Trading Corporation of Bangladesh (TCB) has cancelled licences of 23 of its dealers for breaching the terms and conditions of the contract agreements.
The state-run trading agency issued an order in this regard on December 14 last, said an official.
"The dealers did not renew their contracts for long. They did not also withdraw essential items required for continuation of their dealerships," said an official at the TCB.
He added that the agency had also communicated repeatedly with the dealers before scrapping the licences and confiscating their security money.
Some 2,717 dealers listed with the TCB were operation across the country, according to the TCB that operates in the market to help stabilise the supply and prices of the essential commodities.
The official said the TCB took the decision to cancel the licences for the sake of consumers' interests. It sells commodities like sugar, soybean oil, red lentils, grams and dates at subsidised rates as part of its intervention into the market.
The organisation incurs huge financial losses every year and gets subsidy from the government, according to a source.