Ashutosh Sarkar

The government yesterday issued an ordinance to establish the long-desired Supreme Court secretariat with a view to ensuring full independence of the judiciary.

Chief justice to have overall control, financial authority

The non-party caretaker government system has returned to Bangladesh’s constitution, but apparently not for the national polls slated for early February.

Some legal experts have strongly opposed the National Consensus Commission’s recommendation that constitutional reforms in the July charter be automatically incorporated into the constitution if these are not implemented within a 270-day timeframe.

The government-formed task force may again fail to submit its full-fledged probe report to the High Court in connection with the murders of journalists Sagar Sarwar and Meherun Runi.

The backlog of pending cases, including appeals in some sensational murder trials, is growing at the Appellate Division (AD) of the Supreme Court due to the slow pace of hearings and disposals.

Systemic barriers discourage young women from pursuing judicial careers, legal experts said.

204 cases filed under cyber laws that have remained pending with eight cyber tribunals across the country for more than five years

With one judge for every 78,023 people, the Supreme Court and lower courts have been grappling with a growing backlog of cases, delaying legal remedies for thousands of justice seekers.

The final judgment in the cases is now pending with the Appellate Division as trial proceedings have been completed at the lower court and HC Division

Despite repeated proposals and directives, the interim government has yet to establish a separate secretariat for the judiciary, a crucial reform to ensure the judiciary’s institutional independence.

In a major step to reduce the crippling backlog of cases and restore public confidence in the judiciary, the authorities are set to appoint at least 20 additional High Court judges through the newly formed Supreme Judicial Appointment Council.

Each HC judge is burdened with 6,552 cases, while Appellate Division judges are handling 4,446 cases each, and lower court judges 1,977 cases each.

The wait for justice is likely to grow longer in the case over the Holey Artisan militant attack that claimed the lives of 22 people, including 17 foreign nationals, nine years ago.

Judge shortage, lack of witnesses, inadequate court infrastructure blamed for delays

More than nine years have passed since a case was filed over the rape of a nine-year-old schoolgirl in Dhaka’s Khilkhet area. The tribunal dealing with the case has framed charges against the lone accused and held 96 hearings but is yet to complete the trial.

The Appellate Division of the Supreme Court in the full text of a verdict has upheld its previous judgement that reformulated 39-point code of conduct for its judges with a view to avoiding any confusion under article 96 of the constitution.

The Appellate Division of the Supreme Court in the full text of a verdict has observed that the sixteenth amendment to the constitution, which had empowered the parliament to remove the SC judges for incapacity or misbehavior, is a colourable legislation and is violative of separation of powers among the three organs of the state -- executive, legislature and judiciary, and independence of the judiciary.

Justice continues to evade the family of Sultana Jasmine, a 41-year-old land office employee from Naogaon, who died in the custody of Rapid Action Battalion (Rab) over two years ago.

The High Court, in the full text of a verdict, has said that the appointments of Supreme Court judges were not always made on merit, and many unsatisfactory appointments were made to the High Court on political or other considerations, badly affecting the image of the country’s judiciary.