Review hearing on 16th Amendment adjourned till 18 January 

The Appellate Division has postponed the hearing of the petition seeking a review of the verdict upholding the repeal of the 16th Amendment of the Constitution until 18 January.  

The six-member Appellate Division, led by Chief Justice Obaidul Hasan, made this decision on Thursday. The review petition had previously been discussed on 16 November, where a question arose about whether a six-judge bench could hear the review petition against the seven-judge verdict.

To address this question, the Appellate Division sought the opinions of eight senior lawyers and had set 23 November for an order, while also adjourning the hearing of the revision petition for a week. 

On 23 November, the Appellate Division decided that a full bench of six members of the Appellate Division could hear the review (competent) regarding the repeal of the 16th Amendment.  

The seven-member full bench of the Appellate Division had previously upheld the declaration of the abrogation of the 16th Amendment. The review application, listed as agenda number 18 in the Appellate Division, was attended by Attorney General AM Amin Uddin representing the state and senior advocate Manzil Morsed for the writ petitioners.  

Following the hearing, the court adjourned the proceedings until 18 January. 

The 16th Amendment to the Constitution, introduced in 2014 to transfer the power to remove judges to the Jatiya Sangsad, faced a legal challenge.

After the final hearing of the writ on its validity, on 5 May, 2016, a special bench consisting of three judges of the High Court declared the 16th Amendment invalid based on the majority opinion. 

In January 2017, the state appealed against this judgment of the High Court. On 3 July of the same year, a seven-member full bench of the Appellate Division, headed by the then Chief Justice Surendra Kumar Sinha (SK Sinha), unanimously dismissed the appeal. 

The full judgment of the Appellate Division was published on 1 August, 2017.

The then Chief Justice SK Sinha, in his observation, made observations on various issues, including democracy, politics, military rule, the election commission, good governance, corruption, and the independence of the judiciary.