The law minister has finally submitted the draft of service rules for lower court judges to Chief Justice Surendra Kumar Sinha, after a long delay that caused tensions between the judiciary and the executive.
Published : 27 Jul 2017, 09:47 PM
The top court had granted the state 22 extensions for publishing the gazette, while warning it against asking for more extensions.
On Thursday, the law minister himself handed the document over to the chief justice, law ministry spokesperson Rezaul Karim told bdnews24.com.
“The minister was here to meet the chief justice and left about 40 minutes later,” the High Court Division’s Additional Registrar Sabbir Foyez told bdnews24.com.
Asked about the purpose of the visit, he said: “As far as I know, the minister handed over the final draft of the gazette on services rules for lower court judges.”
The request for more time was made just few days after Law Minister Huq, after a meeting with Chief Justice Sinha on Jul 20, told reporters that the gazette would be out in the coming days.
The government submitted a draft of the rules for lower court judges last year for the separation of the judiciary from the executive on Nov 1, 2007.
The separation followed a historic Appellate verdict over a case filed by judge Masdar Hossain.
It declared the judicial services independent, dissolving the judicial cadre of the Bangladesh Civil Service on the grounds that it was incompatible with the constitution.
But the draft of rules submitted by the government last year were declared incompatible to Masdar Hossain case verdict because it appeared similar to the Government Servants (Discipline and Appeal) Rules 1985.
The Supreme Court then amended the draft and sent it back to the law ministry, asking it to finalise and submit it as a report.
It has since granted a series of extensions for the publication of the gazette.