Court Correspondent :
A Dhaka court yesterday framed charge against five people, including Helena Jahangir, a businessperson turned politician, in a fraud case filed with the city’s Pallabi Police Station.
Other four accused are Hazera Khatun, General Manager of Helena Jahangir’s IPTV “Joyjatra Television”, Coordinator of the IPTV Sanaullah Nuri, Chief News Editor Qamruzzaman Arif and Staff Reporter Mahfuzur Rahman.
The five accused now on bail, pleaded not guilty and demanded justice after Additional Chief Metro-politan Magistrate (ACMM) Md Tofazzal Hossain read out the charges to them.
Earlier in the day, the ACMM dismissed five separate petitions submitted for discharging them from the charges of the case. Later, the ACMM fixed May 25 to start the trial of the case.
Earlier on November 21 last year, Inspector Shahinur Islam of the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) and also Investigation Officer of the case, submitted charge sheet of the case to the CMM Court of Dhaka against Helena and others.
Joyjatra Television’s Bhola District Correspondent Abdur Rahman Tuhin filed the fraud case on August 2 last year. In the case, he alleged that Helena took Tk 54,000 from him (Abdur Rahman Tuhin) of Bhola district for appointing him as a local correspondent of Joyjatra Television. He worked as correspondent for several months but was not paid any salary. On the other hand, the television authorities took Tk 3,000 per month from him.
The law enforcers arrested Helena during a raid at her Gulshan residence in the capital on July 29, last year. Later, she was released on bail in November also last year, after getting bail from different courts on different dates.
