We Want to Try Every Killing in the Country, Law Minister Asaduzzaman Tells New Lawyers

Law, Justice and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Asaduzzaman has said the government wants to hold trials for every killing in this country.

He made the remark on Friday (6 November) as chief guest at an orientation programme for new lawyers organised by the Dhaka Bar Association. The event was chaired by Dhaka Bar Association President Md Anwar Zahid Bhuiyan.

The minister said the bloody path by which they had come was a very slippery one. In more than sixteen years of movement against the fascists, they lost more than four and a half thousand fellow fighters who were killed in crossfire, and more than seven hundred fellow fighters who were forcibly disappeared.

He said the relatives of those who were disappeared still cry to Allah in prayer, wondering when their loved ones will return. More than six million of their leaders and activists faced false, fabricated cases—many of whom had died 20 years before the alleged incidents.

Asaduzzaman said they had promised the people that they wanted trials for all injustice on the soil of Bangladesh, and that they are determined in this regard.

Addressing the lawyers, he said they are walking that path and want the lawyers with them on it. They want to leave behind the steps to build a golden Bangladesh, along which the path of the rule of law in Bangladesh will become smooth.

The minister said they want to arrange supplementary employment for lawyers. Two weeks ago he told the commerce minister that just as every company needs a compulsory auditor to check its accounts, every company should have a compulsory lawyer. He said he asked for the company law to be changed and that he would check it.

He said the law ministry has already announced that he has declared an allocation of Tk 50 crore this year for training lawyers across the country who do not receive training. Taking this profession further forward is their commitment, he said.

Addressing the new lawyers, the minister said they should not try to become 'small-veranda' lawyers but should always remain 'big-veranda' lawyers. The small veranda is the judges' veranda, and they should not enter it to engage in dealings with judges.

He said the government is looking for various ways to achieve professional excellence and at the same time wants to close all the blind alleys. His government is a government of change, which came to power with the people's mandate to deliver good governance, a happy and prosperous Bangladesh, the rule of law and a corruption-free judiciary.

The minister said a question has arisen whether so many lawyers are needed and what they will do. He said 80,000 lawyers are nothing for Bangladesh's 200 million people. But the responsibility of bringing the legal profession back from where it has been taken lies with the newcomers. He also commented that the process of becoming a lawyer is harder than the BCS.

The programme, conducted by Dhaka Bar Association Senior Assistant General Secretary Md Iltutmish Soudagar (Anny), was also attended as special guests by Dhaka-7 MP Hamidur Rahman Hamid, Dhaka Senior District and Sessions Judge Md Rafiqul Islam, Dhaka Metropolitan Sessions Judge Md Shahjahan Kabir, Dhaka Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Md Zakir Hossain, Dhaka Acting Chief Judicial Magistrate Md Mahbubur Rahman, Dhaka District and Sessions Judge Court Public Prosecutor Md Iqbal Hossain, Dhaka Metropolitan Sessions Judge Court PP Md Omar Faruk Faruki, and Dhaka Bar Association General Secretary Kalam Khan, among others.