'Withdraw your comment'

Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) yesterday requested Law Minister Anisul Huq to withdraw his comment on BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia's lawyers over shifting her trial to old Dhaka central jail.

Terming his comment “regrettable and unfortunate”, SCBA president Advocate Zainul Abedin said, “He is a lawyer, the law minister and a responsible person. The countrymen, including his peers, do not expect such comment from him.”

“The law minister's comment was an insult to all lawyers of the country,” SCBA president also said at a press conference at the SCBA auditorium.

On Monday, pro-BNP lawyers said shifting the trial was a “misuse of judicial powers” by the law ministry and sought chief justice's intervention in this regard.

They submitted an application to the office of Chief Justice Syed Mahmud Hossain, requesting him to launch enquiries and take appropriate actions against the judicial officers “encroaching their legal boundaries at the instruction of the government”.

The minister, in response, refuted the allegations saying “I think, if they have made such allegations, I will say that they [Khaleda's lawyers] don't know law.”

SCBA Secretary Barrister AM Mahbub Uddin Khokon also spoke at the press conference.

After the SCBA press conference ended, pro-Awami League lawyers held another briefing and requested the SCBA not to create any controversy over the law minister's comment.

They said the gazette notification regarding Khaleda's trial in old Dhaka central jail was issued as per Section 9(2) of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) and is legal.