HC rejects ex-CPA director\\\'s plea

The High Court (HC) discharged Wednesday the rule issued earlier seeking to revoke the Gatco scam case facing Lutful Kabir, former director of Chittagong Port Authority (CPA), reports UNB.

An HC division bench comprising Justice M Ashfaqul Islam and Justice AKM Zahirul Hoque passed the order, after a full length hearing on the rule.

The HC, however, retained the bail granted to the accused during issuing of rule on April 13 in 2008.

Emerging from the court, Anti Corruption Commission (ACC) counsel Khurshid Alam Khan told reporters that following the day's order there is no legal bar to reviving the stalled case proceedings against accused Lutful Kabir, one of the 24 accused in the Gatco scam case as the HC vacated its order of stay on the operation of the case proceedings.

The ACC counsel also informed that the case proceedings against the other 23 accused remain stayed following higher court orders.

On May, 13, 2008, police after investigation filed the charge sheet against 24 people to the court.

On September 2, 2007, ACC deputy director Golam Shahriar Chowdhury filed the case with Tejgaon thana against former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia, her younger son Arafat Rahman Koko and others on charge of corruption in awarding Global Agro Trade (Pvt) Co Ltd (Gatco), a green horn company, the contract for container handling at inland container depots in Dhaka and Chittagong by allegedly taking Tk 22 million in kickback and thus causing a loss of Tk 10 billion to the national exchequer.