Copy of High Court verdict released

Preserving historic sites relating to Independence War 
Exactly one year after the High Court issued directives to the Government to preserve and maintain historic sites relating to Bangladesh’s war of Independence, the court yesterday released a copy of the historic verdict.
The judgement directs the preservation and maintenance of all important historical places, including killing grounds, relating to the country’s War of Liberation.
Responding to the judgement, Attorney General Mahbubey Alam acknowledged it as a milestone in the Nation’s history.
“I hope that the government would come forward to preserve and maintain all historical places in the country as per the court order,” he said. The HC has set a legal framework for the Government, he added.
The verdict has directed the government to form a committee comprising  politicians, historians, freedom fighters, anthropologists and sector commanders immediately to identify all such historical sites including mass graves, killing fields, graves of the freedom fighters and other related symbols so that tourists and foreign dignitaries can pay homage to the martyred freedom fighters, and also know the history of the country’s Liberation War.
It also directed the government to identify the Suhrawardy Udyan where Bangabandhu Shiekh Mujibur Rahman delivered his historic address on March 7, 1971 calling upon the people to break free from the subjugation of Pakistani rule to achieve independence.
It also asked the government to identify the place in which the Pakistan occupation forces surrendered on December 16, 1971.
The court also observed that the sector commanders who fought for the independence by staking their everything should be decorated with the Independence Award. 
The court also mentioned its reservations about the conferring of the  Independence Award on the Bangabandhu.  It observed that the award undermined the greatness of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman who is commonly seen as the Father of the Nation and the architect and symbol of the country’s independence.
The court had passed the historic judgement exactly a year ago after a PIL  was moved by a retired armyman Maj Gen (Retd) KM Safiullah Bir Uttam and Prof Muntasir Mamun jointly seeking to preserve and maintain historic places relating to the War of Liberation. The two member HC bench comprised Justice ABM Khairul Haque and Justice Momtazuddin Ahmed.
 
Courtesy of The Independent