In a case involving fraud and money theft, Salman F. Rahman, a businessman and industrial advisor for the Awami League, was given bail.

In response to Salman’s writ of petition, the High Court bench of justices Shah Abu Nayeem Mominur Rahman and Judge Zubayer Rahman Chowdhury ruled against the Anticorruption Commission and the government, questioning why the case’s procedures had not been declared unconstitutional.

Together with four other people, the ACC filed a complaint against Salman F. Rahman, vice chairman of the Beximco Group, at the Motijheel Police Station on September 30. The chairman of the group is Sohel F. Rahman.

The complaint claims that the defendants used fraud and fictitious land documents to get bank loans totaling more than Tk 108 crore.

Mahmudur Rahman is charged with forging 83 acres of false land records in Gazipur in order to apply for loans worth Tk 74 crore.

Attorney Rafiqul Haque defended Salman in the writ petition contesting the legality of the proceedings.

On October 9, a High Court vacation bench granted advance bail in the case of Mahmudur Rahman.

Salman was granted bail by the HC in connection with a corruption charge that the ACC filed on November 4.

On October 1, the Anticorruption Commission filed a case against Salman, claiming he faked documents for six pieces of property in Gazipur to reschedule a Tk 192 core loan from AB Bank, amassing Tk 182 core.

The Daily Star and Prothom Alo

Mr. Salman F. Rahman, vice chairman of the Beximco Group of Companies, declared that Prothom Alo and The Daily Star were the originators of the “Minus Two” concept under the emergency rule.

We categorically deny the charge and reject it as absurd.

Salman F. Rahman criticised Prothom Alo and The Daily Star in a number of other general and sweeping ways. He claimed that these two magazines had been involved in a brutal, continuing campaign against his company and had utilised unethical journalism to malign his industry in order to prevent his company’s ambitious expansion plans from coming to pass.

We vehemently refute this accusation and maintain the highest standards of moral journalism along with its tenets. We never published information on the Beximco group of firms without including pertinent proof, their versions, and comments.

Information on the Beximco group of companies was always published with the relevant evidence, their versions, and our comments included.

The truth is that banks in Bangladesh have been forced to charge some of the highest interest rates in the world due to a long-standing culture of loan default, which has also discouraged numerous entrepreneurs from taking out loans and investing in their businesses.

The fundamental culture has been one of, if not the most important, obstacles to the growth of the private sector in the country.

Beximco, which ranks among the worst defaulters over the previous 20 years with defaults reaching thousands of crores of takas, is one of the biggest and oldest companies contributing to the ills of default culture.

Thus, it stands to reason that the Beximco Group of Companies would be worthy of and get an extremely thorough investigation by the nation’s responsible and independent media, including Prothom Alo and The Daily Star, among others.

The media recently focused on Bextex, a Z category company, when DSE investigated them and their volatile share trading right before their AGM and dividend announcement.

About Salman Rahman’s claim that our conclusions about the declaration of dividends and asset revaluation were untrue, we would like to clarify that the data we used in our reports came from the Dhaka Stock Exchange’s website, which is still up to date. The Daily Star and Prothom Alo have not reached a separate conclusion.

Salman F. Rahman and Beximco have never been accused of insider trading, as far as we know. We highlighted in our investigation the unusual trading activity that two banks were engaging in on that stock just before the dividend payout. We merely published these facts in our piece to inform the public as part of our journalistic duty to protect investors’ interests. In the study, we also found that while some saw it as a wise financial decision, others questioned if it constituted insider trading.

Regarding his assertion that he referred to Bextex shares as “junk,” we would like to make it clear that “junk shares” in Bangladesh are shares that fall into the Z-category or are underperforming. The Financial Express, the only financial newspaper in the country, calls shares in the Z category “junk shares.” The fact that international credit rating agencies refer to stocks or bonds that no longer meet investment-grade requirements as “junk” indicates that it is a widespread practice.

The raters in these ratings highlight low profitability as a potential reason for a company to delay dividend payments on securities. Fitch Ratings downgraded its ratings of UBS’s preferred stock to junk status in a research dated March 5, 2009, and also made a hint that it may downgrade it even worse. Fitch pointed up increased dangers on the shares of the European bank.

As we previously mentioned, Beximco Pharmaceutical is a company that is registered in the Cayman Islands. Salman Rahman claims that he negatively portrayed the merger between Gem Global and Beximco Pharmaceutical. The company has a bad image and is currently facing legal action in Hong Kong. Its quick engagement in our capital market with hot money is worthy of public notice, so we took action to protect our investors and the country’s economy.

Transcom Group and Latifur Rahman, the company’s owner, were mentioned by Salman F. Rahman in his written declaration. The Daily Star and Prothom Alo are managed by experienced editors, and the proprietors do not influence the paper’s editorial substance, as is well known to the general public. Because of this, the audience support that these two journals currently enjoy is well-deserved. 

We strongly reject Salman F. Rahman’s claim that The Daily Star and Prothom Alo were the creators of the “Minus Two” idea and view it as his last-ditch effort to deflect attention from the actions of his businesses. 

For instance, a DSE website entry on July 13 states that the SEC has established an investigation team to look into certain odd trading of Bextex Ltd. shares on the stock market.

We restate our commitment to protecting investors’ and the economy’s interests, as well as the “public’s right to know”.

Remember that the owners of Beximco were directors of the aforementioned banks in question at one point in time, and they were in charge of millions of Taka being taken out of more than a hundred bogus accounts in the 1990s before the Bangladesh Bank found out. Salman and Sohel F. Rahman were consequently obliged to resign from their posts on the bank boards. Our interest in this company’s stock trading was also sparked by Beximco’s previous performance, which was linked by the Securities and Exchange Commission to the 1996 share fraud along with other businesses. Beximco continues to be charged with a share fraud scheme.

Salman F. Rahman enters into an agreement with RR Holdings Ltd. and Beximco to extend its LPG operations in Bangladesh; India Oil Corp.

The parent company of Beximco LPG, RR Holdings Ltd., and India Oil Corp., the primary refiner and fuel retailer in Bangladesh, have formed a joint venture company (JVC) with a 50:50 ownership share to operate LPG operations in the country.

Global firm RR Holdings Ltd (RRH), founded in the United Arab Emirates, provides services to a range of sectors, including commerce, textiles, power, and oil and gas. Dharmendra Pradhan, India’s Minister of Steel, Natural Gas, and Petroleum, oversaw the signing of this new agreement in New Delhi. Bangladesh’s socioeconomic growth is anticipated to be boosted by the availability of reasonably priced LPG.

However, a few years ago, Beximco LPG also shipped a cargo of LPG cylinders to the Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) for delivery to the landlocked northeastern districts of India.

Despite the concerns surrounding COVID-19, both countries have been able to maintain an adequate supply of LPG to meet the growing needs for energy. However, it is anticipated that the new JVC, which would operate by first purchasing Beximco’s present LPG assets, would significantly improve the current energy infrastructure.

Speakers at the event were Nasrul Hamid, MP, State Minister for Power, Energy, and Mineral Resources, and Salman F. Rahman, the other co-founder of the Beximco Group and Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s investment and private industry advisor.