Scam-hit BASIC Bank yesterday fired 10 officials, including three senior executives, for irregularities in their appointment.

The board of the state-run lender took the decision a few days ago. The bank yesterday issued an order to this effect, said Ruhul Alam, a deputy managing director of the bank.

Of the 10, three are senior officials employed by the bank on contractual basis.

One of them, Md Azizul Haq, was heading the loan recovery division of the bank as its deputy general manager.

Sources said Haq is the brother-in-law of Sheikh Abdul Hye Bacchu who stepped down in July last year after a central bank investigation unearthed financial irregularities that cost the bank Tk 4,500 crore during his chairmanship.

Haq’s appointment highlighted the interference of Bacchu, a government-blessed appointee, in the day-to-day running of the bank.

Haq joined the bank as an assistant general manager, but his job was regularised as a deputy general manager. He went into retirement after six months. Later, he was appointed for three years on a contractual basis.

The rest seven were employed at different branches as assistant cash officer. They were fired for getting the job on fake certificates.

Although they have been fired now, the bank unearthed the anomalies two years ago that they had submitted fake certificates to get the job, which led to their termination.

But they got admitted to private universities and passed, and used the certificates to get back their job.

The board, which was dissolved last year and then recast, cancelled their appointments after concluding that they should not have been given the job for the second time as they were terminated before, said an official of the bank.

The central bank inspection in 2012 detected scams involving over Tk 4,000 crore in some of the bank’s branches.

The Office of the Comptroller and Auditor General in the same year found 17 instances of financial irregularities at the bank’s headquarters.