The president of the opposition-controlled Bangladesh Supreme Court Bar Association has said executive magistrates punishing opposition supporters in political programmes through mobile courts is unlawful.
Khandaker Mahbub Hossain, a pro-BNP lawyer, on Monday at a press briefing said such move was a threat to the independence of judiciary.
Magistrates before and during the BNP shutdown on June 12 and 13 summarily sentenced over 100 opposition supporters to jail and penalised many others.
The BNP acting secretary general, Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir, on the second day of the 36-hour countrywide shutdown vowed to challenge such mobile courts in court. He also expressed the party's stand to face the issue politically.
He alleged the punishments were given under the tobacco and anti-drug law of 1952.
Two executive magistrates on that day claimed that they were handing down punishments
under sections 353 and 186 of the 2009 Bangladesh Penal Code for mobile courts. The sections provide for action against obstruction in government duty.
The home minister, Sahara Khatun, the same day said legal action had been taken against those creating anarchy.
'Mobile courts are working in line with the law, even the ministers don't have the right to speak about or against the court.'
Human rights organisation Ain o Salish Kendra expressed concern over the operations of such mobile courts, saying those might affect general people like in the past.
Source : New Age
