Moudud to be questioned at jail gate

BNP Standing Committee member Moudud Ahmed will be questioned at the jail gate within three working days on charges of embezzlement and illegal occupation of his current residence.

Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Ali Masud gave the order after a hearing on Monday.

Anti Corruption Commission filed the case (ACC) with Gulshan Police on Dec 17.

ACC Deputy Director Harunur Rashid pleaded for permission to interrogate the BNP leader on Thursday.

Moudud Ahmed was brought before the court from Kashimpur Jail for the hearing on Monday.

The accused told the court that he was sick and that there was no need to bring him from prison in this condition.

"The ACC can question me under its own laws, there are no legal barriers," said Moudud.

The case against Moudud involves his occupying a home from 1978 by misusing his powers.

Plaintiff Harunur Rashid said Moudud's Gulshan home originally belongs to Md Ehsan, a Pakistani national.

Ehsan received the rights over the house from the then Dacca Improvement Trust (DIT) in 1960.

Ehsan's Australian wife Inje Mariah was added as another owner in the house's documents in 1965.

The owners left Bangladesh in 1971, after the War for Independence broke out and in 1972 the property was listed as abandoned after the couple did not return.

Moudud Ahmed has been living in the house since 1973, said the ACC official.

ACC has accused Moudud and his brother Monjur Ahmed in their case.

"Moudud Ahmed bought the property in 1980. Therefore there is no case of illegal occupation here. He also did not misuse his power to attain the property," said defence counsel Mahbub Uddin Khokon.

He opposed the plea to question the BNP leader at the Jail gate and requested for bail.

ACC lawyer Mosharraf Hossain Kajal said the Gulshan home is listed as abandoned in the gazette published in 1972. It is still state property.

"Moudud used his power to get the property on his name and showed his brother Monjur Ahmed in the sale contract."

The judge, after the hearing, rejected the bail plea and ordered Moudud Ahmed to be questioned at the prison gate within three working days.