13 held in Rooppur housing project scam case

The Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) arrested 13 people today for their alleged involvement in a corruption case in the Rooppur Nuclear Power Plant (RNPP) housing project in Pabna.

The ACC arrested the people from Dhaka’s Segunbagicha area. 

The arrestees are -- former Pabna PWD Executive Engineer Md Masudul Alam, Pabna Public Housing Division Deputy Assistant Engineer Md Jahidul Kabir, Deputy Divisional Engineers Md Shafiqul Islam, Ahmed Sazzad Khan, Mostafa Kamal, Estimator and Deputy Assistant Engineer Shumon Kumar Nandi, Assistant Engineers Md Tareque, Aminul Islam, Abu Syed, Rowshan Ali, Tahajjud Hossain, Majid and Sons owner Asif Hossain, and Sazin Construction Limited owner Md Shahadat Hossain.

The government earlier formed two probe committees -- one belonging to the PWD and the other to the Public Works Ministry to investigate purchase of furnishing articles and electronic gadgets with the skyrocketing prices to furnish apartments in multi-storey buildings at the RNPP.

The committees were formed on May 19, three days after a media reported on cost-related irregularities in the housing project called Green City of the RNPP project in Iswardi upazila of Pabna.

Following the incident, the PWD withdrew the housing projects in charge Masudul Alam on May 22. He is now attached to the PWD headquarters in Dhaka.

On May 20, the High Court sought enquiry reports from the housing and public works ministry on the alleged irregularities. The HC asked the Attorney General’s Office to collect the reports from the committees formed by the ministry and submit those to the court within a week of its reopening after the upcoming vacation. It means the reports would have to be submitted by June 23.

Later, Barrister  Sayedul Haque Suman, a lawyer of Supreme Court, later filed a writ petition with the High Court on the same day, seeking a judicial inquiry into the allegations of irregularities. 

According to reports in the media as well as on social media, the purchase prices of various items to furnish the project’s 966 apartments for the Russian engineers and others were abnormally higher than the market prices.

The reports claimed that each pillow was bought for Tk 5,957, and the cost of carrying it to an apartment was Tk 760. An electric stove cost Tk 7,747 and the carrying cost from the ground floor to the top one cost Tk 6,650.

The reports also said that the price of an electric iron was Tk 4,154 and the carrying cost Tk 2,945.

The reports sparked wide spread criticisms across the country. Masudur Alam, the project director, was also criticised on social media.