The High Court on Sunday exonerated 11 Supreme Court lawyers from the contempt of court charges as they apologised for the chaos they created in the courtroom on August 2.
Ten of them, however, landed in jail as a Dhaka court had earlier rejected their petitions seeking bail in two cases filed by the police against them for assaulting the police and obstructing them in their duties during the scuffles in the courtroom.
Of the 11, Bangladesh Nationalist Party lawmaker Syeda Asifa Ashrafi Papia and Tawhidul Islam were arrested on August 4 in the two cases and later were sent to jail.
Eight of the 11 - Kamrul Islam Sajal, Mirza Al Mahmud, Sharif Uddin Ahmed, Abdullah Al Mahmud, Mohammad Ali, Md Ashrafuzzaman Khan, Anamul Hossain Gaffar and Golam Nobi - surrendered in the court of metropolitan magistrate Md Shahadat Hossain in the morning seeking bail in the two cases.
They surrendered in accordance with a decision made by the attorney general, Mahbubey Alam, and the Supreme Court Bar Association president, Khandker Mahbub Hossain, on August 11 following the instruction of the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court to resolve the crisis in the Supreme Court arena over the issue.
The crisis came up with scuffles between the layers leaning to the ruling Awami League and the opposition BNP in the courtroom on August 2 when the High Court bench of AHM Shamsuddin Chowdhury and Justice Gobinda Chandra Tagore, during the hearing in a petition filed against Fazlul Haque Amini, the chairperson of a faction of the Islami Oikya Jote, for making adverse comment about the constitution, warned the BNP chairperson, Khaleda Zia, against making any indecorous comments about the constitution in the future.
The same bench on August 3 imposed a temporary ban on legal practice of the 13 lawyers and issued a rule asking them to explain why they would not be prosecuted on the contempt of court charges for the scuffles.
The police on August 2 filed two cases against the pro-BNP lawyers accusing them of assaulting the police and obstructing them in discharging their duties during the scuffles.
The metropolitan magistrate on Sunday morning rejected the bail petitions filed by the eight lawyers and ordered them to be sent to jail, which triggered instant protests from the BNP-backed lawyers.
The High Court bench, however, ordered the authorities to produce all the detained lawyers before it by 4:00pm.
The authorities accordingly produced eight lawyers from the lock-up in the Dhaka court and Papia and Towhid from prison in the High Court.
All of them, along with lawyer Sahiduzzaman, who had not surrendered, apologised to the court.
The court pardoned them and withdrew its earlier order that had imposed the temporary ban on their legal practice.
All of them but Sahiduzzaman were sent to jail after the High Court order.
The High Court, however, ordered them to obtain bail form the metropolitan magistrate's court and asked the attorney general to assist them in this regard.
Two other lawyers, MU Ahmed and Rezwan Ahmed, who are also facing the rule, were not produced in the High Court as MU Ahmed, arrested on August 11 and now in hospital after he suffering a heart attack, was seriously ill and Rezwan could not be recognised by the senior lawyers.
Source : New Age
