The New Nation - Internet Edition

Our Correspondent, Chittagong

The Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) here on Wednesday recorded 15 cases accusing 24 persons including seven engineers of Chittagong Development Authority (CDA) of public funds plundering.

Deputy Assistant Director of the ACC in Chittagong Shamsuddin Ahmed filed the cases with Kotwali police station after primary investigation.

The accused are Superintendent Engineer Iqbal Hossain Majumder, Executive Engineer and Project Director of 'Oxygen-Kaptai' link road Kazi Hassan Bin Shams, Assistant Engineer Nurul Amin Bhuiyan, Assistant Engineer Mohammad Elias, Assistant Engineer Sayed Golam Sorwar, Sub Assistant Engineer Mohammad Jahangir Alam and Sub Assistant Engineer Mohammad Hamidul Haque. Other accused are contractors.

According to the anti-graft watchdog, the CDA started its construction work on a 6-kilometer link road of Oxygen-Kuwaish on Kaptai road at a cost of Taka 50 million through 15 tenders in November 2001.

The project was scheduled to complete by June 2007. During the period, CDA drew all the allocation but 45 percent of the works were yet to be completed. Moreover, the ACC also found many irregularities in the construction works.

ACC official Obadilluah quoting the FIR (first information report) said that the accused had eaten up over Taka 7.9 million from the project.