Dr Sabrina placed on fresh two-day remand over COVID-19 test scam

Police have been granted two more days to grill Dr Sabrina Sharmeen Husain aka Sabrina A Chaudhury over her alleged ties to a COVID-19 test scam involving JKG Healthcare.

Dhaka Metropolitan Magistrate Masud-ur-Rahman passed the remand order on Friday after police sought another five days to interrogate her.

Police brought charges against JKG Health Care for providing false reports without testing the swabs collected from the people for COVID-19 tests.

In its latest application for remand, police said a suspect in the case gave a confessional statement under section 164 of the Code of Criminal Procedure implicating Sabrina.

Opposing the application, Sabrina's lawyer Obaidul Haque Bachchu said, “Police are claiming in its remand application that Sabrina is the chairman of JKG but that is not true. In order to be the chairman of an organisation, the name of the person must be mentioned in the company's memorandum and articles of association which is not the case here."

"Moreover, her name is not mentioned in the case statement. The other suspects have dragged her into this to save themselves."

Sabrina had previously been placed on a three-day remand following her arrest on Jul 12.

Media reports introduced Sabrina, also a cardiac surgeon of the National Institute of Cardiovascular Diseases, as the chairman of JKG Health Care, a position which she said she never held.

Despite her denials, detective police recovered three payment slips which showed that she had been drawing her monthly salary as the chairman of the organisation.

Sabrina, the wife of JKG Health Care CEO Ariful Chaudhury, was also suspended by the health ministry for violating service rules by holding the post of chairman in a private organisation without permission.