The Dhaka Metropolitan Senior Special Judge Court on Thursday issued arrest warrants against former Basic Bank chairman Sheikh Abdul Hye Bacchu and four of his family members in a case filed on charges of embezzlement and laundering of around Tk 95 crore.
Judge Mohammed Ash-Shams Joglul Hossain of the court passed the order against the five absconding accused after taking cognisance of a charge sheet against six people in the case.
The four family members are Bacchu鈥檚 wife Shirin Aktar, brother Sheikh Shahriar Panna, daughter Sheikh Rafa Hye and son Sheikh Sabid Hye Anik.
Bacchu is facing a travel ban and several warrants of arrest were earlier issued against him by different courts in Dhaka.
In its Thursday order, the court directed the officer-in-charge of Banani Police Station to submit a report by November 4 on the execution of the arrest warrants.
The other accused, Amin Ahmad, owner of Le Meridien Dhaka, is now on bail in the case filed by the Anti-Corruption Commission.
On May 27, ACC assistant director Mohammad Neyamul Ahsan Gazi, also the investigation officer of the case, submitted a charge sheet against the six people in the case.
According to the case filed by the ACC on October 2, 2023, Bacchu bought a 30.25 katha land for Tk 110 crore from Amin Ahmad, but two deeds showed that the value of the property was Tk 15.25 crore.
Amin allegedly assisted Bacchu in showing the price of the land lower than the market price. Bacchu later transferred the land to his wife Shirin and sons Rafa and Anik.
The case statement also reads that Bacchu tried to hide his illegal income while also understated the value of the land by Tk 94.75 crore in the registration, depriving the government of over Tk 8.52 crore in revenue.
Apart from this, on June 12, 2023, the ACC submitted charge sheets against Bacchu and 146 others in connection with 59 cases filed over the embezzlement of Tk 2,265 crore from Basic Bank.
ACC, however, did not implicate the then-board members, who were at the helm of the bank when the massive embezzlement took place between 2009 and 2013.
ACC findings showed that numerous officials, including the former chairman of the Basic Bank, owners of various companies, and others, abused their power for dishonest purposes to take out loans from the bank against mortgages that were fake, overvalued, or nonexistent.
Between 2009 and 2013, Tk 4,500 crore was swindled out of BASIC Bank, once a healthy public bank. Of the sum, over 95 per cent was sanctioned by the board of the state-run bank.
According to the ACC case statements, the accused took out a total of about Tk 2,265.68 crore from the Basic Bank in the guise of loans. Among the 147 accused, 46 are bank officials, including Bacchu and the bank鈥檚 company secretary, Shah Alam Bhuyain, while 101 are borrowers.聽
Bacchu and Shah Alam are accused in 58 of the 59 cases filed by ACC.
In 2015, ACC filed 56 cases in connection with the scam, but neither Bacchu nor any of the bank鈥檚 board members were named as accused, though multiple probes indicated their involvement. Later, three more cases were also filed over the loan scam.
In June 2023, a court in Dhaka issued a travel ban on Bacchu over the loan scam.
