The Bangladesh government’s Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) raided the BCB’s headquarters on Tuesday to collect documents and records following allegations against the cricket board. The three-member probe team held a press briefing following their raid, alongside BCB chief executive Nizam Uddin Chowdhury.
The allegations include financial misappropriation of ticket sales during BPL and irregularity in expenses for cricket-related activities around a political programme called “Mujib 100” (to celebrate the 100th birth anniversary of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman) in 2020 but which got cancelled due to the Covid pandemic. The ACC team also looked into details about the rule change in Dhaka’s third division qualification competition. All three allegations fall under the time when Nazmul Hassan was the BCB president.
“We will file a report in the enforcement unit after verifying all these documents,” ACC’s assistant director Al Amin said.
“The ACC will then decide what the next step will be. Every one of the ACC’s raid is due to a specific complaint. We collect complaints from the media. We have a committee that verifies these complaints. Once it is approved, we go on a raid. It is the same in this case,” he added.
The ACC officials said they are looking into the financial anomaly in the BPL’s ticket sales since the third edition. Ticket sales have earned the BCB around BDT 15 crore (1.2 million USD approx.) from the eight seasons, but in the eleventh season alone it was BDT 13 crore (1.07 million USD approx.).
“One of BCB’s revenue streams is ticket sales. There was 15 crore in eight years, and then 13 crore in a single year. We are trying to collect documents to find out what the anomaly is,” Al Amin said.