Bangladesh former PM's political secretary jailed for 3 years

Dhaka, May 21 (UNI) Bangladesh's immediate former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia's political secretary Harris Chowdhury was jailed for three years by a special court in a graft case today.

This is the first ever judgment by the special court in a bigwig corruption case under the caretaker government of Chief Advisor Fakhruddin Ahmed engaged in the war on corruption.

Dozens of former ministers and members of Parliament, now in jail, are also facing charges of corruption.

The special court, after examining the records and evidence of the prosecution's witnesses, found Harris Chowdhury, who was tried in absentia, guilty and pronounced the sentence.

Judge M Ashraf Hossain of the special court, set up at the national Parliament building complex for trying big shot corrupts, disposed of the first graft case after it started functioning on May 6.

The court took six working days in disposing of the graft case.

Since Harris Chowdhury is on the run, the sentence will be effective after his arrest or his surrender before the court.

Anti-Corruption Commission(ACC) Deputy Director Abu Sayeed filed the case on April 5 accusing Harris of not submitting wealth statement to the Commission within the stimulated time.

On February 18, the ACC asked Harris Chowdhury to submit his statement of wealth within 72 hours. But neither Harris nor any of his representatives complied with the instruction of the ACC which is an offence punishable under the law.

The country's military backed caretaker government assuming power on January 12 started campaigning against corruption and rounded up dozens of former ministers and members of Parliament who belong to former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia's government (2001-2006) and her predecessor former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's government (1996-2001).

The fight against corruption is also designed to clean up the country's power politics marked by nepotism and abuse of powers by politicians.

Under the Bangladesh constitution, if one is convicted for at least two years for moral turpitude, he/she will not be eligible to contest in Parliamentary election.

However, the convicts will have the right to go to higher court to appeal against the judgement of the special court.

UNI