Sylhet industrialist Ragib Ali, family flee to India to evade arrest over Hindu land grabbing

Industrialist Ragib Ali and his family have fled to India hours after a court issued arrest warrants for him, his son, daughter, son-in-law and two others in two cases over the grabbing of a Hindu land by forging documents in Sylhet.

Sylhet Additional Superintendent of Police Sugyan Chakma said officials at Zakiganj border confirmed on Friday that Ragib, his son Abdul Hye, Hye’s wife and two other members of the family crossed into Karimganj on Wednesday afternoon.

Sylhet’s Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Saifuzzaman Hero issued the arrest warrants earlier in that day.

“We could not arrest them as they left before police received a copy of the warrant,” Sugyan said.

The court ordered the arrest of Ragib and Hye in a case over forging land ministry document to grab temporality of Tarapur Tea Estate.

The tea estate’s Sebayet Pankaj Kumar Gupta, Ragib’s daughter Rujina Kadir, son-in-law Abdul Kadir, and relative Dewan Mostak Majid faced the arrest along with Ragib and Hye in the other case over fraud.

According to case details, a Hindu man donated the tea estate and all other properties to Sri Sri Radha Krishna Jeu in 1915.

Pankaj became the Sebayet of the estate in 1971 and later left for India, making Majid the Sebayet of the temporality.

Ragib Ali

Questions were raised over a Muslim becoming a Sebayet of a Hindu temporality. An investigation was launched later.

The investigator found that Majid had forged a land ministry official’s signature to lease the estate to Hye for 99 years.

Ragib sold the estate dividing it into 337 plots.

An annual publication, British Bangladeshi Who's Who, describes North South University Trust’s Founder Life Member Ragib as a philanthropist.

The UK-Bangladeshi businessman is also associated with bank, stock exchanges, insurance companies, and many other business houses, the publication says.

According to the publication, he is also the managing director of Kohinoor Industries Ltd and has served as chairman of South-East Bank Limited.