Most of the structures, including one wall of the main building of

Sadeeq Agro, was built after occupying a canal.

TDS Desk:

Dhaka North City Corporation has started an eviction drive at Sadeeq Agro Farm, which was illegally built on the site of the Ramchandrapur canal and the adjacent road in Mohammadpur area.

Sadeeq Agro came under scrutiny after a controversy over a Tk15 lakh goat which they reportedly sold to Mushfiqur Rahman Ifat, son of ex-National Board of Revenue member Matiur Rahman.

The Tk15 crore goat at Sadeeq Agro. Photo Collected

The demolition work started around 12:30pm on Thursday (27 June).

Most of the structures, including one wall of the main building of Sadeeq Agro, was built after occupying a canal, said Dhaka North City Corporation sources.

Dhaka North City Corporation demolished illegal structure of Sadeeq Agro on 27 June. Photo Collected

“When we visited here in the morning, Sadeeq Agro authorities claimed the building has valid documents. After that we checked the documents again but we found that the building has been built occupying the canal site [illegally],” said Motakabbir Ahmed, the regional executive officer and executive magistrate of Dhaka North City Corporation Region-5.

The much talked about goat which was priced at Tk15 lakh was also kept here. During the eviction, the goat was moved to an open space nearby.

Earlier yesterday, Mahbub Hasan, executive magistrate of Dhaka North City Corporation, told that a letter was sent from the city corporation to the DMP for police deployment during the eviction drive.

Partial view of eviction. Photo Collected

The letter signed by Mohammad Mahe Alam, chief property officer of Dhaka North, revealed, “The illegal constructions by Sadeeq Agro Limited on canal and road land, along with other illegal structures in the vicinity of Mohammadpur embankment under Zone-5 of Dhaka North City, will be evicted. It is requested to take necessary measures to send 3 platoons of male police and 1 platoon of female police to Nagar Bhaban, Gulshan-2 at 10:00am on Thursday.”

They were given notice earlier, but the farm authorities ignored the warnings, said the city corporation.

The owner of Sadeeq Agro farm is Imran Hossain, president of Bangladesh Dairy Farmers Association (BDFA).

The land is owned by someone named Abdul Rashid Talukder. The place is looked after by Abdul Rashid’s brother Abdul Alim.

Sadeeq Agro had taken the land on lease. Imran renewed the lease for three years on 1 April this year.

Abdul Alim said, “The amount of land we have here is 4.96%. Before this, our boundaries were determined by the Water Development Board and the City Corporation.”

The controversy surrounding Mushfiqur Rahman Ifat and his notorious goat purchase began when he made a Facebook post about him buying the goat for an initial amount of Tk15 lakh.

However, people started questioning the source of the money when Ifat’s father Matiur’s name came up. Matiur Rahman who is a former National Board of Revenue (NBR) member, took a strange route when faced with his son’s extravagant expenditure, claiming Mushfiqur wasn’t even his child.

When this claim was easily refuted, Imran returned to the scene.

This time, the Sadiq Agro chairman changed his narrative.

He claimed the goat remained unsold and that Ifat had only paid a booking amount of Tk1 lakh without taking delivery.

Ifat countered these claims, accusing Imran of staging a “drama” using him.

By this time, authorities had begun looking into Matiur’s wealth.

He was been removed from his post as president of the NBR Customs, Excise and VAT Appellate Tribunal – the first time such a move had been made against an NBR tribunal president.

Matiur was then attached to the Internal Resources Division (IRD) of the finance ministry, but wasn’t given any specific designation in his new role, effectively making him an Officer on Special Duty (OSD).

A process began to also remove him from the board of Sonali Bank.

An ACC investigation, which officially began on 4 June, is also looking into 55 bighas of land in Pubail under his name, alongside a park, more 300 bighas of land, a shoe factory, expensive cars and homes parked under his or his relative’s names.

Then a Dhaka court imposed a travel ban on Ifat’s father, Matiur Rahman, a former member of the National Board of Revenue (NBR), and his family on Monday (24 June).

However, reports suggest that both Ifat and his father have already left the country.