The High Court has released the full text of a judgement issuing 17 directives to save the country’s rivers and waterbodies from pollution and encroachers.
The HC bench of Justice Moyeenul Islam Chowdhury and Justice Md Ashraful Kamal delivered the verdict on February 3 this year following a writ petition filed by Human Rights for Peace for Bangladesh.
In the verdict, the court directed the Election Commission to disqualify the persons responsible for grabbing and polluting river lands from contesting any polls.
The EC has been asked to submit a list of the persons before the court in the next six months.
The HC, in its February 3 verdict, said “If any person, whose name is included in the list of river land grabbing, he or she will be disqualified from contesting the union parishad, upazila, pourasava, city corporation and Jatiya Sangsad elections.” It asked the EC to take steps in this regard.
The Bangladesh Bank have been ordered to make sure no river grabbers get bank loans.