Dhaka, Mar 19 (bdnews24.com) — RanksTel director Amanullah Chowdhury claimed on Friday that BTRC had found no illegal VoIP equipment during an overnight raid of the telephone company's operations centre.

The telecoms regulator shut down private land phone operator RanksTel earlier on Friday for allegedly running unlicensed internet telephony operations.

It is the third telephone company in under a week to be caught in BTRC's drive against the illegal VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) trade.

Three RanksTel officials were detained following the overnight raid, from Thursday evening to Friday morning, of the company's main switch room, in which BTRC reportedly uncovered evidence of illegal operations.

BTRC shut down all operations of the main switch room at Novo Tower in the capital's Tejgaon industrial area and sealed the offices at around 9am, the phone company's chief operating, officer Abul Kalam Shamsuddin, told bdnews24.com.

Elite anti-crime force Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) assisted Bangladesh Telecommunications Regulatory Commission (BTRC) officials during the drive.

RAB intelligence division chief Lt Col Ziaul Ahsan told bdnews24.com VoIP appliances were seized from the RanksTel's operations centre at Novo Tower.

He said that RanksTel general manager (engineering) Sheikh Kamruzzaman, deputy general manager (engineering) Mominur Rahman Chowdhury and deputy general manager (sales) Iqbal Karim Bhuiyan Noman were detained for questioning.

But RanksTel director Amanullah Chowdhury, in a press conference later the same day, claimed: "There was no VoIP equipment and so none was recovered."

"We have been victimised through the conspiracies of self-interested groups," he alleged.

"VoIP equipment has previously been recovered from offices of larger organisations. But their switch rooms were not shut down."

Due to the shut down, losses of Tk 20 lakh would be incurred per day and 300,000 customers will be deprived of service, the company's director said.

COO Abul Kalam Shamsuddin also denied that his company was involved in any illegal VoIP operations.

"BTRC's raid lasted over 12 hours, but they didn't find anything illegal. We have not been involved in any illegal operations," he said.

"They took away three of our officials. We don't know where they are," he added.

Chowdhury also said the three detained officials could not be contacted and that their families were worried.

The director also said "if there are any faults on RanksTel's part, they are willing to pay fines according to the law" and demanded fair trial of the incident.

The telecoms regulator in two recent raids on Mar 14 and Mar 16 said it found evidence of illegal call operations against telephone companies Dhaka Phone and WorldTel respectively.

Five top executives of Dhaka Phone officials were sent to jail after being arrested on charges of running unlicensed VoIP services.

bdnews24.com/lh/adk/rah/2013h.