An appeal against the cancellation of two cases filed over the share-market scam in 1996 against Salman F Rahman and others has been pending with the apex court for long seven years.
Although it was strongly believed that Salman was the mastermind of the market manipulation, the Bangladesh Securities and Exchange Commission (BSEC) was reluctant to revive the appeal for so many years, sources have said.
Following a petition, a High Court bench in 2015 quashed two cases filed against Beximco Group Chairman ASF Rahman, Vice-Chairman Salman F Rahman and others. Later in 2017, the BSEC filed appeal petitions against that HC order, but it never mentioned those appeals for hearing.
Beximco Pharma, Shinepukur Holdings, ASF Rahman, Vice -Chairman Salman F Rahman, AB Siddiqur Rahman and Late DH Khan were accused in the cases.
Salman F Rahman was the private industries and investment affairs adviser to former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina. He went into hiding after the fall of Sheikh Hasina on August 5 this year following a mass uprising.
Later, as the story of nemesis goes, he was arrested on August 13 from Sadarghat area in the city while fleeing by boat. He was remanded several times in connection with a murder case. Now he is in jail.
During Sheikh Hasina's regime since 2009 till 2024, the ruling party had a strong influence on the country's judiciary. Former Chief Justice Surendra Kumar Sinha's ousting and exiling under tremendous pressure of the Awami League government stand as one of the many big precedents.
After getting a report from the probe body formed to investigate the 1996 share -market scandal, BSEC on May 4 in 1997 filed two cases with the Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Court (CMM Court) in Dhaka against Salman and others.
The accused were untouched even after the filing of the cases. Later, the trial proceedings of the cases were stalled as the higher judiciary issued stay orders.
Cases were transferred to the special tribunal which was formed in 2015 for holding trial of the cases related to the share market. But the High Court quashed the cases before the start of the trial in the tribunal.
Later in 2017, BSEC filed appeal against the HC order. In September 2023, the Commission instructed its lawyers to revive all the 17 cases, including these two, filed regarding the 1996 and 2010 stock-market scams. Despite its instructions, hearings on the cases have yet to start.
ASM Mahmudul Hasan, Director of the Legal Service Department of the BSEC, told the FE that they will reconstitute their legal team "very soon and then will take initiative to revive the cases".
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