Rented barge allegedly cut up in BNP leader’s dockyard

The dockyard owner’s son, a former Chhatra Dal leader, is named as suspect in the case

A barge has been allegedly cut up at a dockyard by a man posing as its owner.

The barge’s original owner, Rakesh Sharma, lodged the case at Sonargaon Police Station on Monday, alleging that the vessel was dismantled without his permission.

He named seven suspects, including: Md Zafar, 42, Shahadat Hossain, 35, “Iqbal”, 42, Nazrul Islam, 47, Emdadul Haque, “Jafar”, and “Hossain”, 35.

Police said Shahadat is a former vice-president of the district Chhatra Dal.

He is also the son of Rafiqul Islam, vice-president of the Sonargaon BNP unit and owner of the HB Harun & Brothers Meghna Shipyard.

Sonargaon Police chief Rashedul Islam said Nazrul, the fourth suspect, was arrested on Tuesday.

According to the case, Zafar had regularly hired the vessel named Malek Shah Kutubdi for transporting goods.

On Nov 1, he signed a one-month contract for Tk 720,000 and moved the vessel from Chattogram to the HB Harun & Brothers Meghna Shipyard in Narayanganj.

On Nov 23, Rakesh learned from a worker that the barge was being dismantled, and he visited the yard that night.

He claimed losses of around Tk 10.7 million due to the dismantling, alleging that the suspects intended to cut up and sell the vessel.

He told bdnews24.com that the suspects had prepared forged documents to facilitate the sale.

“I’ve obtained an agreement where Zafar posed as the buyer and Emdadul as the seller,” he said.

Shahadat, however, claimed they had only rented out the dockyard for the dismantling.

“We’ve been in the dockyard business for years and have never been involved in irregularities. They said the bottom of the vessel was damaged and needed cutting. Zafar also showed us papers posing as the owner. We didn’t verify those through BIWTA.”

“The cutting work was done by Nazrul’s men. Once we learned what was happening, we handed Nazrul over to police,” he said.

He alleged that they were being implicated “due to political rivalry”, despite having “no involvement” in dismantling the vessel.

Officer Rashedul said police were investigating the matter.