Bangladesh court jails mother of collapsed Rana Plaza owner for six years

A Dhaka court has sentenced Morzina Begum, the mother of the owner of Rana Plaza that collapsed in 2013, to six years in jail for acquiring assets from unknown sources and concealing wealth information.

The court on Thursday also fined her Tk 20,000 and ordered confiscation one-third of a five-storey building she owns in Savar.

Morzina was present at the court when Judge KM Imrul Kaeys of Special Judge’s Court No. 6 of Dhaka delivered the verdict.

She was taken to jail after the sentencing.

The judge sentenced her to three years in jail for acquiring assets from unknown sources and three more years for hiding information about those.

More than 1,100 people were killed and around 100 others injured when the eight-storey building, Rana Plaza, at Savar collapsed in a heap on Apr 24, 2013. It housed several garment factories.

Sohel Rana. File Photo

The owner of the building, Sohel Rana, identified himself as a leader of Juba League, the ruling Awami League’s youth front. He was arrested after the disaster.

He is accused of different charges, including culpable homicide, in several cases. The Anti-Corruption Commission or ACC had also launched investigation into Rana and his family’s assets.

The same court sentenced Rana to three years in prison on Aug 29 last year for not submitting his wealth statement following the ACC’s call.

According to the dossier of the case against his mother Morzina, she showed assets of around Tk 48.4 million in the wealth statement she submitted on Nov 21, 2013.

The assets included one-third of two five-storey towers on Bazar Road in Savar and 40 percent of Rana Plaza.

The ACC found that she had concealed information about the source of over Tk 4.2 million used in constructing one of the buildings and started a case upon the finding at Ramna Police Station on Apr 12, 2015.