Dhaka, Apri 30: A Dhaka court on Wednesday ordered the seizure of homes and land owned by five members of the family of former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, including her sister Sheikh Rehana, son and daughters.
Dhaka Metropolitan Sessions Judge Zakir Hossain Galib issued the order following a petition filed by the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC). Among the seized assets is a house worth Tk4.98 crore in the capital’s Baridhara area owned by Hasina’s Saima Wazed Putul.
In Digholia, Khulna, 87.70 decimals of land worth Tk61.87 lakh are registered under the names of Sheikh Rehana, Saima Wazed Putul and Hasina’s son Sajeeb Wazed Joy. An additional 87.70 decimals of land in the same area, worth Tk41.24 lakh, are in the names of Rehana’s children, Radwan Mujib Siddiq Bobby and Azmina Siddiq Rupanti. Another plot of 19 decimals in Tungipara, Gopalganj, worth Tk 20.50 lakh, is registered in Rehana’s name.
The information was confirmed by ACC spokesperson Akhtarul Islam. Earlier, on April 29, the same court ordered the seizure of a flat in Gulshan worth Tk57 lakh owned by Putul. On March 11, the court ordered the seizure of Sudha Sadan, the residence in Dhanmondi registered under the names of Joy and Putul.
The court also ordered the seizure of homes and eight flats registered under the names of Sheikh Rehana, Radwan Mujib Siddiq Bobby and Tulip Rizwana Siddiq. The market value of these properties is estimated at Tk8.52 crore. On April 9, the court ordered the freezing of additional bank accounts holding Tk16.12 crore in the names of Hasina, Rehana, Joy, Putul and their associates.
In addition, 124 bank accounts held by Sheikh Hasina and her associates were frozen. Before that, on March 4, the court ordered the freezing of 14 bank accounts belonging to Saima Wazed Putul’s organisation, Shuchona Foundation. Not just the Awami League workers but also several analysts believe that the interim government led by Muhammad Yunus is “implementing every design” to malign Hasina and her family.
It may be recalled that Yunus and 13 others were indicted for allegedly embezzlement of over USD two million from his telecom company, Grameen Telecom. Bangladesh’s Anti-Corruption Agency had charged Yunus with misusing funds from the worker’s welfare fund at Grameen Telecom, one of the several companies he had founded.
Hasina’s house in the Gulshan area was also looted and vandalised, with no police case filed over the incident. Hasina has accused Yunus’s interim administration of backing mobs to attack Awami League followers. Significantly, Tulip Rizwana Siddiq, a British Bangladeshi politician and Member of Parliament of Labour Party from Hampstead and Highgate, had quit the post in January this year after she was named in the anti-corruption investigation. Sheikh Hasina has called Yunus an usurper and said that he does not have any constitutional basis or mandate of the people to run Bangladesh, assuming power under a “meticulous design” with money supplied from overseas, misleading ordinary people and students.
IANS