The Appellate Division of the Supreme Court today acquitted BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia and all other accused from Zia Orphanage Trust corruption case, in which they were sentenced to 10 years’ imprisonment.
The apex court scrapped the verdicts delivered by the High Court and the trial court in the case
The trial had sentenced Khaleda to five years’ imprisonment and other accused, including BNP acting chairman Tarique Rahman, to 10 years’ jail sentence in the graft case.
The HC, in its verdict, doubled the jail sentence of Khaleda to 10 years and upheld the trial court verdict that sentenced other accused to 10 years’ imprisonment.
Today, the apex court observed that the prosecution of the Zia Orphanage Trust case was “malicious”.
The accused of this case, who did not move appeal against the HC verdict, will get benefit of this judgement and their dignity has been restored as innocent persons, the SC said in the verdict.
A five-member bench of the Appellate Division headed by Chief Justice Syed Refaat Ahmed announced the verdict unanimously.
The top court delivered the judgement after holding hearing on two appeals filed by Khaleda and one appeal filed each by Saleemul Huq alias Kazi Kamal and businessman Sharafuddin Ahmed challenging the HC verdict that on October 30, 2018, enhanced the five years’ imprisonment handed by the trial court to 10 years to her and upheld 10 years’ jail sentence of other accused in the case.
There is no legal bar for Khaleda to contest the national elections following the Appellate Division verdict, Advocate Fahima Nasrin Munni, a pro-BNP lawyer and a former deputy attorney general, told The Daily Star.
Earlier, the SC held hearings on the two appeals of Khaleda and on one appeal of Sharfuddin for three days and on the appeal of Kazi Kamal yesterday.
On November 11 last year, the Appellate Division stayed the HC judgement in the case and also allowed Khaleda to file two appeals with it challenging the HC verdict.
The 79-year-old former prime minister then filed the appeals, praying to the apex court to scrap the HC judgment and to acquit her from the case filed by the Anti-Corruption Commission.
Khaleda landed in jail on February 8, 2018, after a special court in Dhaka had sentenced her to five years in jail in the case.
While sentencing Khaleda, then special judge, Md Akhtaruzzaman, considered her age and social status.
The five other accused, including her son Tarique Rahman, Kazi Kamal and Sharfuddin were awarded 10 years’ imprisonment for misappropriating over Tk 2.1 crore that had come from a foreign bank in grants for orphans.
On November 27 last year, the HC acquitted Khaleda in Zia Charitable Trust corruption case in which she was sentenced to seven years’ imprisonment by a lower court.
Speaking to The Daily Star, Khaleda’s lawyer Kayser Kamal, also the BNP’s legal affairs secretary, earlier said the former premier was accused in total 37 cases filed during the regimes of the former military-backed caretaker government (2007-08) and Sheikh Hasina-led government on different charges, including corruption, violence, arson, defamation, and sedition.
Of the 37 cases, 12 were scrapped by the HC on October 30 and 31 last year.
The lower courts concerned earlier dismissed nine defamation cases and the president granted clemency to Khaleda in two cases in which she was sentenced to different prison terms, said the lawyer.
The BNP chief is now on bail in the rest of the cases.
The presidential clemency was granted to Khaleda on August 6 last year, a day after Sheikh Hasina resigned as prime minister and fled the country in the face of a mass uprising.
Daily Star
