Dhaka Bureau: Former Inspector General of Police (IG) Benazir Ahmed committed unprecedented fraud in his passport. Concealing the police identity in the passport, he took an ordinary passport and identified himself as a ‘private employee’. He did not hold a blue official passport as a government employee. Despite having the opportunity, he did not take the ‘red passport’. Benazir took the passport in the same manner as the former army chief General Aziz Ahmed’s two brothers, Haris Ahmed and Tofail Ahmed Joseph, got their passports. A media investigation revealed these sensational facts.
An investigation revealed that Benjir applied for renewal of his old handwritten passport on October 11, 2010. For some mysterious reason, instead of taking the blue official passport, he took an ordinary passport. At that time, hiding his real identity, he introduced himself as a private employee. Write ‘Private Service’ as a profession in the application form.
A perusal of the documents shows that Benazir was issued a renewed MRP (machine-readable passport) on October 14, 2010 (No. AA1073252). The expiration date was October 13, 2015. He applied for passport renewal again in 2014, before the expiration date. But this time, as usual, he introduced himself as a private employee.
Those concerned say that Benazir was then Commissioner of Dhaka Metropolitan Police. He did not take an official passport to such an important position. His second round of renewed passports was valid until September 17, 2019 (passport number BC 0111070). Later in 2016, he again submitted his passport renewal application. At that time, he was RAB Director General. This time, as usual, he also applied for a private passport. It was then that he was caught hiding his information and committing fraud.
Those concerned said that Benjir himself did not appear at the passport office. His personal officers brought the application form. But seeing the RAB director general’s private passport, the concerned passport officials got suspicious. Later, when the matter was brought to the attention of the then Director General of the Passport Department, Benazir’s application was blocked. Benazir was then asked to submit a departmental no-objection letter (NOC). But without submitting the NOC, Benjir insisted on renewing the passport.
According to sources, the Directorate of Passports has written to the RAB headquarters seeking a proper explanation for the acceptance of Benazir’s private ordinary passport on dubious grounds. But it didn’t work. On December 15, 2016, a letter was sent from the RAB headquarters in favor of achieving his objective. The then Additional Director General (Administration) of RAB HQ, Abdul Jalil Mondal, immediately wrote a letter requesting the replacement of his passport. The Directorate of Passports (DIP) was forced to issue a passport to Benazir within 24 hours, whose number is BM0828141.
Why didn’t Benjir take a red passport?
Benazir took charge as the 30th IGP in 2020 as the Chief of Police. As per rules, he is supposed to get a diplomatic passport as an officer of senior secretary rank. But he didn’t even take the prestigious red passport. Even as an IGP, he again applied for a normal passport as a private employee. But due to the introduction of state-of-the-art e-passports in the country by then, complications arose with Benazir’s application.
According to sources, at this time, Benazir Ahmed resorted to unprecedented fraud. Send for mobile unit of DIP on the pretext of serious illness as immobile. Later, the responsible officials went to his house and completed all the formalities, including photographing and fingerprinting. These things are done in secret. His application was submitted on March 4, 2020. On June 1, a 10-year e-passport was issued in Benazir’s name (No. B00002095). In the same process, the passports of Haris Ahmed and Tofail Ahmed Joseph, two brothers of former army chief General Aziz Ahmed, were obtained.
The people concerned say that apart from issuing the passport with false information, there have been several other major irregularities in Benazir’s passport. For example, there is no rule to give passports for more than 5 years to government employees, but they have been given 10 years. Besides, the matter was supposed to be reported to the higher level of the government before the issue of general passports in the name of officials holding important positions like IGP, but it was not accepted.
According to the passport officials and the rules, any government employee can take an ordinary passport instead of an official passport. In this case, the approval of the concerned ministry or department is mandatory. As a profession, the word government employee has to be mentioned. There is no opportunity to mention any private job or any other profession as a government job. Besides, it is illegal and a punishable offense to take a passport from a responsible position like a police chief in the identity of a ‘private servant’.
Sources say that many people take ordinary passports for various reasons despite working in government jobs. A major reason for this is taking advantage of the citizenship of a different country. Because if you have a government passport, living in another country or taking citizenship is quite complicated. Besides, official passport holders have to observe special formalities even if they go outside the country. Expatriation approval is to be obtained from the concerned ministry or department. But these complications are less common with private passports. Moreover, traveling abroad is quite unhindered with a normal passport.
A passport official, who did not wish to be named, said it was unusual for Benazir not to get the prestigious diplomatic passport despite being an IGP. There may be different reasons for this. Maybe he has already taken the citizenship of a different country. For this reason, he could not accept the red passport, even though he wanted to. Besides, he may have thought it safe to take a normal passport to leave the country open at any time.
When asked about this, the executive director of Transparency International Bangladesh (TIB), Iftekharuzzaman, said, “It is a despicable fraud.” Even those who issue fraudulent passports cannot avoid liability. It is not that they do not know Benazir Ahmed. So it happened with the collusion of both parties. The whole matter needs to be investigated. In response to a question, he said, “Multidimensional crimes, including corruption, abuse of power, and fraud, have been committed here. He used the expert knowledge he gained as a crime controller to commit crimes. Government officials cannot travel abroad without prior approval. One reason to avoid this is to get a passport by concealing government job information. Another reason is that, as a private employee, he will get the opportunity to travel abroad, invest, and live permanently, but he will not get that opportunity if he has an official passport as a government employee. So the fact that he was planning a heinous crime from the start is indicative of him.
