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The Appellate Division of the Supreme Court on Thursday deferred to November 16 the hearing on a review petition filed challenging its earlier verdict that upheld the cancellation of the 16th Constitutional Amendment brought to restore Parliament’s power to remove judges for incapacity or misconduct.
A five-member bench of the Appellate Division headed by Chief Justice Obaidul Hassan passed the deferment order after the petitioner's Advocate on Record M Ashrafuzzaman sought adjournment of the hearing.
The Appellate Division of the SC was scheduled to hear the six-year-old review petition on Thursday, November 9, 2023.
Lawyer M Ashrafuzzaman said, “The principal counsel for the writ petitioner, Manzill Murshid, has personal difficulties for appearing before this court on Thursday. For this reason, I prayed to the court for granting time. The court granted my prayer. It will be heard on next Thursday.”
The government on December 24, 2017 filed the petition with the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court seeking review of its judgement that upheld the High Court verdict scrapping the 16th amendment to the Constitution.
The Attorney General’s office submitted the 908-page review petition containing 94 grounds on which the apex court may consider the prayer. In a briefing, the then Attorney General Mahbubey Alam said, “We sought the scrapping of irrelevant observations of the verdict.”
Since the review petition has not been finalised yet, a vacuum is prevailing in the procedure for removing Supreme Court judges and election commissioners for their misconduct. Allegations raised against some of the High Court judges are also pending for years. However, legal experts say the Supreme Judicial Council is still in place.
Lawyer Manzill Murshid who appeared in this case for the writ petitioners said, “Since the Appellate Division upheld the judgement and as the apex court didn’t pass any stay order on the judgement, there is no doubt that the Supreme Judicial Council is still in place.”
The 16th amendment, made on September 17, 2014, had abolished the Chief Justice-led Supreme Judicial Council (SJC) and restored parliament’s power to remove judges. But it was challenged before the HC on November 5, 2014, through a writ petition filed by nine SC lawyers.
The High Court issued a rule on the amendment on November 9 in 2014. After hearing, the HC declared the amendment illegal on the basis of the view of the majority on May 5 in 2016. Later, the government appealed against the HC verdict.
The Appellate Division started hearing on the case on May 8 in 2017, in the full bench led by former Chief Justice Surendra Kumar Sinha. The bench heard speeches from 10 senior Supreme Court lawyers on the case. Nine of them gave their opinion on scrapping the 16th amendment to the Constitution.
Finally, the Appellate Division delivered the verdict on July 3 in 2017, rejecting the appeal and upholding the HC verdict and released the full text of the verdict on August 1 in 2017.