Falu's wife jailed for 8yrs for tax offences

A special court for dealing with graft cases yesterday sentenced Mahbuba Sultana, wife of political secretary to former prime minister Khaleda Zia, to eight years' imprisonment for committing two offences including evasion of taxes.
Mahbuba was awarded five years' rigorous imprisonment (RI) under section 166 of the Income Tax Ordinance 1984 for evading tax. She was also fined Tk 1 crore 58 lakh in default of which she has to suffer one more year of RI.
The court sentenced her to three years' simple jail under section 165 of the same ordinance for providing false information about her wealth and concealing information on property.
Judge Firoz Alam of the first Special Court at the MP Hostel at national parliament complex in the capital also directed the government to confiscate Mahbuba's wealth over Tk 6 crore 32 lakh which is equivalent to her income that she had concealed to National Board of Revenue (NBR).
NBR filed the case against Mahbuba on July 5. As the accused is absconding, the trial has been held in her absence. She did not even employ a lawyer to defend herself.
Nine witnesses including the plaintiff of the case testified for the prosecution.
After 35 working days of trial, the court had fixed yesterday for delivering judegment. Judge Firoz Alam read out the order portion of the judgment at the court yesterday afternoon.
The judge said the prosecution arguments and evidence were enough for him to find Mahbuba guilty under section 166 and 165 of the Income Tax Ordinance 1984.
Mahbuba will have to serve the two jail terms consecutively, he said, adding that as the accused concealed her income of over Tk 6 crore 32 lakh for evading tax, he decided to direct the government to confiscate the same amount of her wealth as per law, Judge Firoz said.
Mahbuba wanted to evade tax of Tk 1 crore 58 lakh and so she was fined the same amount of money, he said.
Prosecution lawyer Mahboob Ahmed was present at the court during delivery of the judgement.
Senior Special Judge Mohammad Azizul Haq of the Metropolitan Sessions Judge's Court, Dhaka on July 5 issued an arrest warrant against Falu's wife after Mohammad Masudur Rahman Masud, deputy tax commissioner of Tax Circle of NBR, filed the case.
In his order, the judge said the arrest warrant was issued against Mahbuba as the charges brought against her under sections 165/166 of the Income Tax Ordinance 1984 were found to be true.
In his complaint, Masud mentioned that Mahbuba had evaded a total of Tk 1,58,05,733 in income tax during fiscal years 2001 to 2006.
Mahbuba repeatedly gave false information to the NBR about her real income and expenditure and did not show her income tax return, the complainant said, adding that she did not submit statements about her salary received from ntv, even though she had drawn Tk 9,60,000 from the organisation.