5 people including former IGP Benazir were caught in passport forgery

The Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) has filed a case against former Inspector General of Police (IGP) Benazir Ahmed and 5 people on charges of passport renewal and fraud. 

On Monday (October 14), ACC Deputy Director Hafizul Islam filed the case at the agency's integrated district office, Dhaka-1. A senior source of the organization confirmed the matter to Dhaka Post.

Apart from Benazir, the remaining accused are – former passport director Fazlul Haque, Munsi Mueed Ikram, technical manager Sahena Haque and departmental director Abdullah Al Mamun.

According to the statement of the case, Benazir Ahmed applied for an official Machine Readable Passport (MRP) without departmental no-objection by surrendering his handwritten passport while working as DIG on October 11, 2010. The application form is marked as “Official”. His application form mentions private service with resort to forgery, fraud, criminal misconduct and perjury despite being a government servant in the order of profession. Later, while still working as Director General of RAB, he mentioned "private service" in the passport application form under the guise of forgery, criminal misconduct and falsehood. Also applied for Machine Readable Passport (MRP)/e-Passport (Electronic Passport) without Departmental No Objection Letter at other times.

It is further stated in the statement that the defendants of the passport department were fully aware of the official identity of Benazir Ahmed but the other defendants voluntarily gave the final approval for the issue of ordinary passport or e-passport in his name without obtaining or verifying the departmental no-objection certificate. The case has been filed against the accused under Section 420/467/468/471/109 of the Penal Code and Section 5(2) of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1947 and Section 11 of The Bangladesh Passport Order, 1973.

Another case of passport forgery against Benazir Ahmed was pending in ACC. On June 25, 15 officials including two additional directors and two directors of the passport department were interrogated.

The former IGP was accused of concealing his police identity in his passport. From the beginning till now, he did not have a blue official passport as a government employee. Despite the opportunity, he did not take the red passport. Even in the case of making ordinary passports under the identity of private employees, fraud has been resorted to.

On March 31 this year, reports were published in a daily newspaper under the title 'Aladdin's lamp in Benazir's house' and 'Benazir's resort in forest land' on April 3. In this, various allegations of illegal acquisition of wealth were raised against former IGP Benazir Ahmed and his family members. ACC decided to investigate after taking these complaints into consideration.

And on April 22, ACC started investigating allegations of illegal wealth acquisition against Benazir, his wife Jisan Mirza, two daughters Farhin Rishta bint Benazir and Tahsin Raisa bint Benazir. A three-member special team headed by Hafizul Islam, deputy director of the ACC head office, is probing the allegation.

ACC summoned Benazir Ahmed on June 6 and wife Zeesan Mirza and two daughters on June 9 for the first round of questioning as part of the investigation. But they ask for time without appearing on that date.

Then the second round was called on 23 and 24 June. Even then, without appearing, they submitted a written statement against the complaint through a lawyer.

Among them, Dhaka Metropolitan Senior Special Judge Mohammad Assamach Jaglul Hossain ordered the seizure (croc) of various property documents, Dhaka flats and company shares in the names of Benazir Ahmed, his wife and children, in view of two applications made by the ACC on May 23 and 26. On May 23, their 345 bighas (114 acres) of land and 33 bank accounts were ordered to be seized and frozen.

Then on May 26, the court ordered them to seize another 119 movable and immovable properties. These include four flats in the capital's Gulshan, one land in Savar besides 114 deeded properties in Madaripur. The court ordered the seizure of 621 bigha land of Benazir and his family members in two rounds.

According to the order, their 33 bank accounts and securities (shares) of Rs. Besides, the Bangladesh Securities and Exchange Commission (BSEC) has ordered the Central Depository Bangladesh Limited (CDBL), the electronics share repository of the capital market, to freeze all the BO accounts (Beneficiary Owners Accounts) in the name of Benazir Ahmed and his wife and children. Apart from this, other asset seizure activities are ongoing. A receiver has already been appointed to look after the seized property.

Benazir's passport history

Benazir started his career in 1988. He applied for renewal of his old handwritten passport on October 11, 2010. At that time, instead of taking the official blue passport, he took the green passport. Concealing his real identity, he introduced himself as a private employee. Write 'Private Service' as profession in the application form.

According to ACC sources, Benazir was given a renewed MRP (Machine Readable Passport) on October 14 of that year. The expiry date of which was 13 October 2015. However, Benjir applied to renew his passport again in 2014 before the expiry date. But this time as usual he introduced himself as a private employee. Benjir was the Commissioner of Dhaka Metropolitan Police in 2014. Even from such an important position, he did not take official passport.

The passports renewed in the second phase were valid till 17 September 2019. Later in 2016, he again submitted the passport renewal application. He was RAB Director General at that time. As usual, he identified the service as a private officer in his application. At that point Benazir's passport information was hidden and fraud was caught.

Sources in the passport department said that the concerned passport officials were suspicious after seeing the private passport of the director general of RAB. Benazir's application was shelved when officials later brought the matter to the notice of the then director general of the passport department. Benazir was then asked to submit a departmental no-objection letter (NOC). But he pressed for passport renewal without submitting NOC.

Later, the Directorate of Passports wrote to the RAB headquarters asking for a proper explanation in favor of accepting Benazir's private ordinary passport on dubious grounds. But it didn't work. Under pressure, the Department of Immigration and Passports (DIP) issued him a passport within a day.

Benazir took over as the 30th IGP in 2020 as the head of the police force. As per rules, he is supposed to get diplomatic passport as an officer of senior secretary rank. But Benjir didn't even take the prestigious red passport. Even as an IGP, he again applied for a normal passport as a private employee. At that time e-passport was launched in the country. Complications also arise with Benazir's application. He did not go to Agargaon passport office to solve it. Ask for the mobile unit of the DIP of the passport to report illness. Later, the responsible officials of the passport office went to his house and completed all the formalities including photographing and fingerprinting. His application was submitted on March 4, 2020. On June 1 of that year, a 10-year e-passport was issued in Benazir's name.