Police have arrested Bidisha Siddique, the second wife of late former president and Jatiya Party founder chairman Hussain Muhammad Ershad, in a fraud case.
She was arrested from a restaurant in Gulshan at around 8:30pm on Tuesday. Gulshan police station Officer-in-Charge Daud Hossain confirmed the arrest.
He told Dhaka Tribune that a fraud case had been filed against Bidisha and that she had been sentenced to two years in prison in the case.
As an arrest warrant had been issued following the sentence, police arrested her from the restaurant, the OC said.
Two-year sentence in flat fraud case
Earlier, on May 20, a court sentenced Bidisha to two years’ rigorous imprisonment in a case filed over allegations of fraud involving the sale of a flat.
Dhaka Metropolitan Magistrate Jamshed Alam announced the verdict.
The court also fined her Tk10,000, with an additional one month in prison if she failed to pay the fine.
Case details
According to the case complaint, plaintiff Mosharraf Hossain is an importer and businessman of sanitary products in Mirpur-10.
In 2001, he contacted Bidisha to purchase a flat in Baridhara. Later, they agreed on a price of Tk80 lakh for a flat at President Park in the area.
The complaint said Bidisha called Mosharraf to her Rajanigandha office in Banani on July 10, 2001, and asked him to issue a Tk75 lakh pay order in the name of her nominated person and friend, Abdul Razzaq.
Mosharraf paid the money through Standard Chartered Bank’s Kawran Bazar branch. A baynanama was later executed between the two parties.
Under the agreement, the flat was supposed to be registered after obtaining approval from the Rajdhani Unnayan Kartripakkha and paying the remaining amount. It was also supposed to be handed over by July 10, 2002.
However, the complaint said the flat was not handed over even after a considerable period.
When Mosharraf pressured Bidisha to hand over the flat, she allegedly assured him that she would return the money.
On February 9, 2005, she allegedly issued a cheque for Tk72 lakh. However, the cheque was dishonoured when it was deposited due to insufficient funds in the account.
The plaintiff alleged that Bidisha subsequently delayed the matter on various pretexts and did not return the money or hand over the flat.
He also alleged that he was threatened with death by hired criminals when he demanded either the money or the flat.
According to the case, Bidisha told him that he would have to wait until money was recovered from former president Ershad.