to enter the vault. No-one can enter it whenever they wish,” he said.
Contacted again after the Bangladesh Bank news conference, CIID DG Shahidul told bdnews24.com representatives of the central bank and Bangladesh Jewellers Samity were present when the CIID delegation kept the gold in the vault.
“The report was made after reviewing data collected in their presence,” he said.
The directorate was ready to assist the Bangladesh Bank if the central bank thinks it would inspect the gold again, he added.
State Minister for Finance MA Mannan has called an emergency meeting on the issue.
Relevant officials of the Bangladesh Bank, including Governor Fazle Kabir, NBR Chairman Mosharraf and other officials will attend the meeting at the ministry on Wednesday, according to the ministry’s schedule.