4 ex-Biman officials sent to jail in graft case

A Dhaka court today (24 November) sent four former officials and one current official of Biman Bangladesh Airlines to jail in connection with a Tk1,161 crore corruption case.

Dhaka Metropolitan Sessions Judge Md Zakir Hossain Galib passed the order after rejecting their bail petitions, ACC Lawyer Mir Ahmed Ali Salam told The Business Standard. 

Earlier in the day, the accused surrendered before the court and pleaded for bail.

The five accused are former principal engineer Shahid Uddin Mohammad Hanif, former engineer officer Md Zahid Hossain, former deputy chief engineer Md Shahjahan, principal system engineer (structure) Sharif Ruhul Quddus and former deputy chief engineer Md Shafikul Alam Siddique.

The court also issued arrest warrants against nine including Kevin John Steele, former managing director and CEO of Biman, and Ishrat Ahmed, former flight captain (operation) of Biman, as they were shown fugitives in the charge sheet.

Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) deputy director Jesmin Akter filed the case on 6 February 2023. Investigation officer and ACC deputy director Anwarul Haque later filed charge-sheet against 16 persons. 

According to the case documents, Biman Bangladesh in 2014 took two Boeing 777-200 ER aircrafts on lease from Egypt Air for five years. On February 2015, engine of one aircraft went down, making Biman to take an engine from Egypt Air on rent to keep the aircraft running. After one and a half years, another engine went down, making Biman again bring another engine from Egypt Air on rent.

After some time, one engine, which was brought on rent, went bad too, making Biman to send the defective engine to the US for repairing. In the meantime, Biman had to pay the rent to Egypt Air and repairing cost the US Company as well.

The state incurred a loss of TK1,164 crore by those two faulty aircrafts.