Dispose of Babar’s illegal assets case in 30 days: HC

The High Court has directed the trial court to dispose of accused former State Home Minister Lutfuzzaman Babar's case of illegal acquisition of assets within a month while rejecting the defendant's court change application.

Justice Md Nazrul Islam Talukder and Justice Ahmed Sohel in a virtual court passed the order on Wednesday.

Deputy Attorney General AKM Amin Uddin (Manik) represented the state while Lawyer Parvez Hossain was in favour of the petitioner and Lawyer Khurshid Alam Khan for the Anti-Corruption Commission.

According to the statement and complaint, ACC Assistant Director Mirza Zahidul Alam filed a case at Ramna Police Station on January 13, 2008 against the defendant for providing confidential and false information about the acquisition of assets worth Tk7.6 crore.

Later, ACC Deputy Assistant Director Rupak Kumar Saha investigated and submitted a letter on July 16 of the same year. The case was heard at the Dhaka Special Judge's Court-7 last March.

Defendants told the court they would not testify, but took time from court to give a written statement. However, the defendants took time without giving a written statement on the three allotted dates.

The defendants applied for a change of court but the High Court dismissed the application outright as there was no compelling reason to do so, and gave a directive for the case to be disposed of within 30 days of receipt of the order.

The trial court was scheduled to testify on Wednesday, with the next date set for November 15.