The High Court is scheduled for today to pronounce its verdict on two writ petitions challenging the legality of the Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami’s registration with the Election Commission as a political party.
The cause list, the list of the cases to be dealt with by the courts, for today, published on Wednesday included the writ petitions for verdict to be delivered by the special bench of Justice M Moazzam Husain, Justice M Enayetur Rahim and Justice Quazi Reza-ul Hoque at 2:00pm.
The same bench on June 12, after completion of the hearing in the writ petitions, had reserved the pronouncement of the judgement for a later date.
The Bangladesh Tariqat Federation secretary general, Syed Rezaul Haque Chandpuri, and 24 leaders of the federation, the Zaker Party and Sammilita Islami Jote filed the writ petitions on January 25, 2009.
After a preliminary hearing in the writ petitions a High Court bench had issued a rule on January 27, 2009, asking the commission and the Jamaat to explain why the commission’s decision of November 20, 2008 to register the Jamaat as a political party would not be declared illegal.
The petitioners had on February 18, 2013 petitioned the chief justice to constitute a bench for the final hearing in the writ petitions and the chief justice had on March 5 assigned a two-member bench lead by Justice Moazzam Husain for the disposal of the writ petitions.
On March 10, the two-judge bench had referred the matter to the chief justice for the constitution of a larger bench as the matter involved a substantial question of law as the interpretation of the constitution. The chief justice on the same day constituted the special bench that had completed the hearing in the petitions on June 12.
During the final hearing, petitioners’ lawyer Tania Amir argued that the commission’s decision to register Jamaat as a political party was illegal as its constitution contradicted Article 90C of the Representation of the People Order 1972, and certain articles of the Constitution of the Republic, including its preamble, and the Proclamation of Independence declared by the exile government of Bangladesh at Mujibnagar on April 17, 1971.
She argued that Jamaat had no eligibility to be registered as a political party as it did not fulfil the requirements stipulated in Article 90C of the 1972 order.
The Article 90C(1)(b), as amended in 2008, stipulates that a political party will not be qualified for registration if its constitution is in any way discriminatory on grounds of religion or gender, Tania said.
He argued that Jamaat’s constitution was discriminatory to not only non-Muslims but also to many practicing Muslims and women, which is a violation of the fundamental tenets of the country’s constitution.
A political party cannot qualify for registration, if its name and nomenclature, flag, symbol or any activities threaten to destroy communal harmony in the society in an attempt to divide the nation and to distort its constitutional and religious values, Tania contended.
The Election Commission’s counsel Mohsin Rashid argued that the commission committed nothing wrong by giving temporary registration to Jamaat as a party on conditions that it would amend in six months its party constitution removing the provisions inconsistent with the constitution of the republic and Article 90C of the 1972 order.
Jamaat’s lawyer Abdur Razzaq questioned the maintainability of the writ petition since Jamaat had already amended its party constitution following the rule the High Court issued in January 2009.
He claimed that there was nothing in the Jamaat constitution inconsistent with the country’s constitution.
-With New Age input
