The Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) yesterday finally submitted the charge sheet against Rana plaza owner Sohel Rana and 17 others in a case filed for violating the building code when constructing Rana Plaza, which collapsed on April 24 last year killing 1,135 workers.
ACC Deputy Director SM Mofidul Islam, also the investigation officer of the case, submitted the charge sheet to the Chief Judicial Magistrate Court of Dhaka.
After pressing the charges, the IO also applied to the court to issue arrest warrants against the 12 fugitive accused in the case. The IO mentioned 18 prosecution witnesses.
Earlier, the ACC did not include Sohel Rana’s name in the case as the building was owned by his father and his was not found in any of the documents.
On June 15, the ACC filed a case against 17 people including the parents of Sohel Rana, the owner of the Rana Plaza building.
On Tuesday, however, the ACC included Sohel’s name in the case as they found evidence of his involvement in the building code violations.
The anti-graft watchdog also approved the charge sheet on Tuesday.
Sohel Rana and five other accused in the case, who were earlier shown as arrested, are now in jail while the remaining accused are on the run.
The charge sheet includes Savar Mayor Mohammad Refatullah, Associate Professor of Khulna University Abdur Razzak, who was the architect of the building; former chief executive officer of Savar municipality Uttam Kumar Roy, Mohamamd Ali Khan, a ward commissioner of Savar and Rana’s parents Abdul Khalek and Morzina Begum, among the accused.
According to the charge sheet, the local Savar municipality initially approved a six-storey building and later it permitted the owner to extend into a 10-storeyed one.
The municipality has no authority to approve beyond six-storeys.
According to the case statement, the building authorities obtained permission for a six-storey building but later they added three more floors.
The Savar municipalty authorities, including their engineers, gave the approval for the illegal construction, it says, adding that they also approved the setting up of garment factories on the top six floors, even though the nine-storey building was supposed to be a shopping complex.
On April 24 last year, Rana Plaza, which housed five garment factories, a shopping complex and a branch of Brac Bank, collapsed.
The death toll from the deadliest building collapse stood at 1,135 while 2,438 people were rescued alive from under the rubble.