BTCL officials sued over allegations of abuse of power; CID ordered to investigate

A case has been filed with a Dhaka court against five individuals, including three officials of Bangladesh Telecommunications Company Limited (BTCL), on allegations of abusing official power by shutting down a private university's website domains, verbally abusing a university official, and issuing threats.

The case was filed yesterday (14 January) with the court of Dhaka Metropolitan Magistrate Md Hasan Shahadat by Md Tajul Islam, an adviser to the University of Skill Enrichment and Technology (USET).

After recording the plaintiff's statement, the court directed the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) to investigate the allegations and submit a report.

The information was confirmed today (15 January) at a press conference organised by the Court Reporters' Unity, where the plaintiff said the case had been filed yesterday and the court order was learned of the following day.

Those named as accused are Joyeeta Sen Rimpee, deputy general manager (Broadband-2) of the Moghbazar Telephone Exchange; Mostofa Al Mahmud, deputy general manager (Domain); Abir Kallayan Abedin, assistant manager (Domain) of the same exchange; Md Shah Alom Siraj, assistant secretary (Private University-2) of the Secondary and Higher Education Division under the Ministry of Education; and Md Rakibuzzaman Masud, administrative officer of the private university wing.

According to the case statement, USET, located in the Signboard area of Narayanganj, operates two official websites www.uset.ac.bd and www.uset.edu.bd. On 15 April 2025, the university authorities formally requested BTCL not to share the admin panel passwords of the domains with anyone.

However, on 17 November 2025, the university received a letter stating that objections had been raised regarding the domains. The letter asked USET to pay Tk23,000 as a hearing fee and submit all relevant documents by 30 November.

The plaintiff said although the university attempted to submit the required documents along with a pay order of Tk23,000 on 30 November, BTCL officials refused to accept them, citing that the payment deadline mentioned in the demand note had expired on 27 November.

Claiming a lack of neutrality and fearing denial of justice, USET subsequently filed a writ petition with the High Court seeking remedies and requesting directives to prevent the shutdown of its domains.

The case further says that on 15 December, Tajul Islam visited the office of Joyeeta Sen Rimpee to discuss the matter. During the meeting, she became aggressive and used offensive language, and threatened him with dire consequences, including barring him from the BTCL premises and shutting down the university's websites.

It is also alleged that she refused to receive the lawyer's certificate related to the High Court writ petition and instructed staff at the application receiving section not to accept any documents from the university.

Through his lawyer, Tajul Islam sent a legal notice to the accused on 18 December, citing threats, non-cooperation in official duties, and refusal to accept legal documents.

Despite this, on 11 January around 4pm, the two official domains of the university were shut down, causing irreparable damage to the institution, the case statement said.

The CID has been tasked with probing the allegations and submitting its findings to the court.