At this twilight of my profession, the confession I intend to make is that as I believed that in our situation the fight for the cause of justice needs to be waged on more than one fronts, I was not able to give as much time and undivided devotion to the legal profession as was demanded by the profession of law. But the cause of justice has always been my closest and personal public commitment.
After fifty years of practice in the legal profession my faith and commitment to the cause of justice for building a just society living in peace with itself is more fortified than ever.
I loved and enjoyed and am still enjoying walking through the corridors of justice. This much I can assure you all that no other profession would have given me greater satisfaction or required me to face more human rights-based challenges so selfless and so noble.
All along I have been appealing that bail is a right if presumption of innocence means anything and our fundamental rights are to be valued. We should do everything to complete the trial as speedily as possible but an FIR is not to be treated as a sentence of imprisonment. That should be seen as nothing short of justice by police.
Most hindrances to the course of fair justice are ensued from the flourishing businesses of arrest, bail and police remand. The sure way of encouraging false cases is to keep confined people just for allegation of a crime. We cannot forget that police are not independent or free to act freely.
Luck and blessings from Allah have played a very important part for bringing me where I am and what I am now. I found in my father that in serving a public cause the necessary source of courage was his personal honesty.
Our legal profession is personal to each of us but the service we render is supremely public. We also need courage of personal honesty and tenacity of devotion.
We take up a case to win but our motto is not to win at the cost of justice. Our joy is that we work for securing justice mostly for the weak and the helpless.
I was very fortunate for the remarkable opportunity to spend my formative years as junior lawyer first under Dr. Kamal Hossain and Haider Mota and later under Syed Ishtiaq Ahmed. All of them earned greatness for themselves as legal luminaries and contributed richly to the quality and integrity of the judicial process itself. More than anything, they taught me the ethics, decency and dignity of the profession.
On this occasion when one’s memories and experiences mix emotionally and tend to flow over, I have to recall and remember with humility and gratitude, some iconic Chief Justices like Justice Syed SM Murshed, Justice Shahabuddin Ahmed, Justice Mustafa Kamal, Justice ATM Afzal, Justice Badrul Haider Choudhury and Justice Mahmudul Amin Choudhury. We were lucky to have them in our days who shall shine in our memory like super stars for their erudition, passion, calm, courage and decency. In the crisis of arrogance of political power, they also had to dispense justice in most difficult situations. Through their brave work they have bequeathed to us a legacy of strong judiciary.
It was a great honour for me that with some of them I had the closest of relations. Yet, our personal relationship in no way interfered with our professional relationship. The situation has changed and we miss the warmth and value of informal relations between judges and lawyers. It is my belief that we learn more about our responsibility in pursuit of law and justice through such informal relations between the judges and lawyers than arguing cases in the court.
It is said and it is also true that lawyers are natural political leaders by knowledge, practice and outlook. We battle tooth and nail to win cases but win or lose we feel no bitterness against anybody. Our brotherly friendship does not change.
As Chief Justice SK Sinha has reminded the establishment recently that the strong role of the Judiciary is necessary to consolidate democracy. His Lordship clarified by mentioning the role of the Supreme Court to save the judicial process from being derailed in the dreadfully known as Narayanganj seven murder case. There is much boasting about democracy, still there is much deficiency in the practice of democracy. If politics is not about public service, then democracy has to be a casualty.
But one judgment punishing few members of elite security force for their extreme brutality as hired criminals do not mean much unless we are assured that such audacious acts will not be repeated by members of the disciplined law enforcers.
The people’s confidence in the judiciary is enhanced more by protecting the innocent ones than punishing the guilty ones. The truth cannot be denied that in an atmosphere of excessive police power the innocents have most to fear. Criminals have money power and political power to reckon with. Taking advantage of easy refusal of bail, criminal justice system is grossly abused.
We must not forget that as lawyers we are the heirs and inheritors of larger than life lawyers such as AK Fazlul Haque and Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy. They should be our ideals because they showed us the path of leadership and glory. They did not choose the easy life.
By denying ourselves the leadership position, the country is deprived of leadership of the rule of law and democracy. Wherever we are, we cannot be unfaithful to the nobility and teachings of our profession.
I shall also go on reminding our bright and rising young lawyers that your obligation is not just to law but much beyond. It is our responsibility to see safeguards of the rule of law exist for justice to be done equally to all.
My dear friends at the Bar the long life I have spent in your company has been the most enjoyable and honourable to me. I shall be with you engaged as actively as I can to take forward the cause of law and justice till I retire.
We cannot self-destruct ourselves by destroying the independence of the justice system and making our legal profession worth nothing.
