A Pakistani ice-cream salesman who lives in a slum is facing meltdown after he learned that for more than a year he was the unwitting owner of a bank account containing 2.3bn rupees (£14m), The Guardian reported.


Officials from the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) brought Muhammad Abdul Qadir in for questioning about the fortune last month as they investigated a massive money-laundering scam involving dozens of fake bank accounts.

“I am the most unlucky man in the world,” the 52-year-old said in a television interview. “When I came to know about [the huge sum], it was no longer there.”

The FIA is probing at least 77 bank accounts – typically created in the names of labourers, security guards and other down-at-heel citizens – thought to be part of a 35bn rupee (£220m) laundromat for dirty money that allegedly reaches up to former president Asif Ali Zardari.