The Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) has filed a case against PK Haldar and 11 of his associates for swindling Tk44 crore from FAS Finance and Investment Limited, using the name of the non-existent company Dia Shipping Limited.
ACC Assistant Director Rakibul Hayat filed the case on Thursday.
The anti-graft watchdog’s Public Relations Office Deputy Director Muhammad Arif Sadeq confirmed the matter to Dhaka Tribune.
A total of 40 graft cases have been filed against PK Halder and his associates so far. The commission has prepared three probe reports and issued travel bans on 45 people said to be involved in the scams.
The other accused in the case are Shiv Prasad Banerjee, former managing director of Dia Shipping Limited, Director Papia Banerjee, MA Hafeez, former chairman of FAS Finance and Investment, Siddiqur Rahman, Vice Chairman Jahangir Alam, Director Arun Kumar Kundu, Anjan Kumar Roy, Mostain Billah, Ujjal Kumar Nandi, Satya Gopal Poddar and former managing director and chief executive officer of FAS Finance Russell Shahriar.
According to the case statements, on November 1, 2014, Shiv Prasad Banerjee applied for a loan of Tk44 crore for six years through Russell Shahriar for business expansion.
Shiv Prasad Banerjee showed 32 decimal land in Kaliakair of Gazipur as collateral against the loan while Russell submitted the loan proposal to the board for approval on December 17 of that year.
Later, at the 173rd board meeting, final approval was given for the disbursement of the loan, according to the commission report.
The commission reported that Haldar and his associates had assured no mortgage in the name of the Dia Shipping Limited, so there was no possibility of recovering the loan.
After the approval of the loan, it was disbursed in the favour of Dia Shipping Limited from December 29, 2014 to December 29, 2015, but the amount was directly transferred to various financial institutions created by PK Halder and his associates.
ACC said the findings of the Bangladesh Financial Intelligence Unit (BFIU) corroborated their report.
