Three High Court Division justices --- Justice Salma Masud Chowdhury, Justice Quazi Reza-Ul Hoque and Justice AKM Zahirul Hoque ---- on Tuesday resigned from their respective positions after they had been barred from performing judicial duties for five years due to their alleged corruption and professional misconduct.
The justices, who have been under scrutiny by the Supreme Judicial Council for alleged misconduct during the Awami League regime, tendered their resignations in separate letters, addressed to Bangladesh President.
Law Secretary Sheikh Abu Taher issued a gazette notification to this effect on Tuesday, saying that they resigned from their positions in signed letters addressed to the President of the republic in accordance with article 96(4) of the constitution.
The President has accepted their resignation letters, reads the notification. The three justices were asked to refrain from judicial activities on August 22, 2019.
Neither the Supreme Court administration nor the government has revealed the allegations against them.
Recently, the Supreme Judicial Council has started an investigation against 15 HC justices who are out of the judiciary over alleged professional misconduct, corruption and irregularities.
Among them, there are 12 justices who were kept out of judiciary activities in the face of the demands of the Anti-Discrimination Student Activists on 17 October.
Sources at SC said that the Supreme Judicial Council led by Chief Justice Syed Refaat called Justice Salma Masud Chowdhury, Justice Quazi Reza-Ul-Hoque and Justice AKM Zahirul Hoque earlier this month for some queries.
The Supreme Judicial Council led by the chief justice was formed after the SC delivered its verdict on the Constitution's 16th amendment case on October 20.
The SC administration recently in a press release said the information about some of the justices was being scrutinised.
An official of the SC said the three former HC justices sent their resignation letters to the President through the SC registrar general's office earlier in the day.
Meanwhile, on October 16 this year, over a thousand students besieged the SC premises demanding the removal of ‘pro-Awami League fascist justices’.
On that day, SC Registrar General Aziz Ahmed Bhuiyan told the protesting students that 12 judges would not be given benches for now. Then, the agitating students postponed their demonstrations.
Since then 12 HC judges-- Justice Md Ataur Rahman Khan, Justice Naima Haider, Justice Sheikh Hassan Arif, Justice Muhammad Khurshid Alam Sarkar, Justice Ashish Ranjan Das, Justice Khizir Hayat, Justice SM Maniruzzaman, Justice Khandaker Diliruzzaman, Justice Md Akhtaruzzaman, Justice Shahed Nuruddin, Justice Md Aminul Islam, and Justice SM Masud Hossain Dolon have not been given benches for conducting judicial functions.
The development came two months after the then chief justice Obaidul Hassan and five other judges of the Appellate Division of the SC stepped down amid students’ demonstrations demanding their resignations following the fall of Sheikh Hasina-led government on August 5.
