The High Court (HC) on Thursday acquitted Gias Uddin Al Mamun, a businessman and close friend of BNP acting chairman Tarique Rahman, in a money laundering case scrapping his 7-year jail sentence.
An HC bench of Justice AKM Asaduzzaman and Justice Syed Enayet Hossain passed the order after hearing a petition submitted challenging the judgment.
Lawyers Omar Sadat and Sabbir Hamza stood the petitioner while Asif Hasan for the Anti-Corruption Commissioner (ACC).
On September 22, 2011, the ACC filed a case against Gias Uddin Al Mamun with Cantonment Police Station in Dhaka.
According to the case statement, M Shahjad Ali, the then chairman of BTL and Globe Pharmaceuticals, was the Bangladesh agent for a Dutch contracting company that won a tender to modernise the railway signaling system.
In 2003, when the work order was finalizsed, Gias Uddin Al Mamun allegedly demanded an illegal commission for the work.
In 2004, Shahjad deposited Tk 6, 015, 7762 into Mamun's NatWest Bank account in London.
On April 24, 2019, the Special Judge Court of Dhaka sentenced Gias Uddin Al Mamun to seven years in jail and imposed a fine of Tk 12 crore.
The court also ordered the confiscation of 44,610.08 British pounds from Mamun's NatWest Bank account.
Mamun was arrested on January 30 in 2007 and was released from prison on August 6 this year.