Over 500 passports have gone missing from the Bangladesh High Commission in Malaysia.
“We are investigating the matter and expect to get a report by next week,” Bangladesh High Commissioner to Malaysia AKM Atiqur Rahman told the Dhaka Tribune.
After getting the report, the mission will inform the foreign ministry and take action in line with the report, he said.
He said the mission in early December received some passports which belonged to a series that should still be in the stock and that was when the mission discovered that about 500 passports were missing.
“After getting such passports, we started the investigation,” he said.
When asked if the mission authorities suspected Suchona Rani Halder, the custodian of the passports, the high commissioner replied that before getting the report he could not say anything.
However, the high commission through a mail asked Halder, a former Chhatra League leader, to report to the mission. The Dhaka Tribune obtained a copy of this email.
Halder, who was posted to the mission last October, went on leave for 10 days and was supposed to report to the mission by December 15 but she is yet to return.
When contacted, she told the Dhaka Tribune that she was sick and she would go back after completing her medical treatment.
About the missing passports, she said: “There is a racket working there and passports go missing frequently.”
When asked who were involved in the racket, she said: “Some officers and staff. I do not want to name any names.”
She said she wanted to be posted in the Australian mission but she did not get it and later she was posted to Malaysia.
“I don’t want to stay there [Malaysia] and I want posting in Kolkata or Delhi and I will meet HT Imam [political adviser to the prime minister],” she said.
