Bismillah Paribahan owner jailed for contempt

In a rare move, the Supreme Court today sent Abdus Shahid, a transport businessman, to jail from the court for violating its order against construction of a building in Habiganj.

The Appellate Division of the SC also sentenced Shahid, owner of Bismillah Paribahan, to 15-day simple imprisonment for committing contempt of court.

SC Registrar Syed Aminul Islam handed over Shahid, who appeared before the apex court this morning in connection with a contempt of court petition, to police as per the SC order.

Shahid committed contempt of court by continuing construction of the structure and preventing Haiganj Pourasava authorities from demolishing it defying the SC order, petitioner’s counsel Subrata Chowdhury told The Daily Star.

He said Shahid constructed a three-storey building occupying a land of one Shyamal Kanti Das at Ramakrishna Mission Road in Habiganj in December 2011 without any approval from the pourasava.

Following a petition filed by Shyamal, the joint district judge of Habiganj ordered Shahid to stop constructing the building in January 2012.

Then Shahid filed an appeal with the High Court challenging the Habiganj district judges’ court order.

In April 2012, the HC stayed the Habiganj court order. Later, Shyamal appealed to the SC against the HC order.

SC on January 27, 2013 issued a status quo on construction of the structure. But Shahid continued constructing the structure ignoring the SC status quo order.

Shyamal then filed the contempt of court petition with the SC against Shahid.

In April 6 last year, the SC ordered the municipality authorities to demolish the building.

Shahid, however, prevented the municipality authorities from demolishing the structure.

On April 5 this year, during hearing the contempt of court petition, the Appellate Division summoned Shahid and Habijanj municipality’s acing mayor Peyara Begum, its secretary Md Nur Azam Bin Akthar and engineer Madhusudan Das to appear before it today to explain their role over demolishing the building.

The four appeared before the apex court bench headed by Chief Justice SK Sinha today.

Their lawyer AKM Fayez told the court that his client tried to demolish the building at different times, but they could not do that due to prevention from Shahid.

After hearing, the SC sentenced Shahid for one month’s imprisonment and ordered the municipality authorities to remove the illegal structure in a month.