Court Correspondent :
The Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) yesterday moved the court to drop bribery charges against former Chief Justice Surendra Kumar Sinha brought by former BNP Minister Barrister Nazmul Huda.
On Tuesday, the graft watchdog moved the motion to a Dhaka Metropolitan Magistrate Court when the court held a hearing on the investigation report, said Zulfikar Ali, General Registration Office of the court. The court forwarded the case to Dhaka’s Senior Special Judge’s Court.
In a report filed to the court on December 4 last year, the ACC said it found no evidence backing Huda’s allegations against Sinha of corruption and abusing office. The ACC then decided to prosecute Huda, the President of the Bangladesh Nationalist Alliance (BNA), on charges of false allegations.
On Sep 27, last year, Huda filed the case with Dhaka’s Shahbagh Police Station, which forwarded the case to the ACC.
A former BNP Minister and later expelled from the party, Huda had accused the then Chief Jjustice Sinha of “influencing a High Court bench” to issue an order against him in 2017. He also brought charges of abuse of office and bribery against Sinha.
Huda was sentenced to seven years in jail and his wife Sigma Huda to three years in a case started during the 2007-2008 military-installed caretaker administration on bribery charges involving Tk 24 million.
The High Court acquitted them in 2011 following their appeal, but the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court cancelled the High Court verdict and ordered a rehearing of the couple’s plea following the ACC petition.
Sinha was an Appellate Division judge at the time. After the rehearing, another High Court bench upheld the conviction of the couple but reduced Huda’s sentence in November 2017.
A former President of the Supreme Court Bar Association, Huda was a top leader of the BNP once. He had also served as Communication Minister in Khaleda Zia administration.
After being expelled from the BNP in 2010, he had formed Bangladesh Nationalist Front, Bangladesh Manobadhikar Party, Trinamool BNP and finally the BNA alliance.
Ahead of the 2018 national elections, around the same time when sued Sinha, Huda launched a failed bid to join the Awami League-led coalition in an effort to contest the parliamentary polls.
