The Anti-corruption Commission (ACC) is going to take various steps to revitalise its 11 committees for gearing up its anti-graft drive.
The Commission is expected to reshuffle the bodies as these virtually failed to bring about any substantial results during the last several years after formation of ACC in 2009-2010.
The Commission will also try to find out the actual causes behind inactivity of the committees and how to solve it, a top ACC official said.
The committees were formed to strengthen the ACC's anti-graft drive to root out corruption from different service-oriented government institutions.
ACC Chairman M Badiuzzaman told the FE that he is very much frustrated with the performance of the committees.
"We formed the committees to strengthen anti-graft drive in service-oriented institutions as we receive many graft allegations against the institutions and general people suffer without getting service from those," he said.
The ACC boss said the Commission would sit shortly to reshuffle the committees.
"We have already informally discussed the matter and also got some proposals from the ACC officials on reshuffling and reviving the committees," he said.
The ACC formed 11 committees to look into the graft allegations in 11 government institutions. These are Dhaka City Corporations (DCCs), National Board of Revenue (NBR), Rajdhani Unnayan Kartripakkha (Rajuk), Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS), Education Engineering Department (EED), Roads and Highways Department (RHD), Local Government Engineering Department (LGED), Bangladesh Road Transport Authority (BRTA), Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation (BPC), National Housing Authority (NHA), and Bangladesh Employees' Welfare Board (BEWB).
ACC officials said there were several factors behind the inactivity of the committees. Among them, lack of necessary support from the Commission, absence of accountability of the ACC officials and rapid change in the manpower of the committees were the prime causes.
There are allegations that some members of the committees were involved in corruption and the Commission took punitive measures against some officials.
The committees failed to lodge any case in the last six months.
Among the committees, ACC deputy director (DD) Dr Nurul Haque heads the four-member committee to probe into the irregularities of the DGHS which lodged 14 cases so far. The committee on EED is being led by ACC DD SM Mofidul Islam which has been unable to unearth any irregularity of the EED, ACC sources said.
ACC DD SM Akther Hamid Bhuiyan is leading the committee to investigate the irregularities of the DCCs. He has already filed 14 cases against the DCCs on various corruption allegations.
DD of ACC Mirza Zahidul Alam has recently been assigned to probe into the graft allegations against RHD. The Committee has so far filed four cases.
The committee on LGED was reshuffled several times but could not bring about any substantial result. ACC DD Jahangir Hossain is now leading it which has filed four cases so far.
ACC DD Md Khairul Huda is leading the committee on BRTA, DD Mahmud Hasan is leading the committee on NHA, DD Md Moniruzzaman Khan is leading the committee on BEWB, DD Md Morshed of Chittagong Division office is leading the committee on BPC, DD Monirul Haque is leading the Committee on Rajuk and DD Abdullah Al Zahid is leading the committee on NBR.
