Khaleda challenges HC verdict on graft cases

BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia today filed two separate petitions with the Supreme Court seeking a stay on the High Court verdict that cleared the way for running the trial proceedings of Zia Orphanage Trust and Zia Charitable Trust graft cases.

On June 19, the HC rejected two separate writ petitions filed by Khaleda challenging the legality of the appointment of a lower court judge who indicted Khaleda and eight others in the cases in March this year.

Advocate M Asaduzzaman, a counsel for Khaleda, today submitted the petitions to the Supreme Court office on behalf of the BNP leader.

In the petition, Khaleda said the appointment of Special Judge's Court-3 of Dhaka Bashudev Roy was illegal. So, the indictment orders issued by the judge were illegal, she said.

She said the government should have issued a gazette notification for appointing the special judge for dealing with the cases as per Criminal Law Amendment Act 1958 but the government did not follow the law in appointing the trial court judge who framed the charges against her.

The High Court did not consider these issues while rejecting her writ petition, the BNP chairperson added.

Asaduzzaman told The Daily Star that the SC will fix a date for hearing the petitions.

The BNP chief on May 12 filed the writ petitions with the HC challenging the appointment of the judge, who on March 19 framed charges against Khaleda and eight others in the corruption cases filed by the Anti-Corruption Commission.

The court of Roy was set yesterday for recording statements from the witnesses of the cases.

But it deferred the date for recording the deposition of prosecution witnesses to July 9 after Khaleda's lawyers prayed to the court for adjournment of the proceedings.

The lawyers in their prayer argued that the two writ petitions filed by Khaleda were pending with the HC.