Former Bangladesh Bank deputy governor Sitanshu Kumar Sur Chowdhury on Monday was shown arrested in a money laundering case filed by the Anti-Corruption Commission over the Hallmark Group loan scam seven years ago.
Dhaka metropolitan magistrate Partha Bhadra passed the order on the day after investigation officer Sayedur Rahman, an inspector of the Criminal Investigation Department, produced him before the court with a petition in this regard.
SK Sur, however, had not been included in the first information report in the case. He is now in jail in connection with a graft case.
The IO in the petition mentioned that SK Sur was a deputy governor of the Bangladesh Bank at the time of Hallmark Group loan scam involving about Tk聽3,500 crore.
So, it is necessary to show him arrested in the case, he said in the petition.
The ACC filed the case on December 26, 2018, against Hallmark Group officials Tusher Ahmed, Mohammad Aslam Uddin and Sumon Bhuiyan for making suspicious transactions of Tk聽13.50 crore, allegedly amassed illegally, and transferring the money to conceal its source.
The ACC on Monday also seized assets worth Tk聽4.70 crore that was recovered from a Bangladesh Bank locker belonging to SK Sur Chowdhury in the previous day.
ACC director general (prevention) Md Aktar Hossain at a press briefing on Monday at the commission鈥檚 headquarters in the capital Dhaka said that an ACC team recovered 1,005.4 grams of gold, $1,69,300, 鈧�55,000 and a fixed deposit receipt of Tk聽70 lakh from SK Sur鈥檚 locker at the central bank.
The assets were seized and these will remain under the custody of the Bangladesh Bank, he said.
ACC director Kazi Saemuzzaman, who led the ACC team, said that Bangladesh Bank officials were permitted to maintain lockers in their names for storing personal valuables.
The commission conducted the operation in compliance with a court order, following SK Sur鈥檚 failure to submit information regarding his assets despite being formally asked to do so, he said.
Saemuzzaman said that the commission was investigating whether these assets were declared in Sur鈥檚 tax returns.
On January 19, the commission raided SK Sur鈥檚 Dhanmondi house in the capital and recovered Tk聽16.25 lakh in cash, savings certificates, and insurance papers worth Tk聽4.45 crore.
During the operation, the commission also obtained information about his three flats.
On January 14, SK Sur was arrested and subsequently sent to jail by a Dhaka court in connection with a case filed on December 23, 2024, for failing to submit his wealth statement to the commission.
On the same day, the commission filed three separate cases against SK Sur, his wife Suparna Sur Chowdhury and his daughter Nandita Sur Chowdhury for not complying with notices that asked them to submit their wealth statements.
The former BB deputy governor has been under ACC scrutiny for his alleged links to Prashanta Kumar Haldar, also known as PK Halder, a former managing director of NRB Global Bank.
PK Halder, the prime suspect in numerous financial scam cases in Bangladesh, was arrested in Ashoknagar in India on May 14, 2022, on money laundering charges. However, he was recently granted bail in the case.
Previously, the commission froze the bank accounts of SK Sur, his wife and daughter as part of its investigation into allegations of tax evasion.
In July 2022, the National Board of Revenue also directed banks to freeze their bank accounts.
