7 ex-Oriental Bank officials jailed for life
ACC filed 34 cases against officials of the Bank in 2006 for swindling Tk 34cr
A Dhaka court yesterday sentenced seven former officials of erstwhile Oriental Bank, later renamed as ICB Islamic Bank Limited, to life-term imprisonment for embezzling Tk 1.7 crore. Judge Akhtaruzzaman of the Special Judges Court-5 passed the order and fined the convicts Tk 1.07crore. All the seven are currently absconding. The court ordered that the verdict be executed once the convicts are arrested. The court, in its order, also said that the fine be realised evenly from each of the convicts within 60 days. Otherwise, the court said, the fine should be realised from the convicts by auctioning their assets as per the rule 386-1 (B) of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC).
Those sentenced are Oriental Banks former deputy general manager Imamul Haque, former senior vice president Shah Mohammad Harun, senior assistant vice president Abul Kashem Mahmudullah, assistant vice-president Fazlur Rahman, executive officer and vice-president Tariqul Alam, senior executive vice-president Mahmud Hossain, and executive vice president Qamrul Islam. According to the case documents, the convicts allowed one Qamrul Ahmed, who introduced himself as the owner of M/s Tanveer Agency, to open an account at the banks headquarters on July 27, 2005.
On that very day, he applied for Tk one crore loan and got it approved. Later, investigations found that Ahmeds company did not exist. Anti Corruption Commission Deputy Director Jahangir Alam filed a case against the seven officials, in this connection, on December 29, 2006, with Motijheel Police Station. The investigation officer of the case, Shekh Fayaiz Alam, submitted the chargesheet in the case on December 31, 2012. The court framed charge in the case on June 29 last year.
Earlier, on March 20, 2015, the ACC had approved a chargesheet in a case filed against another five people, including four former bank officials, for allegedly swindling out over Tk 7.5 crore from Oriental Bank.
The accused are Oriental Banks former senior assistant vice president M Manzurul Alim, former assistant vice president Tariqul Alam, former senior assistant vice president Mushtaque Ahmad, former assistant executive officer Saiful Aziz Pavel, and Khairul Anam, a resident of Comilla.
In April 2014, the ACC filed a case against the five. According to the ACC investigation, the accused bank officials disbursed loans against fake documents of a private company, M/S Orbit International, during 2005-2006 and the bank officials in collusion with Khairul Anam embezzled more than Tk 7.5 crore.
In total, the ACC filed 34 cases against the officials of the Oriental Bank in 2006 on charges of swindling around Tk 34 crore from the bank.
In 2006, Bangladesh Bank dissolved Orientals Board of Directors after detecting massive irregularities, and converted it to ICB Islamic Bank.
The ICB Islamic Bank later decided to refund cash to 93 percent of the depositors of the erstwhile Oriental Bank.
The remaining 7 percent of the depositors were supposed to be paid as per the reconstructed scheme for repayment approved by Bangladesh Bank.
BB has extended the deadline for refunding all the affected depositors fund of Oriental by May 2018.
