Hearing on writ petition resumes today

The hearing on a writ petition challenging the legality of the president's proclamation of the state of emergency in the country will resume in the High Court today.
An HC bench of Justice Khademul Islam Chowdhury and Justice Mashuque Hosain Ahmed yesterday adjourned the hearing and fixed today for resumption of the hearing.
Advocate MI Farooqui, counsel for the petitioners, told the court yesterday that the state of emergency was imposed on the grounds that "a grave emergency exists and the security and economic life of Bangladesh was threatened by internal disturbance", but the economic situation has deteriorated during the emergency.
He also argued that the conflict among the political parties could not be treated as internal disturbance, since such political conflicts generally prevail in all the third world countries.
Deputy Attorney General (DAG) Naima Haider informed the court that the state counsels would make their submissions today.
Four Supreme Court lawyers, M Saleem Ullah, Muhammad Mohsen Rashid, Nahid Sultana Juthi and Md Abdul Mannan Khan, jointly filed the writ petition as public interest litigation (PIL) with the HC challenging the legality of the president's proclamation of the state of emergency, two Emergency Power Orders (No 1 and 2), Emergency Power Ordinance (EPO) 2007 and Emergency Power Rules (EPR) 2007.
The hearing of the petition began on Monday.