Ashutosh Sarkar

The government has sent 11 lower court judges, now on deputation to different ministries, to Australia for training although the Supreme Court authorities earlier warned that judges will be charged with violation of discipline if they travel abroad without its approval.

The number of apex court judges has come down to six from 11 in 2009 after the retirement of Justice Nazmun Ara Sultana, the first-ever female judge of the Supreme Court.

The Jatiya Sangsad no longer has the power to remove Supreme Court judges for incapacity or misconduct as the government has finally lost the legal battle to defend the controversial 16th constitutional amendment that restored this authority of parliament.

The High Court has disposed of only one of the 27 appeals filed by graft suspects against their convictions during the past caretaker

The government is going to seek more time from the Supreme Court for issuing a gazette notification on the rules determining the discipline and code of conduct of lower court judges.

The shortage of judges in the Appellate and High Court Divisions of the Supreme Court has been compounded with deaths and

For the statue of Lady Justice, it was a brief stay on the Supreme Court premises. It was there for only five months.

The decision to remove Lady Justice’s statue from Supreme Court premises is made by Chief Justice Surendra Kumar Sinha himself, mainly to resolve the debate over this issue peacefully.

The High Court yesterday declared illegal annual readmission and session fees charged by English medium schools, much to the relief of students and their guardians. HC bench of Justice Sheikh Hassan Arif and Justice Md Badruzzaman delivered the verdict after hearing two writ petitions filed by two guardians in 2012 and 2014, challenging the legality of the fees.

The chief justice is the key person in forming opinion as to the eligibility of persons for appointment in the higher judiciary and his opinion shall have primacy over that of the executive, observed the High Court in a verdict recently.

The High Court has declared unconstitutional the rules under which executive magistrates run mobile courts.

Chief Justice Surendra Kumar Sinha and Attorney General Mahbubey Alam had a heated exchange yesterday during a hearing on the appeal against the High Court verdict that scrapped the 16th amendment of the constitution.

The government may seek more time from the Supreme Court for issuing a gazette notification on the rules determining the discipline and code of conduct of lower court judges, although the apex court on several previous occasions expressed dissatisfaction at the government's failure to do so.

The hearing proceedings of the BDR carnage case might be concluded in June this year as the High Court might need 30 to 40 more

Delivering the first ever appeal verdict over the killing of a blogger, the High Court yesterday came up with some observations on the roles of the state, imams and the parents in shaping an individual's life so that he or she cannot tread the path of militancy.

The government has to return Tk 615 crore to 17 companies and several businesspeople that were forced to deposit the amount with Bangladesh Bank as tax on their alleged hidden money during the last caretaker government's tenure. The companies and businesspeople yesterday won a legal battle at the Supreme Court, which rejected the BB's appeals against 11 High Court verdicts ordering the government to return the money.

The High Court yesterday questioned the legality of the constitutional provisions that empower the president to appoint Supreme Court and lower court judges and also to control the appointment, promotion and posting of and disciplinary measures against lower court judges.

The law ministry has started drafting an anti-discrimination law in order to protect the rights and ensure benefits of underprivileged people.

The High Court has yet to dispose of three rules issued at different times in the last 10 years questioning the legality of extrajudicial killings in law enforcers' custody.

Shortage of judges at the Supreme Court and other courts across the country is getting worse and creating a huge backlog of cases due to recruitment delays.