The Appellate Division of Supreme Court has disposed of the appeal petition filed by the government challenging the HC order that declared the exiting Warrant of Precedence illegal.
The five-member appellate division bench headed by Chief Justice Md Muzammel Hossain passed the order with “expansion, modification, observation and finding.”
According to the SC observation, the rank of Chief Justice will be equivalent to that of the Speaker of the National Parliament, said Md Asaduzzaman, lawyer of the petitioner of a writ that yielded HC order to issue a new Warrant of Precedence in 2010.
Existing Warrant of Precedence, formulated in 1986 and revised in 2008, ranks the Speaker of the parliament third, followed by the Chief Justice and former presidents of Bangladesh in fourth position.
On Tuesday, Asaduzzaman claimed that the cabinet division had framed the existing Warrant of Precedence in 1986 in an arbitrary manner.
He said: “The posts Appellate Division judges will be equivalent to that of cabinet ministers while the HC judges will be equivalent to the state ministers. Attorney General will be given precedence over the secretary.”
“MP's will be given precedence over the cabinet secretary, chiefs of the Armed Forces and chief secretary. The post of additional attorney general will be equivalent to that of secretaries and the posts of district judges will be equivalent to that of the administrative executives.”
Earlier in 2006, Md Ataur Rahman, a former secretary general of the association also a district judge of the Tribunal for Prevention of Repression on Women and Children, in Patuakhali filed a writ petition on behalf of Bangladesh Judicial Service Association.
The writ claimed that the cabinet division had framed the existing Warrant of Precedence in 1986 in an arbitrary manner, without evaluating the dignity and status of judicial officials.
On February 4, 2010, the High Court directed the government to issue a new Warrant of Precedence for the republic's officers, giving district judges and equivalent judicial officers precedence over the chiefs of armed forces, and government secretaries.
The HC also declared the existing Warrant of Precedence illegal and void, as it does not conform to the country's constitution.
Later, the government filed a leave to appeal petition against the HC verdict on March 13, 2011.
