A petition has been filed with the company court of the High Court (HC) division seeking liquidation of the Nobel laureate Dr Muhammad Yunus-owned Grameen Telecom.
Mahmud Hasan Feroz, secretary of the 'Grameen Telecom union of workers and employees' recently filed the prayer on behalf of all the 99 members of the union.
Upon hearing the petition on Monday, the HC bench of Justice Muhammad Khurshid Alam Sarkar fixed April 03 for passing over the matter.
Lawyer Yousuf Ali appeared in the court on behalf of the petitioners while lawyer Mustafizur Rahman Khan represented Grameen Telecom.
"The workers and the employees of the company are entitled to get 5.0 per cent of the net profit of Grameen Telecom as per the rule," Mr Ali says.
They [workers] will get the profit since 2006 and the dues are more than 2.5 billion now.
"But the company is not giving the dues to the employees. In the circumstances, they moved the Labour Court," he adds.
"We've enough evidence that Prof Yunus is trying to influence the court's ruling… In this situation, we've appealed to the HC to appoint a liquidator at the company."
The court heard both parties and fixed April 03 for passing order over the issue, the lawyer stated.
Meanwhile, Mr Rahman says, "Grameen Telecom is a non-profit organisation. The law under which the employees are demanding their dues does not apply to this organisation."
Even if they get money, he asserts, the amount is not so much that has been claimed.
Grameen Telecom tried to hire a consultant for out-of-court settlement, but they [union leaders] finally did not do it, according to Mr Rahman.
They are now saying Grameen Telecom tried to influence the court, law and labour ministers, he comments.
"They also stated this in the petition submitted to the High Court. This type of statement is totally baseless and worthless," utters the lawyer.
Without discussing the union, the Grameen authorities laid off 99 employees through a notice. Since then dissatisfaction started among the employees.
Later, a writ petition was filed with the higher court challenging the notification.
On hearing the plea, the court also summoned Dr Yunus.
Finally, it directed the authorities on 04 April 2021 to reinstate the employees.
Apart from this, several other cases were filed in different times against Dr Yunus and other officials of the company demanding dues.
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