ACC imposes travel ban on 4 Petrobangla officials

FT ONLINE

Anti-Corruption Commission on Tuesday imposed travel ban on four Petrobangla officials for their alleged involvement in embezzlement of Tk 200 crore through selling 1.16 lakh tonnes of coal from Barapukuria Coal Fired Power Plant.

The officials are recently removed BCMCL managing director Habib Uddin Ahmed, coal mine secretary Abul Kashem Prodhania and suspended general manager for mine operation Nuruzzaman Chowdhury and deputy general manager of store AKM Khademul Islam.

ACC deputy director M Samsul Alam sent a letter to the immigration department asking it to impose a ban on travel by the officials through all the air, land and river ports of the country, said ACC secretary M Shamsul Arifeen.

He said they suspected that the officials were directly involved in the anomaly as corruption, not negligence, was what took place.

ACC on Monday kicked off the inquiry a day after the power plant was shut for an indefinite period due to mysterious disappearance of coal from a yard.

On Monday, prime minister Sheikh Hasina also ordered bringing to book as quickly as possible the people responsible for the disappearance of coal from the coal mine field in Dinajpur.

Thursday night, following a departmental probe, Petrobangla, which runs the BCMCL, removed Habib Uddin, Abul Kashem and suspended Nuruzzaman and Khademul Islam.
Barapukuria Coal Fired Power Plant buys coal at the price of Tk 11,000 per tonne but brick kiln owners buy coal at Tk 17,000 per tonne.

The sudden disappearance of coal came to the notice of a team of Power Development Board officials visiting the power plant.

The BDB officials found only 6,000 tonnes of coal in the stocks at the yard which could run the plant for barely two or three days.

According to the PDB, the power plant requires about 4,500 tonnes of coal per day when all the three units are in operation.