A Dhaka court yesterday placed three officials of state-owned Agrani Bank on remand for three days in a case filed for swindling Tk 94.8 crore from the bank. The officials are – Acting Managing Director of the
bank Mizanur Rahman Khan, Deputy General Manager Md Akhterul Alam and Assistant General Manager Md Shafiullah. Dhaka Metropolitan Magistrate M Nur Nabi passed the order in response to a petition filed by Deputy Director of the Anti Corruption Commission (ACC) Benzir Ahmed.
The ACC official produced the trio earlier before the court and sought 7-day remand for each, but the court granted remand for three days.
Earlier on June 30, the ACC arrested Mizanur barely six hours after he took charge. Syed Abdul Hamid, managing director of the bank, was removed as per the direction of Bangladesh Bank (BB) for violating rules in sanctioning loans amounting to Tk. 792 crore.
Later, Deputy Managing Director Mizanur Rahman was made the acting managing director of the bank. But he was arrested just six hours later.
Two other Agrani Bank officials — Deputy General Manager Akhtarul Alam and Assistant General Manager Shafillulah — were also arrested by the ACC.
In February, the central bank served a show-cause notice on Hamid on nine counts of irregularities. The Bank Companies Act provides for serving a notice before removing a bank official.
The BB had decided to remove the Agrani Bank MD over suspected loan disbursement to several businesses, including Moon Group. Agrani Bank had allegedly disbursed loans amounting to Tk. 792 crore to a project of Moon Group three and a half years ago, even though no “valid documents” were submitted by the group over the loan.
Later, the group defaulted on repayment of the loans. Agrani Bank tried to recover the money by auctioning assets, including the Moon Group’s building and land, mortgaged with the bank, but a court injunction stood in its way.
The ministry, at that time, took no action and Khan was made the deputy managing director from general manager, while Managing Director Hamid got his job extended thrice.