The High Court has struck down the Bangladesh Bar Council’s decision to cancel the first review results of the written enrolment examination for aspiring advocates, delivering relief to hundreds of candidates who lost their eligibility after a controversial second review process.
In a judgment delivered on Wednesday, a High Court bench comprising Justice Khizir Ahmed Chowdhury and Justice Md Ziaul Haque declared the Bar Council’s decision illegal and directed the regulatory body to allow affected candidates to sit directly for the viva voce examination required for enrolment as lawyers.
The ruling came after the court made absolute a rule issued in response to a series of writ petitions filed by 632 candidates.
The petitioners challenged the legality of the Bar Council’s decision to annul the review results of the written examination that had been published on November 18, 2025.
According to court documents, the candidates had initially been declared successful following a review of their written examination scripts.
However, within days, the Bar Council cancelled those results and ordered a fresh evaluation of all review applications.
On November 24, 2025, the Bar Council formally revoked the first review results and initiated a second review process.
New results were subsequently published, and viva voce examinations were conducted only for candidates who qualified under the revised outcome.
The decision triggered widespread dissatisfaction among candidates who had passed the first review but lost their eligibility after the second evaluation.
The High Court’s verdict effectively restores the rights of those candidates, allowing them to proceed to the final stage of the enrolment process without undergoing another written assessment.
Senior lawyers Barrister Badruddoza Badol and Barrister M Ashraful Islam, among others, represented the petitioners before the court, while Additional Attorney General Barrister Aneek R Haque appeared on behalf of the state.
The judgment is expected to have significant implications for hundreds of aspiring lawyers whose professional futures were affected by the Bar Council’s decision.
Legal observers say the ruling reinforces the principle that examination and recruitment processes must be conducted transparently and consistently, particularly when decisions affect the legitimate expectations of successful candidates.
The verdict also raises broader questions about administrative accountability within professional regulatory bodies and the manner in which examination review processes are handled.
With the court now directing the Bar Council to permit the affected candidates to appear before viva boards, the long-running dispute over the enrolment examination has entered a decisive new phase.
