The Anti-Corruption Commission on Sunday filed a case accusing four businessmen and seven state-owned Agrani Bank officials on charges of embezzling Tk 190 crore as accumulated loan with principal and interest.
The accused are seven officials of Agrani Bank and four, including three owners of Nurjahan Group, a Chattogram-based industrial conglomerate, are loan receivers.
ACC deputy director Subel Ahmed confirmed the lodging of the case with its local office.
Deputy assistant director of ACC Chattogram integrated office-1 accused them to disburse loan against foreign LC violating Bangladesh Bank regulations and thus misappropriated the amount in connivance, he said.
The bank officials are鈥攅x-principal officer of the bank鈥檚 Asadganj Branch Mostak Ahmed, ex-DGM of Ctg central region Md Abul Hossain Talukder, ex-GM of the Bank鈥檚 head office Md Obayed Ullah Al Masud, ex-GM of Sylhet circle Md Shams Ul Islam and ex-DGM Tajrina Ferdousi, ex-GM of head office Md Mofazzal Hossain and Bank鈥檚 ex-MD and CEO Syed Abdul Hamid.
Businessmen who were implicated in the case are loan receiver Md Mizanur Rahman, proprietor of M/S Mizan Trading at Katunganj, and guarantors in favor of loan receiver and directors of the Jasmir Vegetable Oil Ltd, a sister concern of the Nurjahan Group, Zahir Ahmed, Tipu Sultan and Farhad Monowar.
According to the case statement, ACC in its investigation revealed that Agrani Bank鈥檚 Asadganj Branch had opened a Letter of Credit valuing Tk 126.11 crore and 52 thousands in favour of M/S Mizan Traders to import chickpeas and wheat on the basis of recommendations of five officials of the Bank鈥檚 head office although the actual loan receiver was not a trusted client and not fulfilled required pre-conditions of getting the loan against foreign LC.
The businessmen were accused in the case as they were also signatory of the loan sanction letter as guarantor.
The bank finally disbursed Tk 51 crore out of entire LC value Tk 126.11 crore and 52 thousand and as the loan amount has not been paid within due time, the actual loan amount has now stood at around Tk 190 crore with interest.
The commission brought the allegation against the accused persons under Sections 409 and 109 of the Bangladesh Penal Code and Section 5(2) of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1947.
