HC issues rule on bail of engineer Shafikul over Rooppur pillow scam

The High Court (HC)  issued a rule on Monday asking authorities concerned to explain in four weeks as to why it shall not grant bail to deputy assistant engineer Shafiqul Islam, arrested in three separate graft cases filed over swindling money from the Rooppur Nuclear Power Plant’s housing project

A High Court virtual bench of Justice Md Nazrul Islam Talukder and Justice Ahmed Sohel passed the order after holding hearing on a plea seeking bail for the engineer.

The Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) on December 12, 2019, filed the three cases with its Pabna integrated office for plundering money of the Rooppur Nuclear Power Plant’s housing project.

The anti-graft body arrested 13 people on that same day including Shafiqul Islam.

According to media reports, the purchase prices of various items to furnish the project’s 966 apartments for the Russian engineers and others were abnormally higher than the market prices.

The reports claimed that each pillow was bought at Taka 5,957, and the cost of carrying it to an apartment was Taka 760.

The cost of an electric stove was Taka 7,747 while the carrying cost of it from the ground floor to the top one was Taka 6,650, the reports said, adding the price of an electric iron was Taka 4,154 while the carrying cost Taka 2,945.