A review petition was filed on Sunday against an Appellate Division order in April this year that said life imprisonment meant jail until death.
The review petition was filed by Advocate Mohammad Shishir Monir, challenging an April 24 order by a four-member Appellate Division bench headed by Chief Justice Surendra Kumer Sinha.
The chief justice, while reading out a 92-page verdict of a murder case in Savar, had said: “...Life imprisonment means jail until death.”
Khandaker Mahbub Hossain, the defence counsel of the case, said: “The chief justice had said life imprisonment meant jail until natural death. My view is life imprisonment should be 30 years’ of imprisonment as per Section 57 of Bangladesh Penal Code. In addition, convicts with life imprisonment are entitled to receive reduced sentence for good behaviour.”
Responding to journalists’ queries, Attorney General Mahbubey Alam on Sunday said: “The court has ordered life imprisonment of three convicts in Savar murder case by scrapping their death sentence. But it said life imprisonment meant jail until death, not 30 years.”
A speedy tribunal court in 2003 ordered death sentence for three accused in the murder of a man named Jaman, who was killed in Savar in 2001.
A High Court bench upheld the lower court verdict after an appeal was filed. Later, on February 14 this year, another High Court bench commuted their death sentence to life imprisonment.
This article first published in Bangla Tribune