TDS Desk:

During the authoritarian rule of the previous regime, Nasrul Hamid Bipu held the position of State Minister for Power, Energy, and Mineral Resources for over a decade. In that time, this vital ministry was effectively turned into personal property — a staging ground for systemic plunder and rampant corruption. The scale and audacity of his alleged looting rivals the fantasy of Arabian folklore.

Bipu’s exploits were not his alone. His family — including his brother, wife, son, and maternal uncle — are all alleged to have profited massively from the energy sector. Over the course of 10 years, the total sum of his and his family’s financial misappropriation is estimated at over Tk1 lakh crore, exceeding the country’s annual national budget.

Bipu is accused of building a family-run syndicate of corruption, opening private companies through which thousands of crores were siphoned off. A glaring example of this is the Matarbari project, in which he allegedly attempted to award a contract to build the country’s largest LPG terminal in Cox’s Bazar to a consortium that included PowerCo International — a company reportedly controlled by his own family.

POWERCO: A SHELL FRONT WITH HIGH STAKES

The proposed LPG terminal, a public-private partnership with Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation (BPC), was valued at $305 million (approximately Tk2,500 crore). Yet, one of the key consortium members, PowerCo International, had a declared paid-up capital of just $100. Investigations revealed that the company was effectively run by Bipu’s close relatives and business associates.

Documents show that PowerCo’s ownership was linked to Kamaluzzaman Chowdhury, Bipu’s maternal uncle and long-time associate of the family-run Hamid Group. Several other directors and key staff of PowerCo were also found to have direct ties to the Hamid Group, where Bipu had previously served as Chairman and Managing Director of several subsidiaries.

One such associate, Murad Hasan, served as Chief Operating Officer (COO) of PowerCo and previously held the role of CEO at Delco Business Associate, a Hamid Group subsidiary. In Bipu’s 2014 election affidavit, he listed himself as Managing Director of Delco and a major shareholder. The company is now controlled by his son Jarif Hamid and younger brother Intekhabul Hamid.

POWERCO, DELCO, AND THE BARIDHARA CONNECTION

The links between PowerCo and Delco go beyond shared personnel. PowerCo was originally registered at 32 Progoti Sharani, Baridhara, which also houses showrooms for international furniture brands Camrich, Sunon, and Euro — all distributed by Delco. Domain registration records for sunon-bd.com also list Intekhabul Hamid as the domain owner at this same address.

Intekhabul Hamid, Bipu’s younger brother, is also Managing Director of several Hamid Group subsidiaries and has documented links to Nabil Khan, the Indian national serving as PowerCo’s Managing Director. Khan runs a Middle East-based shipping and investment firm and is considered a close associate. Another key figure, Tareq Khalil Ullah, served as Assistant General Manager of PowerCo and was previously employed by Hamid Group. He is known to be closely aligned with Intekhabul.

Registration records show that two Hamid Group officials were physically present at the Registrar of Joint Stock Companies and Firms (RJSC) during PowerCo’s incorporation. One of them, Jahangir Alam, is listed as a witness and an assistant manager at Hamid Group, according to his LinkedIn profile.

MULTIMILLION-DOLLAR DEALS WITHOUT TENDERS

Though the Matarbari contract ultimately fell through, PowerCo, Delco, and their partner companies reportedly secured hundreds of millions of dollars in government contracts during Bipu’s tenure. The Dutch-Swiss energy firm Vitol, another member of the consortium, was awarded three consecutive LNG supply contracts without any competitive bidding process. Notably, PowerCo acquired a 30% stake in the Matarbari terminal alongside Vitol.

Following their consortium formation, Vitol received three energy supply contracts worth approximately $100 million from Petrobangla, which operates under Bipu’s former ministry. Another consortium partner, Marubeni, signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in May 2021 to build a 100 MW solar plant with Electricity Generation Company of Bangladesh (EGCB) — an entity also under Bipu’s control.

Both Vitol and Marubeni have a history of corruption scandals. In 2012 and 2014, Marubeni paid millions in fines to the U.S. Department of Justice for bribery in Nigeria and Indonesia. Consequently, Japan’s JICA banned Marubeni from its projects for nine months. Vitol, too, was penalised in 2020 with a $164 million fine for bribing officials in Brazil, Ecuador, and Mexico.

A DECADE OF SYNDICATED PLUNDER

Further investigations revealed that Intekhabul Hamid and the nephew of a former bridges minister allegedly secured Tk8,000 crore worth of projects through four shell companies over a five-year period. These include Tk2,000 crore in contracts from DPDC and NESCO under the guise of advanced metering infrastructure projects during the 2020–21 fiscal year.

In 2021–22, Delco was awarded another Tk500 crore project for mobile apps and customer portal development. Intekhabul’s companies also received eight megaprojects in the network and security category, including a Tk2,300 crore contract to install 5 million smart meters, awarded by the Rural Electrification Board (REB) on 1 June 2023.

Sources claim that to get a power project approved during Bipu’s reign, companies had to pay bribes at no fewer than 20 stages. Over the last two years alone, 27 solar power plants were approved, amidst allegations of massive kickbacks. Intekhabul reportedly secured two of these projects.

In effect, over the past decade, the Power and Energy Ministry became a de facto family estate for Nasrul Hamid Bipu — a deeply entrenched syndicate that weaponised public office for private gain.