In a dramatic turn of events, three senior executives of the embattled travel platform Flight Expert were arrested late Saturday night while attempting to file a police complaint against their own managing director at Motijheel Police Station.
The arrested include Head of Finance Sakib Hossain (32), Chief Commercial Officer Saeed Ahmed (40), and Chief Operating Officer AKM Sadat Hossain (32), all now facing charges in an alleged Tk4 crore embezzlement case involving fraudulent flight bookings.
The arrests came hours after the company’s abrupt collapse, which began with its website mysteriously going offline Saturday morning. As panicked reports flooded social media about missing tickets and unpaid refunds, hundreds of cheated customers and travel agents descended on Flight Expert’s Motijheel headquarters demanding answers.
The situation escalated when Government Tours & Travels owner Bipul Sarker formally accused the company of financial fraud that evening.
Ironically, the three arrested executives had visited the police station themselves to file a General Diary against their fugitive MD Salman Bin Rashid, who employees believe has fled to Canada with his family. According to their statement, Rashid vanished without warning on Saturday, later announcing the company’s shutdown through a WhatsApp group message to staff.
The case names five total defendants including Rashid and his father MA Rashid, exposing the dramatic downfall of what was once a prominent player in Bangladesh’s online travel sector. Operating under the Mecca Group umbrella, Flight Expert had built its reputation on Hajj/Umrah packages and flight bookings before its sudden collapse left thousands of customers stranded mid-transaction.