A Dhaka court has issued warrants against former chief justice SK Sinha and 10 others on charges of embezzlement and money laundering.
On Sunday (Jan 5), the court of Senior Special Judge KM Imrul Kayes accepted the charge sheet, which was filed by the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) on Dec 9.
In July 2019, the graft watchdog filed the case over a loan scam involving the-then Farmers Bank (now Padma Bank) and laundering Tk 40 million.
The others accused are KM Shamim, former managing director of Farmers Bank, former chairman of audit committee, former senior executive vice president and head of credit Gazi Salauddin, first vice presidents Swapon Kumar Ray and Shafiuddin Askary, vice president Md Lutful Haque, Tangail residents Md Shahjahan, Niranjan Chandra Saha, Ranjit Chandra Saha and his wife Shanti Ray.
The ACC also pressed charges against the bank's senior vice president and branch manager Md Ziauddin Ahmed, but his name was dropped as he died.
The ACC found that both Niranjan Chandra Saha and M Shahjahan deposited Tk 20 million each into Sinha’s personal account in Sonali Bank, transferred from their accounts with the Farmers Bank’s Gulshan Branch, by separate pay orders in 2016.
The duo had collected the money through a loan from the same bank, which was processed illegally, and without following due process with the help of the accused bank officials.
Ranajit was allegedly a personal secretary to Sinha, and Ranajit and Shahjahan are childhood friends, the ACC found during its investigation.
The accused committed a scheduled offence under the Money Laundering Prevention Act, 2012, according to the case documents.
The ACC launched an inquiry on Apr 25, 2018, following up on a complaint from an unknown source, who said Tk 40 million had been deposited in the bank account of former chief justice Sinha from two accounts of Farmers Bank.
The anti-graft watchdog interrogated Shahjahan and Niranjan, who said they had transferred the money to Sinha as part of the payment for a six-storey building in Uttara, which he had sold to Tangail resident Shati Ray in 2016, their lawyers told reporters in May 2018.
The ACC launched the investigation against Sinha four and half months after he stepped down as the chief justice on Nov 10, 2017 amid controversies over the 16th constitutional amendment.