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“All Citizens are Equal before Law and are Entitled to Equal Protection of Law”-Article 27 of the Constitution of the People’s Republic of Bangladesh



Issue No: 174
January 16, 2005

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Law Event

Human rights summer school: A pioneer initiative

Dr. Uttam Kumar Das

Human rights is also an issue of culture among human communities. The concepts and ideas of human rights are expanding from person to person in different ways. Among them the effective one is through education and teaching. However, human rights education is a very new phenomenon in country like ours. Though it should be a part of the mass education but till now it does not happen. Only few law departments and other of social sciences in public and private universities offer this either as a full or part of a course. There are so many limitations: lack of the up-to-date syllabus and study materials, well educated (in the field of human rights) and trained up teaching staff, motivations so on and so forth.

Most of the donors and development partners working in the country are seemingly more interested to channel their funds through NGOs for programmes relating so called human rights awareness. However, most of these organizations, with few exceptions off course, are not in a position in terms of their human resources and capacities to run such type of activities. Sometime, the 'key persons' or 'leaders' of these organizations even do not practice the very basic spirit of human rights in their daily activities within and out side the organization, as we observe.

Considering this vacuum in the education of human rights, again a non-government organization (however, not like regular one) Empowerment through Law of the Common People (ELCOP) has come up with a mission of human rights education for selected group of people who will lead the country in near future.

The ELCOP has just recently completed the fifth round of its mission of 'Human Rights Summer School.' The latest programme held from 18 to 29 December 2004 as usual at the premises of the Bangladesh Academy for Rural Development (BARD) in Comilla.

According to Dr. Mizanur Rahman the two-week long school is a residential programme that facilitates the participants to be introduced with the alternative and parallel methods of learning human rights, developing their better understanding, research capacity and skills of advocacy for promotion and protection of human rights which would lead to empowerment of common people. The participants are the selected law students from mainly public universities of the country as well as some from other South Asian countries.

The main objectives are:
*Sensitize the participating students on crucial social issues, like poverty alleviation, empowerment of women, rights of minority and environmental issues;
*Teach them how to identify human rights issues;
*Provide with a modern and effective methodology for the implementation of basic human rights;
*Plant in the students a deep sense of social responsibility; and
*Train a group of pro-human rights and anti-generic lawyers who will play a more efficacious role in protecting and upholding human rights.

The theme of summer school 2004 was "Human Rights and Good Governance." The total number of participants was 47. Among them two were from India and four from Nepal.

The working days, from 18 to 28 December were devoted on different issues. These include Genesis of Human Rights, Good Governance, Group Rights and Governance, Legal Education and Justice, Displaced Persons' Rights, Migrants Rights, Access to Justice, Lawyering for Justice and community visit.

Like previous one, this year's resource persons also included eminent and active persons in the field of legal education, judiciary, research, human rights activism etc. They included Justice K M Subhan, Barrister M. Amir-ul Islam, Mr. Shafique Ahmed, Professor Rafiqul Islam of Macquarie University, Australia, Dr. Mizanur Rahman, Dr. Rahamat Ullah, Gobinda Chandra Mondol, Professor Dr. M. Shah Alam, Zakir Hossain, Ms. Christine Richadrson, Professor M. Habibur Rahman, Dr. Sarker Ali Akkas , Mr. Nakib Md. Nasrullah, Mr. Salim Toha; Professor David McQuoid Mason of University of Kwazulu-Natal, South Africa; Professor Yubaraj Sangroula of the Katmandu Law School, Nepal; Professor Shubhram Rajkhowa of Gouhati University, India; Dr. Hossain Zillur Rahaman; Advocate Sultana Kamal, Dr. Faustina Pereira and Mr. Philip Gain; Mr. Iqbal Sobhan Chowdhury; Ms. Rina Sen Gupta and Mr. Mizanur Rahman of the International Organization for Migration (IOM); Supreme Court lawyer Dr. Naim Ahmed; senior government official Dr. Mahfuzul Haq for their valuable contribution.

In the fifth school, for the first time a day was devoted on Displaced Persons' Rights. The day sponsored by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). Issues covered on that day included conceptual background of asylum seekers, refugees and internally displaced people (IDP), mandate and activities of UNHCR and the international protection of refugees, accession to the 1951 Convention relating to the Status of the Refugees and its 1967 Protocol and adoption of a national legislation on asylum seekers and refugees, UNHCR's operations in Bangladesh.

The former Chief Justice Muhammad Habibur Rahman formally opened the school on 18 December 2004. Dr. Kamal Hossain was the Chief Guest at the valedictory session while Mr. Christopher Beng Cha Lee, Representative of UNHCR in Bangladesh and Mr. Kim McQuay, Representative of the Asia Foundation were special guests.

This year ELCOP introduced the lifetime achievement award for human rights. The first award goes to Justice K M Subhan for his life long activity and contribution for promotion and protection of human rights in the country.

One important thing needs to be mentioned that a good number of private universities have initiated law departments. So, participants should also be picked up from there. Off course, the quality and level of the participants should be a determining factor for selection. Also different institutions should come forward with innovative idea and plans for initiating human rights education and research.

The author, a human rights researcher and practitioner, now works with UNHCR in Dhaka.

 
 
 


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