Ispahani Group boss Mirza Ali Behrouze Ispahani passes away

The chairman of one of Bangladesh's oldest business conglomerates, MM Ispahani Group, has passed away. He was 66.

Mirza Ali Behrouze Ispahani breathed his last early on Monday morning while being treated at Apollo Hospital in Dhaka, said a statement issued by the Ispahani Group.

Ispahani Group is involved in tea, textiles, jute, property, poultry and shipping.

Behrouze was managing director of International Publications Limited, which owns the financial national daily Financial Express.

The Ispahani Group statement said Behrouze Ispahani was buried in the capital's Hossaini Dalan graveyard at 7:45pm.

Behrouze, a descendant of the Ispahani family, which has been involved in business in South Asia since 1820, was a member of the Dhaka Stock Exchange and sat on the Board of Midas Financing Ltd.

Educated in the US, Behrouze had also been serving as chairman of the Islamia Eye Institute and Hospital and Ispahani Public School and College.

He was also a member of the Trustee Board of Independent University, Bangladesh.

The Ispahani Group, well known for its tea across the Indian sub-continent, employs around 10,000 people.

In 1820, Haji Mohammad Hashem Ispahani moved to India's Mumbai from Persia's Isfahan.

His grandson Mirza Mehedi transferred their business headquarters to Madras and opened the Dhaka branch office in 1888.

Mehedi's sons Mirza Ahmed, Mirza Abol Hassan and Mirza Mahmood established a private limited company, MM Ispahani Limited, in 1934.

Hassan later joined politics and served as Pakistan's industry and commerce minister in the 1950s from the Muslim League.

In 1947, the Ispahanis moved their corporate headquarters to Chittagong with Mirza Ahmed's son Mirza Mehdy at the helm of affairs.

It was then when the group made a huge investment in tea plantations in Sylhet. The group also was the top jute exporter in the Indian Sub-continent.

Behrouze was the son of Mirza Mehdy.