Destiny 2000
January 15, 2025
A Dhaka court on January 15, 2025 sentenced Destiny Group managing director Rafiqul Amin and 18 others to 12 years in prison in a case over the misappropriation of funds raised through the company's Destiny Tree Plantation Limited project, and fined the 19 convicts a combined Tk 4,515.57 crore.
Judge Md Rabiul Alam of Dhaka's Special Judge's Court-4 delivered the verdict. The court directed the convicts to deposit the fine with the state within six months. Those sentenced include Destiny Group chairman Mohammad Hossain, Destiny-2000 president and former army chief Lt Gen (retd) Harun-Ar-Rashid, Amin's wife Farah Diba, and several vice presidents, directors and senior distributors. Fifteen of the accused had been absconding since the case was filed, and the court issued arrest warrants for them.
The Anti-Corruption Commission filed the case on July 31, 2012, and pressed charges in 2014 in two cases accusing 51 people of misappropriating more than Tk 4,200 crore from investors. Charges were framed in August 2016, and the court heard 141 prosecution witnesses. The verdict had been set for November 28, 2024 but was deferred because the judgment was not ready.
Because Amin and Hossain had already been held for more than 12 years, both were released from jail on the evening of the verdict. Farah Diba remained in prison to complete her term. In a separate money laundering case, the same court sentenced 46 people, including Amin and Harun-Ar-Rashid, to prison terms in May 2022.
Destiny-2000 Ltd, founded in Dhaka in 2000, was once one of Bangladesh's largest multilevel marketing organizations before its operations were halted in 2012.