The Bangladesh revenue board has asked all banks to freeze accounts of detained former prime minister Sheikh Hasina, her five family members and several other high-profile leaders, officials said in Dhaka on Friday.
The central intelligence cell of the National Board of Revenue has sent a list of 55 people including Hasina and some charities to all commercial banks and the savings directorate with a direction to freeze their accounts.
NBR sources said Hasina's nuclear scientist husband Wajed Miah, expatriate sister Sheikh Rehana, expatriate son Sajeeb Wajed Joy, daughter Saima Wajed Putul and her husband are on their list.
The others included former foreign minister M Morshed Khan of ex-premier Khaleda Zia's Bangladesh Nationalist Party government and his family members, ex-BNP state minister for home Lutfozzaman Babar and his relatives and former vice-chancellor of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University Prof MA Hadi and detained former president of the apex body of the country's business chambers Abdul Awal Mintu.
The list also included Awami League-run Bangabandhu Memorial Museum, Bangabandhu Memorial Trust and Grenade Affected Welfare Trust.
"According to the NBR order the account holders would not be allowed to withdraw Fixed Deposit Receipt or make transactions," a NBR official said.
The Awami League leader is now in a makeshift jail to face an extortion charge.
Earlier in March, the NBR asked all commercial banks to immediately suspend transactions of accounts of 53 graft suspects when it froze accounts of former law minister barrister Moudud Ahmed of BNP and his wife Hasna Moudud.
The powerful Anti-Corruption Commission earlier asked Hasina and her arch-rival and BNP chief Khaleda Zia to submit their wealth statements by the end of this week.
According to NBR sources, the revenue board has so far frozen the accounts of 400 high-profile politicians and businessmen as part of the interim government's anti-graft campaign.
