Cash and liquor were recovered by members of the law enforcing agency on Tuesday from the house of Selim Prodhan (second from left), who ran an online casino — Collected Amid the ongoing anti-casino crackdown, the Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) members made another sensational recovery after raiding the house and office of detained online casino ringleader Selim Prodhan on Tuesday.
During the operation, the elite force members seized Tk 2.9 million money in cash, foreign currencies of 23 countries amounting to Tk 7.76 million, and 32 cheques of 13 banks amounting to Tk 80 million.
Besides, forty-eight bottles of illegal liquors, two deer skins, 12 passports, and some laptops were also recovered during the raids that lasted for more than 12 hours, officials said.
The law-enforcers also detained two aides of Selim Prodhan - Akhteruzzaman and Rahman.
Soon after the recovery, the Bangladesh Bank's Bangladesh Financial Intelligence Unit (BFIU) directed all banks and financial institutions to freeze accounts of Selim.
This is the fourth account freezing order that the BB issued since launching of the ongoing anti-casino crackdown on September 18.
In a post-recovery briefing, director of the RAB legal and media wing Lt Col Md Sarwar Bin Kashem said their cyber monitoring cell came to know that some unscrupulous businessmen are operating online casino gaming here.
"Selim Pradhan is the main coordinator of the gaming here, and he was planning to leave the country. Then we conducted an operation on Monday, and nabbed him from a flight of the Thai Airlines."
After preliminary interrogation, the RAB personnel raided his Gulshan residence and Banani office in the capital in the night, and recovered many things, he further said.
"We found Tk 2.9 million in cash, foreign currencies worth Tk 7.76 million, 48 bottles of unauthorised foreign liquors, cheques of 13 banks amounting to Tk 8.0 million, passports, laptops and deer skins."
Citing preliminary information, the RAB director said money of the online gaming was deposited in three gateways. From there it was deposited to the winners' accounts, and the remaining portion was kept in the gateways.
Selim's chief personal assistant transferred the money to three bank accounts from the gateways. Then, the money was laundered to some overseas destinations through 'hundi' or various individuals.
"We have information that Selim Prodhan earned around Tk 90 million a week through online casino gaming," he added.
The RAB members were taking preparations for filing cases against him under money laundering prevention act, wildlife conservation and security act, and anti-narcotics act until filing of the report at 8:00 pm.
The RAB officials said Selim Prodhan founded a business conglomerate - Prodhan Group - in 2006. The group also has overseas office at Si Racha of Chon Buri in Thailand.
Under the group, he operated a number of business entities, like - P24 law firm, Aid Entertainment, P24 Gaming, and Japan-Bangladesh Security Printing and Papers Limited.
Japan-Bangladesh Security Printing and Papers Limited is one of the top loan defaulters of a commercial bank, which rescheduled loan amounting to Tk 1.0 billion in 2018.
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