Virtual Hearing of Cases: 40 lawyers, magistrates, officials being trained

Around 40 magistrates, lawyers and court officials of Dhaka are being given training for holding virtual court hearing of urgent cases including bail petitions in need.

The representatives from the Judicial Reforms Committee of the Supreme Court and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) are providing the training for few days through video conference which is expected to end today, Supreme Court Spokesman Md Saifur Rahman told The Daily Star yesterday.

He said the committee and UNDP are also working to develop a software in this regard with the assistance from the government's Access to Information (a2i) programme.

Once the software is developed a manual will be prepared for the virtual court hearing and then it will be distributed among the judges, lawyers and court staffers, said Saifur Rahman.

Earlier on April 26, Chief Justice Syed Mahmud Hossain at a full court meeting with the Supreme Court judges decided to amend the Appellate Division and the High Court Division rules for holding such hearing via online and video conference.

The SC judges also decided that the CJ will request President M Abdul Hamid to issue an ordinance so that the SC and subordinate courts can hold virtual hearing.

When asked, SC Spokesman Saifur Rahman said he does not know about the development of amending the rules and issuing ordinance.