The High Court on Tuesday released the full text of a landmark verdict that restored the non-party caretaker government system for overseeing the national elections.
The 139-page ruling, delivered on December 17, 2024, by Justices Farah Mahbub, who is now in the Appellate Division, and Debasish Roy Chowdhury, declared several key provisions of the Constitution (Fifteenth Amendment) Act, 2011 as unconstitutional.
The verdict said that it was up to the next Parliament to review and decide on the legality of other parts of the 15th Amendment.
These include changes to the constitution鈥檚 preamble and various articles made through additions, deletions, and modifications.
Among the unresolved issues are matters related to nationality, secularism, and the mandatory display of the portrait of the country鈥檚 founding president, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, in all government offices and Bangladesh missions abroad.
The ruling said that the removal of the caretaker system through Sections 20 and 21 of the 15th Amendment violated the basic structure of the constitution鈥攑articularly democracy, electoral fairness, and public trust. It struck down the abolition of article 58A and Chapter IIA, which had mandated a neutral interim government during elections.
However, the restoration of the caretaker system will apply only in future elections, not retroactively.
The 15th Amendment, passed in 2011 by the Awami League-led Parliament, abolished the caretaker provision, claiming it was outdated and had been misused.
But critics, especially the Bangladesh Nationalist Party and other opposition groups, saw its removal as a way to rig elections and keep the ruling party in power.
The verdict is seen as a major win for those who have long demanded a return to neutral election-time governance.
Attorney general Md Asaduzzaman interpreted the ruling as a green light to reintroduce a restructured and possibly renamed caretaker government system.
However, the final shape of such a system may depend on the Appellate Division鈥檚 ruling on a still-pending review of the 2011 verdict that had struck down the original 13th Amendment, which had introduced the caretaker system in the first place.
The High Court鈥檚 judgment followed two public interest writ petitions filed in 2024, 13 years after the amendment was passed, following the August 5, 2024 student-led uprising that toppled the Sheikh Hasina regime.
The petitioners, including civil society figures like Badiul Alam Majumder, argued that the 15th Amendment undermined democratic accountability and judicial oversight. They were supported by the BNP, Jamaat-e-Islami, Gonoforum, and other opposition political parties.
The court also struck down several other parts of the amended articles 7A and 7B, which tried to shield certain constitutional changes from future amendment. They were found to violate the people鈥檚 right to constitutional change.
Article 42, which removed the referendum process for major constitutional changes, was invalidated.
The original referendum provision is now restored.
Article 18, which weakened the High Court鈥檚 authority to ensure fundamental rights, was also declared unconstitutional.
The verdict reaffirmed the basic structure doctrine, emphasising that core democratic principles like fair elections and constitutional supremacy cannot be altered even by parliament.