ACC sends list of convicts to NCC

The Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) yesterday sent to the National Coordination Committee (NCC) on serious crimes and corruption a list of the people convicted of corruption in the lower courts.
The government had asked the commission to send the list on Monday last.
"The list was sent at noon today. It catalogues 100 cases involving 116 individuals," ACC Director General (Admin) Col Hanif Iqbal told UNB yesterday.
He said, "We've sent the list to the NCC. It's up to them if they want to send it to somewhere else," he said.
MEETING WITH LAND-MINISTRY OFFICIALS
Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) Chairman Hasan Mashhud Chowdhury yesterday said corruption would continue to haunt the land ministry and its departments if the existing land law is not reformed.
He said graft would not either come down until automation replaces the conventional method of dealing with land-related issues.
The ACC chair was talking to reporters after a view-exchange meeting with senior officials from the land ministry and its departments, held at the secretariat.
The meeting was the first of a series of view-exchange meetings the ACC plans with different ministries as part of its campaign against institutional corruption.
Mashhud said administrative problems, prevailing atmosphere and shortages of manpower were the main reasons for corruption in the land ministry.
He said it would not be possible to fight institutional corruption without involving the people who make the decisions.
The objective of the meeting was to identify the causes of corruption, not to find out the individuals involved in it, he said.
On why the commission does not focus on the departments where corruption is perceived to be rampant, the ACC chair said if they begin dealing with corruption in all departments at the same time, results would not be good.
On whether it is possible to root out corruption by only talking to officers leaving the low-tier staff aside, he said they will take measures to exchange views with employees across the board.
Earlier at the meeting, ACC commissioner Manjur Mannan said according to a study about 1.4 million land-related cases are pending with the courts, affecting 120 million people.
"I'm one of them," he said.