Grabbing land, stealing fertiliser his forte?

Abdul Kuddus and his brother Helal Uddin own 13 decimals of land in a plot jointly owned by several people under the Ghorasal municipality.

In early 2018, the two brothers received a proposal to sell their land at Tk 20 lakh. The market price for the land in Ghorasal's prime location was nearly Tk 1 crore back then. So they refused to sell.

In a couple of months, a group of men linked to Narsingdi Awami League leader Kamrul Ashraf Khan Poton filled the entire plot with earth and enclosed it with a boundary wall.

"Poton has turned the plot into a car parking facility and rented it out to an industry," Abdul Kuddus recently told The Daily Star.

Nearly fifty people from different areas of Palash upazila have brought allegations of land-grabbing against Poton. 

A former lawmaker from Narsingdi-2 constituency, Poton is the senior vice president of Palash upazila Awami League.

Asked whether he filed any case, Kuddus said he and his brother could not muster the courage to file a case against Poton who was evidently very powerful in his constituency.

Fearing backlash, nobody in Polash and Ghorasal speaks out against Poton or his family, allege locals and AL sources.

Poton's elder brother Anwarul Ashraf Khan Dilip is the incumbent lawmaker from the constituency. His nephew Al Mozahid Hossain Tushar is the mayor of Ghorasal municipality. 

Poton forced many people from Khudraban, Ghorashal municipality and Danga areas under Palash upazila to sell their land at giveaway prices, said victims, requesting anonymity. A few of them did not get any money, they added.

Hamayet Ullah from the municipality alleged that Poton took away eight decimals of land that he and his three brothers owned. 

"Before registration, Poton promised he'd give us Tk 24 lakh, but after registration, he offered us Tk 80,000, which we refused to accept," he told this newspaper over the phone.  

In 2018, forty men and women of the Hindu community from the Khudraban area lodged a joint complaint against Poton with the then deputy commissioner of Narsingdi for grabbing their lands.

The Daily Star has obtained a copy of the complaint. Dated January 7, 2018, it states: "…we, the undersigned, are from Ward no 5 of the Ghorasal municipality in Narsingdi district … We have been living in the Khudraban village for centuries. Activists working for lawmaker Kamrul Ashraf Khan Poton started erecting walls through our neighbourhood. When we tried to prevent them from grabbing our ancestral lands, we were told that the MP was in need of land. We were asked to leave our land for India."

Stressing that the undersigned have no intention to leave the country, the letter then begs the DC to protect their ancestral lands.   

Requesting anonymity, seven out of the 40 complainants told this correspondent that they were forced to sell their lands at low prices. At least two of them left the country, they added.

They said the market value of per decimal land in Khudraban village was Tk 75,000 - Tk 80,000 in 2018, but the land owners got only Tk 40,000 to Tk 45,000.

Kanon Bala, whose son was one of the 40 complainants, said Poton's men started erecting a brick wall along the boundary of their 100-decimal homestead weeks after her husband Bimal Chandra had died in December 2017. 

"We did not sell the land, nor did we take any money from Poton. Yet his men raised around a 50-yard-long wall along the boundary of our house," said Kanon. 

She could save the land because the government high-ups took notice of the incident, she added.

These correspondents saw marks of removed walls and pillars on Bimal's land during a visit there on April 4.

Contacted, Subhash Chandra Biswas, the then deputy commissioner of Narsingdi, said he recalls the complaint.

"After receiving such a complaint, I visited the area and before my visit, those who were erecting walls removed them," said Subhash who is now an additional secretary at the public administration ministry.

The Daily Star tried to contact Poton several times. Despite repeated attempts, he did not pick up the phone. This correspondent sent text messages to his mobile phone and Whatsapp number. He responded to neither.

MISAPPROPRIATION OF FERTILISER

Poton's interests go well beyond lands.

He is also the president of Bangladesh Fertiliser Association (BFA) and proprietor of M/S Poton Traders, a contracting firm.

His firm worked with the state-owned Bangladesh Chemical Industries Corporation (BCIC) for over a decade. Using his power as the BFA president, he won major contracts to transport imported fertiliser from Chattogram and Mongla ports to government warehouses, according to BCIC sources.

But things changed in December last year when two BCIC probe committees found out that Poton's firm was involved in a major fertiliser scam.

The BCIC filed a Tk 1,163 crore money suit against Poton and his firm, M/S Poton Traders, on charge of misappropriating 71,801 tonnes of imported chemical fertiliser.

Though the market price of the misappropriated fertiliser is Tk 582 crore, Poton and his firm should pay up double the price for the loss the BCIC incurred due to his failure to comply with the agreements, says the case statement.

The suit was filed with the 5th Joint District Judge's Court on March 20. Meanwhile, The Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) has also started an investigation over the scandal after a High Court bench issued a Suo Moto rule on January 5 and asked the ACC to submit a report after the probe.

The Daily Star has obtained copies of several letters that the BCIC sent to Poton Traders, urging the company to deliver the fertiliser.

In a letter dated October 31, 2022, the BCIC says that it signed 13 agreements with Poton Traders in the 2021-2022 fiscal year, which stipulated that from 13 ships Poton's firm would collect and transport 3.93 lakh tonnes of imported fertiliser from Chattogram and Mongla ports to different government warehouses across the country.

According to the letter, once cleared by the port authorities, the deadline for delivering bulk urea fertiliser was 50 days and for bagged urea 40 days. However, 3.21 lakh tonnes of fertiliser collected from six ships have so far been delivered in time. The deadline for delivering the last batch of the remaining 71, 916 tonnes ended on 15 May, 2022.

On October 2, 2022, Poton Traders wrote to the BCIC mentioning a timeline for delivering the remaining fertiliser. In its letter, Poton's firm claimed that the fertiliser it had in its warehouses amounted to 66,222 tonnes.

As Poton's firm failed to deliver the fertiliser again within the deadline it itself set, the BCIC formed two probe committees who submitted their reports on December 8. After visiting Poton's warehouses, the probe body found that there were only 1,307.9 tonnes of fertiliser, which were substandard and couldn't be provided to the farmers.

Contacted, BCIC Chairman Md Saidur Rahman Khan said they have already filed a money suit against Poton Traders and its owner over the misappropriation of fertiliser.

Replying to another query, he said they have already debarred Poton Traders from tendering for the BCIC and now the BCIC has no deal with him.

Another BCIC top official said they have provided the ACC with all the necessary documents for the investigation.

ACC Deputy Director Md Rafiquzzaman, who is leading a three-member team investigating the allegation against Poton Traders, said the investigation is going on.

"We hope to wrap up our investigation by the end of this month," he added.

Several attempts were made to reach out to Poton for his comments on this. When he did not pick up the calls or respond to text messages, The Daily Star called his personal secretary Kamrul Islam Kamal who assured that he would call back with Poton's comments but he did not.