Bangladesh News

One hundred and twenty-six staff of Titas Gas have promised to return to the government exchequer assets worth around Tk 400 crore that they had amassed illegally, sources in the task force against corruption said yesterday.

Of those who have given their word, 118 are employees including meter readers, line-men and CBA leaders, while the rest are officers.

To avoid being charged with corruption, they are ready to return assets including cash, factories, flats, plots of land and cars, added the sources.

Investigations have revealed how some of the meter readers of Titas Gas Transmission & Distribution Company Limited have become rich overnight, said a task force official seeking anonymity.

Working under the National Committee to Combat Serious Crime and Corruption, the task force has decided to send the dossiers on 10 employees and 13 officials to the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) for further investigation. The decision came after those employees and officials had denied the allegations brought against them after probe.

Of the 10 employees, meter reader Israfil Alam was a candidate in the 2001 election from Raninagar-Atrai while Azizul Haque Majumder, another meter-reader, sought to run for Noakhali-1 constituency in the cancelled ninth parliamentary election.

Immediately after their deployment at Titas Bhaban on October 31 last year, the army-led task force against corruption took a number of initiatives to identify the corrupt officials and employees of Titas.

As part of efforts, they asked all staffers to submit wealth statements.

On the basis of newspaper reports and their own investigation, the task force prepared a list of 250 employees and as many officials for questioning them about how they had accumulated wealth inconsistent with their legal sources of income.

So far 209 employees have been quizzed and of them, 118 were found to have amassed a fortune through corruption. As 10 others have denied allegations of corruption, the task force has decided to refer their cases to the ACC.

The sources said the rest were not involved in corruption.

Out of 250 officials on the list, 79 have been questioned and of them, eight have pledged to return their ill-earned assets to the exchequer.

Evidence of graft has been found against 13 other officials. Since they deny having done anything wrong, their files would be sent to the ACC.

Kamal Uddin, a former director general of Titas, told newsmen at Titas Bhaban yesterday that he would return Tk 2 crore to the state coffers.

Now a coordinator of a Petrobangla project, he observed that 80 percent officials and employees of Titas Gas Transmission and Distribution Company Ltd are corrupt.

Asked, he declined to name those involved in large-scale corruption, and said, “They are so powerful that my life would be at risk if I disclose their names.”

Altaf Hossain, an employee, owns a five-storey building on a 3.5-katha land in the capital, Tk 3.43 lakh and furniture worth around Tk 2.5 lakh.

A meter-reader named Makbul Hossain has 5.8 kathas of land and a house on a 2.75-katha plot in the city.

Another employee named Sirajul Islam Majumder has 3.5 kathas of land in Gazipur, 2.75 kathas of land at Khilkhet and 7.7 kathas of land at Demra in the city, gold ornaments worth Tk 4.20 lakh and a station wagon.

DRIVE AGAINST BILL DEFAULETRS
Meanwhile, the Titas Gas authorities in cooperation with the task force launch a drive today against factories and businesses defaulting on gas bills.

Task force sources said around 480 factories across Savar, Tongi, Joydevpur, Munshiganj and Dhaka owe Titas around Tk 1,200 crore in unpaid bills.

The authorities however would not consider any action against those who would promise to pay the outstanding bills within a week, added the sources.

Earlier, Titas had given the defaulters a month’s time as they pleaded that if any action is taken against them they would not be able to pay salaries to the workers ahead of Eid-ul-Azha.

The time expired more than a week ago, but no-one of them has bothered to pay the arrears.