Ashutosh Sarkar

Negligence of Sylhet’s Murari Chand College’s principal and hostel superintendent “crumbled” the right to life and personal liberty of the woman raped on campus, the High Court observed yesterday, directing that they be suspended.

The Official Secrets Act, under which journalist Rozina Islam has been accused and sent to jail, directly contradicts the Right to Information Act, Public-interest Information Disclosure Act, and the spirit of the constitution.

Minu Akhter, who has been serving in prison for three years instead of the convicted Kulsuma Akhter in a case filed over the killing of one Kohinur Begum in Chattogram in 2006, awaits a High Court ruling on her unjust circumstances.

Justice could not be delivered even 17 years after the grisly murder of Awami League lawmaker Ahsanullah Master as appeals in case are still now pending with the apex court.

It has been a long and agonising wait for Sheikh Zahid.

Nine years have passed since former BNP lawmaker M Ilias Ali and his driver Ansar disappeared from the capital, but their families are still waiting anxiously for their return home.

Twenty years on from the 2001 Ramna Batamul bomb blasts which killed ten people at Pahela Baishakh celebrations, justice is yet to be delivered to the family members of the victims as the appeals and death reference in connection with the carnage case are still pending with the High Court.

The High Court has observed that restricting or interfering with citizen’s free movement because of “arbitrary or whimsical desires” of the government or state authorities is unconstitutional.

The Awami League government has partially fulfilled its electoral pledge to hold trials over 1971 war crimes by bringing individuals to book but it is yet to make any considerable progress in trying organisations.

Safayet Ullah alias Sagor (19), a small trader at Chattogram’s Sandweep area has been suffering in jail for five and a half months without trial in a case filed under the Digital Security Act for making a derogatory comment about the prime minister on a Facebook post, although the post was circulated from the Facebook ID of Safayet Hossain Ayan.

Although the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court faces a shortage of judges, there is apparently no move from the authorities concerned for appointing new judges anytime soon.

The recent High Court verdict upholding 10 years’ imprisonment for Haji Md Salim has sparked a debate over his parliamentary membership and the careers of several other convicted politicians, whose appeals are still pending with this court and the Appellate Division.

A special High Court bench has observed that confessional statement of an accused child has no legal evidentiary value and such confessions cannot form the basis of finding him guilty.

Some unscrupulous people in the guise of businessmen conspired with rogues of the financial sector to loot the money of general people, said the High Court in an order on the liquidation of People’s Leasing and Financial Services Ltd (PLFSL).

The High Court yesterday warned loan defaulters that if they fail to pay back money to People’s Leasing and Financial Services Ltd (PLFSL), they will be thrown into jail.

The family members of 2009 Pilkhana massacre victims say they are still in the dark about the reasons behind such a bloodshed and who masterminded the killing of so many people.

The High Court yesterday came down heavily on a section of Bangladesh Bank officials over their alleged links with financial scams involving People’s Leasing and Financial Services Ltd (PLFSL), a non-bank financial institution.

Incarcerated for over nine months, writer Mushtaq Ahmed and cartoonist Ahmed Kishore were brought into the courtroom 11 days ago and produced before a judge.

A High Court verdict yesterday said if perpetrators were successful in implementing their plan to blast two powerful bombs, weighing 76kg and 40kg respectively, in Gopalganj’s Kotalipara in July 2000, when Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina was supposed to address a rally there, the incident would be similar to the August 15 massacre.

The High Court has observed in a verdict that it is about time corrupt military and civil officials and staffers, and judges were put before the court of people in order to establish the rule of law.