The Anti-Corruption Commission has approved a charge sheet against Sohel Rana, the owner of Rana Plaza, in a graft case. The commission at its regular meeting on Monday approved the charge sheet against him, ACC public relations officer Pranab Kumar Bhattacharya said. He said an ACC investigation officer will submit the charge sheet before court within a day or two. On May 20, 2015, ACC deputy director Mahbubur Rahman filed the case with Ramna police station in the capital against Rana for allegedly accumulating wealth illegally. According to ACC sources, the national anti-graft agency on April 2, 2015 sent a notice to a senior jail superintendent of Kashimpur Jail in Gazipur where Rana remained detained to convey the message to him (Rana) that the ACC asked him to submit his wealth statement to it within a stipulated time. As Rana is in prison, his wife submitted an application to the ACC seeking time extension to submit the wealth report, but the commission rejected the plea and it gave approval on May 18 for lodging a non-submission case against Rana. After the deadly Rana Plaza collapse on April 24, 2013, the ACC decided to conduct a probe against Rana to know how he accumulated huge wealth, and formed a two-member inquiry team in this regard.According to the ACC inquiry report, Rana built two commercial buildings – Rana Plaza and Rana Tower – at Savar with ill-gotten money. He also has a five-storey residential building at Savar. Apart from the buildings, Rana, who was arrested after the building collapse on April 29, 2013, has huge movable and immovable wealth, the ACC sources said. On April 12, 2015, the ACC also filed separate cases against his parents – Morzina Begum and Abdul Khaleque – on charge of amassing wealth worth around Tk 17 crore illegally.The Rana Plaza collapse is considered the deadliest garment-factory accident in history, as well as the deadliest accidental structural failure in modern human history claiming the lives of over 1,100 people and leaving around 2,515 injured.
