The High Court on Tuesday revoked its own order that earlier asked the Anti-Corruption Commission and the Criminal Investigation Department to investigate in four months the reported allegations of misappropriation of banks’ money and laundering of huge amount of money by various persons and entities, including S Alam Group.
The High Court, however, said that ACC, Bangladesh Bank, and Bangladesh Financial Intelligent Unit, CID is free to inquire into the irregularities, if there were any.
The bench of Justice Md Nazrul Islam Talukder and Justice Kazi Ebadoth Hossan pronounced a verdict after rejecting its own rule issued on suo motu on December 4, 2022, over the allegations.
The bench issued the suo motu after taking cognisance of four newspaper reports, including one of ¶¶Òõ¾«Æ·, on allegations of disbursement of the loans to S Alam Group and other companies by the three profit-making banks.
¶¶Òõ¾«Æ· published the report on November 30, 2022, under the headline ‘S Alam Group lifts Tk 30,000cr loans from IBBL alone’.
The report said that Chattogram-based S Alam Group has lifted a stupendous sum of money in loans — more than Tk 30,000 crore — from Islami Bank Bangladesh Limited that the business group controls. The amount was way beyond the group’s entitlement.
While the group was entitled to borrow a maximum of Tk 215 crore from the IBBL as per rules, the group, using its clout with the bank’s board and management, obtained the credit, most of which was awarded through various unethical mechanisms, according to a Bangladesh Bank audit report.
The group is also controlling First Security Islami Bank, Bangladesh Commerce Bank, Social Islami Bank, Union Bank, NRB Global Bank and Al-Arafah Islami Bank.
Following the High Court’s Tuesday’s order, the ACC and CID would not need to submit reports after holding the probe into the allegations, ACC lawyer Khurshid Alam Khan told reporters.
Khurshid said that Justice Md Nazrul Islam Talukder, senior member of the HC bench, scolded him when he opposed the rejection order.
Khurshid told the judge that the High Court had the authority to issue a suo motu rule against the government authorities for action after taking into cognisance of a reported ‘public wrong of grave nature’ as per the rule 10 of the Supreme Court of Bangladesh (High Court Division) Rules 1973.
Khurshid quoted the bench verdict as saying that the High Court Division was bound to follow the judgement delivered by the Appellate Division on February 5, 2024, on Saiful Alam’s petition, observing that the High Court should not have issued suo motu rule.
The court further observed that Supreme Court lawyer Syed Sayedul Haque Suman, the attention drawer of the suo motu, or the authorities of The Daily Star or even Bangladesh Bank could have taken initiative regarding laundering of money by Saiful Alam and his wife Farzana Parveen or other entities, to the foreign countries.
The Appellate Division in the February 5 verdict scrapped the High Court’s bench suo motu order for inquiring into the reported money laundering and offshore investment of Tk 11 thousand crore by S Alam Group chairman Mohammad Saiful Alam and his wife Farzana Parveen within two months.
A six-judge bench, chaired by chief justice Obaidul Hassan, however, observed that there would be no bar to the ACC and the Bangladesh Financial Intelligent Unit for inquiring into the allegations against the couple, if they feel so.
The Appellate Division rebuked the ACC for not holding inquiry into the allegations against the couple immediately after publication of a report carried out by The Daily Star on August 4, 2023, titled ‘S Alam’s Aladdin’s lamp’.
It scrapped the entire High Court ruling and directive issued in suo motu on August 6, 2023, after taking into cognisance the newspaper report which said that the couple made offshore investment of Tk 11 thousand crore without permission from the Bangladesh Bank and other authorities concerned.
Lawyers Ahsanul Karim and Sayed Ahmed Raza appeared for S Alam Group.
