A Chittagong court on Sunday issued arrest warrants against eight, including Yusuf Ali Mirdha, suspended general manager of Bangladesh Railway East Zone, and two other officials in recruitment scam cases. The cases were filed on April 10.
Chittagong Metropolitan Senior Special Judge SM Mujibur Rahman passed the order after taking the charges into cognisance.
The charges were corruption in the recruitment process for the posts of fuel checker and assistant chemist. Mohammed Fuad, bench assistant of the court, said the court had fixed November 21 for further hearing.
The same court on October 6 issued arrest warrants against suspended General Manager Mridha and four others in another related case.
Social welfare officers Golam Kibria and Hafizur Rahman and Mridha were suspended after the scam surfaced.
Apart from them, arrest warrants were also issued against Ganesh Chandra Shil, Sultana Begum, Jahirul Islam, Abul Kashem, and Anisur Rahman - all allegedly illegally recruited.
Of the three cases, charge sheets of two cases were submitted before the court of Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Mashiur Rahman on August 18 while the court transferred the charge sheets to the Chittagong Metropolitan Senior Special Judge Court on September 5.
Sources at BR said the east zone issued seven advertisements in October and November of 2010 to fill up 3419 vacant posts in 38 categories.
Border Guard Bangladesh personnel seized Tk7m which was allegedly collected from the job seekers as bribe from a car of Omar Faruk, assistant personal secretary of the then Railway Minister Suranjit Sen Gupta on April 9, 2012.
Mridha, Kibria and Dhaka divisional commandant of Railway Nirapatta Bahini Enamul Haque were in the car. The driver of the car Ali Azam, who took the car to the BGB headquarters, has remained missing mysteriously since the incident.
The then rail minister Suranjit Sen Gupta resigned from his post after the incident. He suspended his APS prior to resigning from the post of minister.
