Feni Women and Child Repression Prevention Tribunal has over 2,000 cases in backlog with the post of judge of the tribunal having remained vacant since October last year.
Currently, Feni District and Session Judge Dr Begum Zebunnesa has been working as an acting judge for the Tribunal, despite having to manage cases in three other courts.
Public Prosecutor Hafez Ahmed of the Feni District and Session Judge court confirmed the matter to Dhaka Tribune.
He said: "The pending cases for the Tribunal includes 258 rapes including 19 child rape, 502 written complaints, and 1,286 cases filed under the Women and Child Repression Prevention Act.”
The vacancy of the Tribunal's judge post has worsened the hassle of the justice seekers. It is important that someone is appointed for the post soon," PP Hafez added.
Nur Nahar, one of the justice seekers who had filed a case in the Tribunal, said: "For a few years I have been attending court with my daughter. Our case has not been progressing. The accused got bail and have been threatening us."
Another justice seeker, Nizam Uddin Ahmed said that On May 21 of 2014, some robbers attacked his house, looted valuables, and gang-raped his house help.
Four suspects had given their confessional statement under the section 164 of the Code of Criminal Procedure. At one point, police framed a charge-sheet, but however left out one of the suspects who had earlier confessed, Nazim continued.
"Because of this, I have rejected the charge sheet and the court instructed the Police Bureau of Investigation (PBI) to continue the case investigation.
"I have heard that the suspects arrested initially are out on bail. I don't know how the case is progressing at the moment."
