bdnews24.com :
The High Court has turned down a lawyer’s petition that challenged the legality of the government’s coronavirus ‘lockdown’ restrictions.
That’s not the end of the story.
Supreme Court Advocate Yunus Ali Akhand has been fined by two judges for wasting their precious time.
The High Court bench of Justice M Enayetur Rahim and Justice Sardar Md Rashed Jahangir struck down the lawyer’s petition and imposed a fine of Tk 10,000 on him on Wednesday.
In his petition filed on Apr 25, Akhand argued that the government should not have imposed the lockdown without declaring a state of emergency and called for a stay on the restrictions and an order to prevent further lockdowns in future. The petition named the cabinet secretary and the National Technical Advisory Committee on COVID-19 as defendants.
It stated that the government should not restrict the right of the people to move freely without a state of emergency and the government’s action was unconstitutional.
The lockdown without a state of emergency violated Articles 27, 28, 31, 32, 33, 35 and 36 of the constitution, the lawyer claimed.
The petition was put on the cause list on Apr 27. The court called Akhand on Sunday as well, but he was not present. The court then set a new date for Tuesday, but Akhand missed that hearing as well. The petition was then put on the cause list on Wednesday and called the petitioner several times, but there was no response.
The court then asked the opinion of Deputy Attorney General Mustafizur Rahman Khan whether a petitioning attorney could be fined in addition to the dismissal of the petition if they failed to appear before the court.
