A Dhaka Court sentenced six former Oriental Bank officials yesterday to seven years of imprisonment, and a businessman to 10 years of imprisonment for loan forgery.
Judge Md Aminul Islam of Dhaka Special Judge Court passed the order in a case filed by the Anti-Corruption Commission for taking loans using a fake account.
The court also ordered that the government could recover the money from the absconded seven accused under section 386 of criminal procedure code.
The court also fined Tk1,428,572 to each of the accused.
The court examined nine prosecution witnesses including two joint directors of Bangladesh Bank before pronouncing the judgement.
The accused are Shah Md Harun, the Oriental Bank’s former senior vice-president; Abul Kashem Mahmud Ulllah, former senior assistant vice-president; Md Fazlur Rahman, former assistant vice-president; Mahmud Hossain, former senior executive vice-president; Kamrul Hossain, former executive vice-president; Imamul Haque, former deputy managing director of Oriental Bank principal branch; and Md Bakar Hossain, proprietor of M/S Bakar Hossain.
According to the case statement, the accused, Bakar, opened a bank account on April 16, 2005 at the Oriental Bank’s Islampur Branch in Dhaka and later used the name of a fake company to shift the account to the principal branch. He then used fake documents to take a loan worth Tk1 crore in two instalments on August 18 and 21, 2005, with the help of the accused bank officials.
On December 29, 2006, ACC Deputy Director SM Aktar Hamid Bhuiyan filed a case with Motijheel police station on this regard.
On June 6, 2013, the investigation officer of the case submitted the charge sheet accusing seven accused and mentioning nine prosecution witnesses.
The court framed charges against them on January 30, 2014.
