Staff Reporter :
The Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) has filed a case against Prashanta Kumar Halder (popularly known as PK Halder) and 11 others.
The case statement said they have embezzled and laundered Tk 44 crore of FAS finance and Investment Ltd. They have taken loan in the name of on paper institution Diya Shipping Ltd.
ACC Assistant Director Rakibul Hayat filed the cases with the commission’s integrated district office in Dhaka-1 on Thursday
A total of 40 graft cases have been filed against PK Halder and his associates so far. The commission has prepared three probe reports and issued travel bans on 45 people said to be involved in the scams.
The other accused in the case are Shiv Prasad Banerjee, former managing director of Dia Shipping Limited, Director Papia Banerjee, MA Hafeez, former chairman of FAS Finance and Investment, Siddiqur Rahman, Vice Chairman Jahangir Alam, Director Arun Kumar Kundu, Anjan Kumar Roy, Mostain Billah, Ujjal Kumar Nandi, Satya Gopal Poddar and former managing director and chief executive officer of FAS Finance Russell Shahriar.
According to the case statements, on November 1, 2014, Shiv Prasad Banerjee applied for a loan of Tk44 crore for six years through Russell Shahriar for business expansion.
Shiv Prasad Banerjee showed 32 decimal land in Kaliakair of Gazipur as collateral against the loan while Russell submitted the loan proposal to the board for approval on December 17 of that year.
Later, at the 173rd board meeting, final approval was given for the disbursement of the loan, according to the commission report.
The commission reported that Haldar and his associates had assured no mortgage in the name of the Dia Shipping Limited, so there was no possibility of recovering the loan.
After the approval of the loan, it was disbursed in favour of Dia Shipping Limited from December 29, 2014 to December 29, 2015, but the amount was directly transferred to various financial institutions created by PK Halder and his associates.
ACC said the findings of the Bangladesh Financial Intelligence Unit (BFIU) corroborated their report.
Acting Secretary of ACC and Director General Sayeed Mahbub Khan briefed the media in this regard on Thursday afternoon. He said that there was truth found behind the allegations of the accused abusing power and forging documents to misappropriate and launder Tk 440 million.
Thursday, a case was fined in this regard under sections 409/420/468/471/109 and the Prevention of Corruption Act 5(2) and the Prevention of Money Laundering Act 4(2), (3).
