Bacchu gets warning

Anti-Corruption Commission will take legal action against former BASIC Bank chairman Sheikh Abdul Hye Bacchu if he failed to show up on May 30 to be quizzed over Tk 4,500 crore loan scam.

The ACC made the decision as Bacchu skipped quizzing twice, including yesterday.

“In a letter, we've asked him to appear on May 30. We also mentioned that if he did not show up on that day, we will take legal action,” said an ACC deputy director wishing to be unnamed.

“We'll have to arrest him if he does not come,” the official said adding that Bacchu was trying to delay the ongoing enquiry. 

Bacchu yesterday sent a letter to the ACC asking for two months' time citing illness.

On May 7, he skipped ACC quizzing citing the same.

Bacchu on that day also sought two months but the ACC gave him a week.

A Bangladesh Bank enquiry found that about Tk 4,500 crore was siphoned out of the state-run BASIC Bank between 2010 and 2013.

On July 14, 2014, the central bank sent a report on the scam to the ACC, detailing how people embezzled money from the bank through dubious accounts.

The BB found that Bacchu illegally influenced the activities of the bank, leaving the once-sound institution in a bad state.

In 2015, the ACC filed 56 cases but Bacchu was not accused in any of them.

On August 18 last year, a three-member Supreme Court bench expressed discontent at the ACC for not naming Bacchu and the former board members of the bank.

The ACC summoned the former chairman and 10 ex-directors for quizzing three months later.

The ACC had earlier quizzed Bacchu on four occasions, the first on December 4. He asked for a month's time on December 17 last year but the commission refused.