Report on amendment bill Sunday

The parliamentary committee on law ministry will present its report on the Bill to restore Parliament's power to remove judges at Parliament on Sunday.

The Parliament secretariat on Saturday released the orders of the day for Sunday, which says committee chief Suranjit Sengupta will present the report.

Law Minister Anisul Huq has already said the bill may be passed in the current session.

The Bill on what will be the 16th Amendment to the constitution was sent to the committee for scrutiny on last Sunday.

The committee looked through it on Tuesday and Wednesday as the nation was abuzz with fierce debate on the bill.

Suranjit told reporters after Tuesday’s meeting that the preamble was being dropped from the bill as they deemed it irrelevant.

He had earlier spoken of holding dialogues with the government, the judiciary and other political parties, but later said there was no need for discussions.

“We are restoring article 96 word for word from the 1972 constitution. There’s nothing new here, so we don’t need a discussion. But we will hold discussions while introducing the new law,” he said on Wednesday.

The amendment pending with Parliament requires that a law be introduced to guide the investigation and gathering of evidence of incapability or misconduct of a judge.

Law Minister Huq has assured that the law will be formulated within three months of the amendment.

Lawyers’ leaders have formed a committee with Dr Kamal Hossain at the head to resist the amendment.

Although chief opposition Jatiya Party at first declared that it would oppose the Bill, it too has changed its tone and rallied behind the planned amendment.

Opposition BNP alleges the government is pushing through the bill to impose itself on the judiciary.