Dr M Shah Alam, former professor of Chittagong University and former member of the Bangladesh Law Commission, died on Monday.
He has long been suffering from old age complications and breathed his last at a city hospital around 10:45pm, said Professor ABM Abu Noman, Law Faculty Dean of Chittagong University said.
He left behind his family and host of relatives to mourn his demise.
Shah Alam received his secondary and higher secondary education at a local high school and Rajshahi Cadet college, and passed SSC and HSC examinations with distinction in 1968 and 1970 respectively.
He briefly studied economics at Dhaka University when Bangladesh War of Liberation started, in which he participated actively.
After the liberation, he went to the former USSR on scholarship for higher studies. He studied there for ten years in Moscow People's Friendship University, obtaining graduation, post-graduation and Ph.D. degrees in specializing in international law.
Upon completion of higher studies, Dr. Shah Alam joined Rajshahi University Faculty of Law as an assistant professor, where he served for ten years.
In 1992 he joined Chittagong University as an associate professor and as the founder Dean of the reorganized Faculty of Law and founder Chairman of the Department of Law.
One of the pioneers of clinical legal education in Bangladesh, he introduced this particular method of legal education in the Chittagong University.
In 1996 he became a full professor of law. During 1999-2000 he worked as a member of the Bangladesh Law Commission.
Dr. Alam has published four books on international law and constitutional law, and edited the Chittagong University Journal of Law for several years.
He has a good number of publications in reputed research journals at home and abroad. He was a Japan Foundation Fellow in 1995-96 at the Tokyo University Faculty of Law and a Senior Fulbright Fellow in 2001-2002 at the New York University School of Law. Occasionally, Dr. Alam wrote for national dailies on current issues of law.