New Delhi: The Bangladesh Supreme Court Sunday overturned a 2013 High Court verdict that declared the registration of Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami with the country’s election commission as a political party “illegal”. The deposed Sheikh Hasina-led Awami League government had banned Jamaat in August last year, but the ban was lifted later that same month by the Muhammad Yunus-led interim administration soon after assuming power.
Despite that, the Jamaat still needed to register with the poll panel to be able to contest elections. The top court verdict has now paved the way for the same.
The legal battle over Jamaat’s registration began after a writ petition was filed on 25 January, 2009, by Maulana Syed Rezaul Haque Chandpuri, secretary general of the Bangladesh Tariqat Federation, and 24 others. They sought to declare Jamaat’s registration illegal, and on 1 August, 2013, the High Court ruled in their favor, cancelling the registration, and saying the party’s charter was unconstitutional due to its opposition to secularism.
Subsequently, the Bangladesh poll panel formally revoked Jamaat’s registration in October 2018, just ahead of the 11th general election.
Jamaat appealed the High Court verdict to the Appellate Division, which began hearing the case on 3 December, 2024. The hearing concluded in May 2025, and the verdict was announced Sunday.
Following the verdict, Jamaat-e-Islami’s lawyer, Barrister Ehsan A Siddiq, told The Daily Star that the party’s registration has now been reinstated.
“The EC will now move forward with addressing pending issues, including Jamaat’s election symbol,” he said, adding that the party will soon submit a formal application to the poll panel for necessary decisions.
This move also follows Bangladesh Supreme Court’s verdict last week that overturned the death sentence of senior Jamaat-e-Islami leader A.T.M. Azharul Islam, acquitting him of war crimes charges dating back to the 1971 war, effectively nullifying the International Crimes Tribunal (ICT)’s earlier ruling.
Islam, a top leader of the Jamaat-e-Islami party that opposed Bangladesh’s independence in 1971, was arrested and tried for alleged crimes against humanity during the war. His conviction and sentencing by the ICT in 2014 drew sharp reactions, both at home and abroad.
The court also directed prison authorities to release the 73-year-old leader unless he is wanted in connection with other cases.
The Supreme Court found that the death sentence had been handed down without adequate assessment of the evidence, leading to what it described as an “unjust verdict,” according to both state and defence lawyers.
The tribunal had originally sentenced Azharul to death on multiple charges, including genocide, murder, and rape. The Appellate Division upheld the conviction after an appeal hearing on 23 October, 2019. In response, Islam filed a petition on 19 July, 2020, seeking a review of the judgment and presenting 14 legal arguments before the same court.
Welcoming the Supreme Court’s decision to acquit Islam, Asif Nazrul, former law adviser to Yunus’s interim government, described the verdict as a direct outcome of last year’s student-led protest movement that toppled Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s Awami League government on 5 August.
“The credit for enabling this moment of justice goes to the leadership of the July-August mass movement,” Nazrul wrote in a social media post. He earlier also applauded removal of the ban on the party, calling it politically motivated.
(Edited by Amrtansh Arora)
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