Shahed on 38-day remand
A metropolitan magistrate court in Dhaka on Sunday remanded Regent Group chairman Shahed Karim alias Mohammad Shahed for 38 days in police custody and his group’s managing director Masud Parvez for 21 days in separate cases filed with different police stations in Dhaka and Satkhira.
The Anti-Corruption Commission, meanwhile, on Sunday approved a case against Mohammad Shahed on charge of embezzling about Tk 1 crore from Farmers Bank Ltd, which was later renamed Padma Bank Ltd.
The Rapid Action Battalion in a briefing last night also said they found evidence against Shahed of siphoning off of money from the bank and an investigation was on to determine the total amount.
In the briefing, the RAB’s legal and media wing director Lieutenant Colonel Ashique Billah said a large portion of the money Shahed managed by fraudulence were siphoned off from Bnagladesh to various foreign countries.
Ashique said Shahed had visa for four countries —Singapore, Malaysia, Indian and Nepal — and added that more interrogation was required for the accused to disclose the amount of money.
Dusing the interrogation, said Ashique Billah, Shahed admitted to his fraudulent activities and they received information that he used to exploit people at gunpoint.
New Age court correspondent reported that one of the metropolitan magistrates, Rajesh Chowdhury, passed the order on Sunday following the hearing after both the accused were placed on the dock by the Rapid Action Battalion in four cases while another court in Satkhira remanded Shahed for 10 more days in a case filed with Debhata police station under the arms act following his arrest along the Indian border on July 15.
During the hearing, Shahed pleaded guilty and said he could reimburse the money to the people if he was allowed to run his business while claiming he was sick and pleaded to the court whether it would be possible to fix the time of his remand custody after Eid Ul Azha, which would be celebrated on August 1.
The RAB brought both of them to court on completion of their 10-day remand in one of the cases filed against them in early July.
On July 16, Metropolitan Magistrate Mohammad Jasim placed Shahed and Masud a 10-day remand each. Masud was arrested from Gazipur on July 14.
On July 6, RAB conducted separate drives at the Uttara and Mirpur branches of Regent Hospital and arrested eight people for issuing fake COVID-19 test certificates and collecting money from COVID-19 patients.
On July 7, the RAB filed a case against 17 people, including Shahed and 12 of them arrested so far.
The ACC officials said their authorities approved another case against Shahed on charge of embezzling about Tk 1 crore from the then Farmers Bank Ltd in a meeting at its headquarters following the inquiry report submitted by assistant director M Sirajul Haq.
ACC director for public relations Pranab Kumar Bhattacherjee said that the commission would disclose details of the scam on Monday after filing the case.
On July 22, the commission filed a case against four people, including Shahed, on charge of swindling about Tk 1.51 crore from NRB Bank Ltd through loan forgery.
According to the case statement, without depositing any money, Shahed, on behalf of Regent Hospital, opened a current account with the NRB Bank’s SME department on November 17, 2014.
News Courtesy: www.newagebd.net
