Men in ‘uniforms’ dupe jobseekers of Tk 36 lakh

Around one and a half years back, Hasan Sikder, a village farmer, got introduced to Sheikh Selim alias Shuvo, who introduced himself as an official of the army.

After getting introduced, the two set a meeting near Mirpur's Sony Cinema Hall in the capital, where Selim came in a microbus, wearing a camo print uniform resembling those worn by armed forces personnel. But Hasan later found out that Selim was a member of a fraud gang, he said on Sunday.

A few days later, Selim told Hasan that he had given many people jobs in different positions of an official establishment for Tk 6 lakh per person. "If any acquaintance of mine wants the job of a gardener or messenger, Selim will arrange it," Hasan told The Daily Star.

He demanded Tk 5 lakh for a gardener job, and Tk 8.5 lakh for messenger, Hasan said.

Hasan sent his nephew Bony Israil, and neighbours Rana Mollah and Masud Rana to Selim for messenger posts. He also sent his younger brother Ahadul Sikder, and other neighbours Riaz Mia and Mahamudul Hasan for gardener jobs.

For the jobs, they gave Selim Tk 36 lakh. Selim, dressed in uniform and using his microbus, took the jobseekers to a place through the capital's Kachukhet, said Sohrab Hossain, father of Masud Rana, quoting his son.

He said the microbus then stopped at a canteen, from where Selim and two others in "uniform" took the jobseekers to an office.

They then took interviews, said Sohrab, a farmer from Gopalganj's Muksudpur upazila. Their clothes and mannerisms were so believable that no one doubted their legitimacy.

He, however, said none of the interviewees could pinpoint the office's exact location, as they are villagers. When the whole interview process was completed, the group of fraudsters gave appointment letters on "official letterheads". They also forged signatures of officials concerned and put memo numbers on the letters.

Hasan said when the jobseekers went to the location to join work, they found out that the appointment letters were forged. He then told Selim to give the money back, but Selim did not comply.

On January 30, Hasan filed a general diary (GD) against the fraudsters with Mirpur Model Police Station, after which Sub-inspector (SI) Tapan Kumar arranged a meeting between Selim and the jobseekers to settle the issue.

At the meeting, Selim admitted to taking money, Hasan said. He alleged that during the meeting, SI Tuhin Kazi of Dhaka Metropolitan Police's Tejgaon division went to the station to take Selim away.

Contacted, Tuhin said Selim is his friend's uncle, and on his friend's request,  he went to the police station. He claimed that when he came to know that the matter involved money, he went away. A police inquiry team also questioned him about the matter, to whom he gave similar information.

On February 1, Hasan lodged a written complaint with the complaint cell of Inspector General of Police, where he explained in detail about how he was deceived by the gang.

Officer-In-Charge of Mirpur Police Station Mustafizur Rahman said SI Tapan, investigation officer of the GD, contacted both sides and held a meeting, where Selim agreed to pay the money back.

Asked why they did not arrest Selim, he said authorities asked the group to file a case, which would allow them to arrest Selim, but they did not agree to do so, as they did not want to deal with hassles of the legal system.

A good number of people came to the police station with Hasan, and asked police to hand Selim over to them, but law enforcers refused.

This correspondent tried to reach Selim over two phone numbers given by the complainant, but he did not pick up the calls or reply to messages.