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The High Court on Tuesday directed Awami League lawmaker Abdus Salam Murshedy to hand over a house at Gulshan in Dhaka, which he has allegedly occupied illegally, to the government, terming it an abandoned property.
Salam Murshedy has been ordered to hand over the property through the secretary at the Housing and Public Works Ministry within three months of receiving the HC verdict.
The court observed that Murshedy occupied an abandoned government house on Road no 104, holding no 29, in the Gulshan Residential Area, without it being released by the court of settlement.
The HC bench of Justice Md Nazrul Islam Talukder and Justice Kazi Ebadot Hossain delivered the verdict after holding a hearing on a writ petition seeking its directives to recover the Gulshan house allegedly occupied by Abdus Salam Murshedy illegally.
The HC also directed the Housing and Public Works Secretary to submit a compliance report before this court through its Registrar Office within 15 days of receiving the property.
Supreme Court lawyer Syed Sayedul Haque Suman, also an independent lawmaker, submitted the petition as a public interest litigation to the HC on October 31, 2022.
In the petition, Suman said Rajdhani Unnayan Kartripakkha (Rajuk) had given ownership of the luxurious building of the Housing and Public Works department to Murshedy, a lawmaker from Khulna-4 constituency, by forging documents.
Following the writ petition, the HC on November 1, 2022, issued a rule regarding the matter and asked the concerned bodies of the government to submit relevant documents of the house.
Upon hearing on the rule, the HC on Tuesday disposed of the writ petition with observation.
Earlier during the hearing of the petition, the Anti-Corruption Commission's lawyer Khurshid Alam Khan told the HC that the commission, in a probe, found that fraudulence, forgery, and abuse of power occurred during the allocation of the Gulshan house and plot to Murshedy.
Following the inquiry report, ACC filed a criminal case against 11 people.
The High Court also asked the Anti-Corruption Commission to continue with the investigation into a corruption case filed against 11 people for their involvement in transferring the abandoned house to Murshedy in the 1990s.
The High further observed that the ACC must take action against any others involved in transferring the house to Murshedy.