A Dhaka court on Wednesday
asked the Bangladesh Nationalist Party’s chairperson, Khaleda Zia, her eldest
son Tarique Rahman and four others to appear before it on August 30 to face
charges of embezzling Tk 2.1 crore from the Zia Orphanage Trust’s fund between
June 1991 and February 2007.
The Dhaka metropolitan
senior special judge, ANM Bashir Ullah, also deferred to August 30 the hearing
on the acceptability of the charge-sheet of the case, as none of the six,
against whom charges were pressed, appeared in the court on Wednesday.
Before starting the
hearing, the court asked the defence counsels why the accused persons were not
present.
Khaleda’s
counsel Sanaullah Miah replied that she was on bail granted by the High Court
in the case till next January.
An accused,
even if on bail, has to appear in the court during the hearing of a case, the
court pointed out.