We now come to know that out of 18 government houses on prime locations at Gulshan, Dhanmondi and Banani, at least a dozen were allegedly bought off at throwaway prices by high profile people like the two sons and relatives of former prime minister including a host of ministers and lawmakers of the former government. Rajuk sold these costly real estate property through auction. It is a legitimate question to ask as to why the auction was necessitated in the first place? The mystery is yet to be revealed. But the collusion between Rajuk and the purchasers can be gauged from the fact that the so-called highest bidders acquired the houses and property at an overall cost of Tk 65 crore while the market price was estimated at Tk 300 crore. Much of the property was bought by concealing the names of the real beneficiaries using front men and there have been also complaints lodged by dispossessed original owners in some cases. The matter must be gone into in greater detail.

We regard all this as state-sponsored looting of public wealth. There must be many more instances of such reckless expropriation of national property just waiting to be unearthed. We urge the caretaker government to roll its search engine on to find out the fullest extent of the anti-people crime and ensure that deterrent punishment is meted out to not only the persons who committed it but also those who colluded with them. It is not enough to redesignate 32 Rajuk officials, including former chairman and the ex-chief engineer as officers on special duty. The ACC should probe them thoroughly, let alone pursue the cases of those already in jail.