ACC to file case against mayor Sarwar this month

Majibor Rahman Sarwar

The Anti Corruption Commission (ACC) is preparing to file a case against detained Barisal City Corporation (BCC) mayor Majibor Rahman Sarwar for hiding information about his assets in his statement and possessing wealth beyond known sources of income.
The ACC is now serutinising the proposed FIR (first information report) submitted by an ACC task force. The case will be filed this month, according to ACC sources.
Sarwar, arrested on May 29 for alleged corruption, submitted his wealth statement to the ACC on July 27 through a representative, which said he and his family possess wealth worth Tk 9 crore.
The ACC sources said investigation revealed that Sarwar and his family possess wealth and property worth about Tk 20 core, earned in last few years without any legal source of income.
The assets include 7 flats, lands, shops and Tk 1.12 core fixed deposits with banks in his name and names of his wife and daughters, task force sources said.
Most of the assets were earned after he was elected mayor of Barisal City Corporation in March 2003, they said.
They said Sarwar's Tk 8 crore assets out of Tk 9 crore mentioned in his wealth statement was also earned without any known legal source of income.
The task force also detected Tk 4 crore undisclosed property owned by the mayor. These include 'illegal' constructions on government lands and money collected from those as rent, the sources added.
ACC sources said the task force submitted the proposed (FIR) on September 18. ACC legal experts are reviewing the report and a regular case will be filed with police within this month.
Maj. Abdul Hye, head of the ACC task force No.4, told journalists earlier that only Tk one crore assets out of Tk 9 crore mentioned in the mayor's wealth statement was sound legal.
According to the wealth statement, Sarwar has one flat in Gulshan in Dhaka, three flats and a five katha land in Banani, two shops in Banani and Basundhara in Dhaka, 30 decimal land in Savar, 10 acres of land in Barisal, 3 luxurious cars, one revolver, 3 rifles and Tk 40 lakh in 10 bank accounts in his name.
His wife Nasima Sarwar has three flats in Dhaka, 70 decimal land, 30 tolas of gold ornaments and Tk 15 lakh in two bank accounts.
Fixed deposits of Tk.53.8 lakh were found in names of their two minor daughters, sources added.
The wealth statement submitted on behalf of Sarwar and his family showed rent from flats as their source of income but did not describe the legal source of money with which the flats were purchased.
However, the wealth statement said that according to Section 19/B of income tax laws, declaration of source of income was not needed while submitting income tax returns.
Official sources said Sarwar got Tk 42,000 as salary, house rent and allowances as mayor of Barisal City Corporation.
It was gathered that Sarwar earned around Tk 15,000 per month from a bidi factory. But at several public meetings earlier he claimed that he did not take a single penny from that factory for the sake of welfare of workers.
He also has a construction firm named 'Comfort Trading and Builders', but no business was found in its name in last 3-4 years, the sources said.
The ACC sources said, scrutiny of documents and statements submitted by land registration offices, banks and other institutions, found wide differences between Sarwar's submitted wealth statement and real value of his assets and legal sources of income.
Besides field investigation, the task force also interrogated Sarwar about his wealth and sources of income. He was interrogated Barisal Kotwali police station while on rwmand.
Investigations revealed that BCC mayor Sarwar invested a huge amount of capital in different firms in different names, which would exceed Tk 4 crore. He got financial benefit regularly from those investments, the sources said.