Symposium on Jurisprudence of Evidence in Information and Communications Technology (ICT) Regime
Bangladesh Institute of Law and International Affairs (BILIA) organised a symposium on “Jurisprudence of Evidence in Information and Communications Technology (ICT) Regime: National and International Perspectives” on Saturday, February 11, 2017 at its auditorium. Two papers were presented by Ms. Pryianka Bose Kanta, Lecturer, Department of Law, University of Dhaka and Mr. Bayazid Hossain, Lecturer, Department of Law, Bangladesh Open University. Kazi Habibul Awal, Former Senior Secretary, Ministry of Defence, Government of People’s Republic of Bangladesh presided over the programme. Dr. Md. Mahbubur Rahman, Associate Professor, Department of Law, University of Dhaka was the distinguished discussant on those two papers. Ms. Kanta presented a paper titled as “Introducing ‘Virtual Hearing’ in the Existing Justice System of Bangladesh: Panoramas and Challenges”. In this paper, Ms. Kanta tried to make inference that by introducing ‘virtual hearing’ system in the judiciary of Bangladesh we can reduce case load by speedy trial, prevent hijacking of the prisoner, and ensure access to justice for all. She said that virtual trial is cost effective, less time consuming and above all as in virtual hearing evidence is recorded so a judge can replayed and reassessed the recorded evidence if it requires.
Mr. Bayazid Hossain in his paper titled as “Cyberspace as a Place of Investigation: A Critical Review under International Human Rights Law” tried to show that Internet Intermediaries’ licensing states get more evidence support from Internet Intermediaries than that of non-licensing states. Right to justice is affected in non-licensing states due to lack of sufficient evidence. He said that Internet Intermediaries do not treat licensing states and non-licensing states equally. He further argued that licensing states have the potential possibility to interfere on judicial proceeding of non-licensing states.
Dr. Mahbubur Rahman emphasized on the fact that before introducing virtual trial in our justice system we should solve the problems of existing legal system. Dr. Shahdeen Malik said that virtual trial may be introduced in some particular civil litigation such as arbitration. In the final comment Kazi Habibul Awal suggested that to justify the effectiveness of virtual trial in our judiciary we can take some pilot project as test basis.
The writer works as a Research Officer at BILIA.
Comments