Ershad: HC deals with 3 pleas today

The High Court is scheduled to deliver its verdict today on three separate appeals filed in connection with a 25-year-old graft case against Jatiya Party Chairman HM Ershad.

The bench of Justice Md Ruhul Quddus and Justice Bhishmadev Chakrabortty will announce the judgement. Earlier on April 12, the justices concluded hearing on the appeals and fixed May 9 (today) for delivering the verdict, Anti-Corruption Commission lawyer Advocate Khurshid Alam Khan told The Daily Star yesterday.

Of the three appeals, one was filed by Ershad seeking acquittal in the case as a lower court had sentenced him to three years' imprisonment in 1992.

The other two appeals were filed by the government for making the punishment stricter, he added.

On March 30, the bench allowed the ACC to become a party in the case as a co-appellant.

Earlier on March 27, Chief Justice Surendra Kumar Sinha assigned the HC bench to hear the three appeals.

The then Bureau of Anti-Corruption (Bac), which became defunct after formation of the ACC in 2004, filed the case against Ershad with Cantonment police in 1992 on charge of misappropriating Tk 1.91 crore by misusing power on different occasions when he was the president from December 11, 1983 to December 6, 1990.