The case against Didarul Alam, the importer and owner of M/s Nafis Corporation and M/s Shamshed International, was filed on Thursday with the Court of Metropolitan Magistrate Mokhlesur Rahman.

Humayun Kabir Chowdhury, proprietor of M/s Hamara Shipping Agency and shipping agent of Korean flag carrier MV Celtic that carried the wheat, lodged the case.

Stevedoring firm Ruhul Amin and Brothers, two carrier firms Kaderia Enterprise and Marine Services and Traders, and owners of six barges were also implicated in the case for their alleged collusion with the importer in the mischief.

The court ordered the officer-in-charge (OC) of Patenga Police Station to investigate the matter on an urgent basis and take measures to recover the goods.

According to the case, Didarul had opened two letters of credit (L/Cs) on behalf of his two firms at Southeast Bank's Jubilee Road branch, and United Commercial Bank's Agrabad branch on February 24 and 26 this year to import 26,500 tonnes of wheat from Priyanka Overseas Limited of Delhi, India. The ship carrying the goods arrived at the outer anchorage on February 27.

To avoid payment of demurrage for the ship's overstay, the importer on March 5 submitted a Letter of Indemnity (LoI) to the shipping agent requesting him to arrange unloading of the goods through lighterage vessels from MV Celtic at the outer anchorage.

The LoI also urged the shipping agent to take release of the goods after completing customs and port formalities, and paying all the duties. The importer promised to bear all the expenses required.

The importer on March 2 sent a letter to the customs authorities informing them of 'No Objection' to unload the wheat, and later paid about Tk 10.4 lakh as 'river dues' in three pay orders to Chittagong Port Authority (CPA), sources said.

Following two letters of guarantee from the shipping agent, the customs authorities gave permission to unload the goods from MV Celtic through 32 lighterage vessels and appointed a customs official to supervise the unloading. Twenty-four ansar personnel were also deployed for security.

"But the importer secretly took six lighterage vessels out of the port area and unloaded about 5,650 tonnes of wheat and later unloaded another 4,500 tonnes from other lighterage vessels. The goods are worth about Tk 11.97 crore," said shipping agent Humayun Kabir.

The importer, owners of lighterage vessels, ansar personnel and some corrupt customs officials were involved in the misdeed, he alleged.

The two guarantor banks had earlier on March 31 lodged a complaint with the customs authorities against the importer for unloading the goods without informing them. The authorities on April 2 served a show cause notice on the shipping agent, who replied to it the next day.

The shipping agent said the importer has not yet submitted original import documents from the banks to the customs authorities.

When contacted, the importer denied the charges brought against him by the shipping agent.

"After arrival of the goods, I found some discrepancies in the documents provided by the shipping agent and also found that a substantial quantity of the wheat was not edible. I complained to the customs and other authorities about these and refused to receive the goods," Didarul said yesterday.

Opening of the LC on February 24 and 26, and arrival of the ship carrying the goods at the outer anchorage just a day after indicated that the shipping agent himself did something fishy and is now trying to shift the blame on him, the importer said.