Former minister Latif Siddiqui lands in jail

A Bogura court on Thursday sent former textiles and jute minister Abdul Latif Siddiqui to jail after rejecting his bail plea in a corruption case filed by Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC).

Bogura district and senior special judge Naresh Chandra Sarkar passed the order when Latif Siddiqui appeared before the court and sought bail, reports UNB.

Earlier on 18 February, assistant director Aminul Islam of ACC submitted a charge sheet against him in the corruption case.

According to the case statement, Latif Siddiqui sold 2.38 acres of land of Bangladesh Jute Mill Corporation at Dariapur village in Adamdighi upazila to Begum Jahanara without any tenders for just Tk 2.3 million (Tk 23 lakh), which was just over a third of its market value, said to have been Tk 6.4 million (Tk 64 lakh) at the time.

Later, a corruption case was filed with Adamdighi police station accusing Siddiqui and Jahanara.

Siddiqui's offense was to sell the government-owned land and incurring a loss of Tk 4.07 million (Tk 40.70 lakh) (the difference between the selling price and its market value) to the public exchequer.