The New Nation - Internet Edition

Staff Reporter

Imprisoned former Prime Minister Begum Khaleda Zia and her two sons-Tarique Rahman and Arafat Rahman yesterday moved the High Court challenging the legality of invoking Emergency Power Rules (EPR) in corruption cases against them.

Placing the cases under EPR has debarred them from seeking bail until disposal of the cases. The separate writ petitions are likely to come up for hearing on Sunday, said the counsel for Begum Zia, who is the Chairperson of the BNP.

Begum Zia and her younger son Arafat Rahman Koko were accused by the Anti-Corruption Commission of favouring GATCO with a contract to accrue financial benefits of Tk 2.20 crore by abusing the power and thus inflicting a loss of Tk 1,000 crore to the State.

The ACC in a separate case accused her eldest son Tarique Rahman, for amassing huge unearned wealth and concealing it in the wealth statement he had submited to the anti-graft body.

Tarique's wife and mother-in-law were also implicated in the case in conniving with him to protect the illegal wealth.

Begum Zia's chief counsel Barrister Rafiqul Huq filed the writ petitions arguing that the invoking of EPR in cases relating to incidents that took place before the promulgation of the state of emergency was not legal.

Besides, detained former BNP ministers Barrister Moudud Ahmed and Barrister Nazmul Huda also filed separate writ petitions challenging the ACC notices asking them to submit statement of wealth to ACC.