Staff Reporter :
A Dhaka court on Thursday ordered the authorities concerned to send former RAJUK chairman Iqbal Uddin Chowdhury and incumbent director of Partex Group Shawkat Aziz Russell to jail rejecting their bail prayers in a graft case.
Earlier, a special squad of Anti-Corruption Commission [ACC] arrested Iqbal Uddin Chowdhury, also a former secretary, from his Paribagh residence in the city at about 2:00am.
Besides, Russell, son of former BNP lawmaker and Partex Group Chairman MA Hashem, was arrested from his Gulshan residence in the city at 2:30am. He is also chairman of Amber Group, director of United Commercial Bank Limited and director of Bangladesh Cricket Board [BCB].
They both were nabbed in connection with a case filed for their alleged irregularities in allotting 20 katha plot at Purbachal. The case filed by ACC official Sylvia Ferdous with Motijheel Police Station also accused five other top officials of RAJUK board and Russell’s brother Rubel Aziz.
The case document said that, Iqbal Uddin Chowdhury had allotted two plots of 20 katha to two brothers by abusing his administrative power during his tenure from 2001-2004, though none of them formally applied for the plots.
Other accused RAJUK board members are: SD Fayez, AKM Wahidul Islam, SM Jafarullah, HM Zahirul Haque and Rezaul Karim Tarafdar.
Meanwhile, the court of Dhaka Metropolitan Magistrate Satyabrata Sikdar permitted the investigation agency ACC to interrogate Shawkat Aziz at jail gate within five working days.
“The lawyers of Iqbal Uddin Chowdhury prayed to the court for his bail. But the court rejected the prayer and ordered to send him to jail,” ACC legal official advocate Mahmud Hossain Zahangir said.
“On the other hand, ACC prayed for seven days remand of Shawkat Aziz. His lawyers prayed to grant his bail. But the court rejected the bail prayer and directed the ACC to interrogate him at jail gate any two days within five working days,” he said.
It is not the first time, Iqbal Uddin Chowdhury was sent to jail during the period of immediate past caretaker government for alleged misappropriation of a huge amount of money by selling 18 buildings far below than market price.
