Dhaka: Authorities have decided to charge former Prime Minister and Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) chief Khaleda Zia under the tough Emergency Powers Rules (EPR) in a graft case to bar her from seeking bail, officials said today. Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) officials said they decided to charge Zia and her younger son Arafat Rahman Koko under the EPR a month after they were arrested for alleged corruption in appointing a controversial contractor to handle the Chittagong Port and a Railway Container Depot in Dhaka.

"As a result they would not be allowed to seek bail in the court," ACC secretary Mokhlesur Rahman said while legal experts of the anti-graft body said under EPR, the trial of the case must be completed within 60 days. Zia's arch rival ex-premier and Awami League chief Sheikh Hasina who was arrested in June this year on two "extortion cases" was also charged under EPR but she challenged the decision in High Court which was yet to hear her petition.

ACC officials said the anti-graft body was set to file a fresh case against Zia's elder son Tarique Rahman "very soon" as they now examined all evidence and provisions of relevant laws before filing a case against the high profile corruption suspect on separate graft charges. Rahman, also BNP's senior joint secretary general, concealed information about Tk 4 crore in his wealth statement and evidence has been found showing his income to be disproportionate to his known sources of income, they said.