Bangladesh Nationalist Party chairperson and former prime minister Khaleda Zia was acquitted by Dhaka magistrate courts on Tuesday in five separate cases filed on charges of defamation.
Besides, the Dhaka Special Judge Court-9 fixed September 8 for recording depositions of witnesses in the Niko corruption case filed against Khaleda Zia and seven others.
Dhaka additional chief metropolitan magistrate聽 Mahbubul Haque鈥檚 court issued acquittal orders in four cases, while another additional chief metropolitan magistrate Tofazzal Hossain鈥檚 court acquitted her in one case.
The court acquitted Khaleda Zia in the cases as the plaintiffs did not appear before the court on Tuesday, the scheduled hearing date in the cases.
Khaleda鈥檚 lawyer, Masud Ahmed Talukdar told journalists that the politically motivated cases were filed during the Awami League government tenure by the state sponsored people against Khaleda Zia for tarnishing her image.
鈥楾wo Dhaka courts acquitted her following our petitions, as the plaintiff did not appear for a long time,鈥� he added.
According to the case, on August 30, 2016, Gazi Zahirul Islam, a former leader of the Dhaka Union of Journalists, filed a case accusing Khaleda Zia of celebrating her birthday on August 15.
The complaint says that Khaleda celebrates her birthday on this day solely to tarnish the reputation of the country鈥檚 founding president, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, and his family.
AB Siddique, the president of Bangladesh Jananetri Parishad, a pro-Awami League organisation, filed a case with a Dhaka court on November 3, 2016, accusing Khaleda of 鈥榰ndermining鈥� the country鈥檚 map and national flag.
The third case was also filed by AB Siddique on October 21, 2014, claiming that on October 14 in the same year, Khaleda at a programme in Dhaka said that the ruling party鈥檚 (AL) professed secularism was nothing but a sham. Siddique also said in his case statement that her remarks hurt religious sentiments.
The fourth case was filed by AB Siddique on January 5, 2016, against Khaleda and the party鈥檚 standing committee member Gayeshwar Chandra Roy on charges of demeaning War of Independence martyrs.
The fifth case was filed by AB Siddique on January 25, 2017, against Kheleda on charges of making a 鈥榙efamatory remark鈥� on country鈥檚 founding president Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.
It was mentioned that Khaleda, at a programme on December 31, 2016, said that Sheikh Mujib wanted to be the prime minister of undivided Pakistan rather than leading Bangladesh (the then East Pakistan) to independence.
The Dhaka Special Judge Court-9, meanwhile, on Tuesday fixed September 8 for next hearing in the Niko graft case as the witnesses did not come to the court on the scheduled day of testimony.
The Anti-Corruption Commission filed the case in December 2007, accusing Khaleda and several others of abusing power to award a gas exploration and extraction deal to Canadian company Niko when she was prime minister between 2001 and 2006.
Khaleda Zia, who had been under house arrest for the past five years, was released on August 7 after the president pardoned her punishments, a day after Sheikh Hasina resigned and fled to India amid the student-led mass uprising.
Earlier, Khaleda on February 8, 2018, was sent to Old Dhaka Jail after a special court in Dhaka sentenced her to five years鈥� imprisonment in the Zia Orphanage Trust corruption case.
The High Court later doubled her five-year jail term.
In the same year, the same court sentenced Khaleda to seven years in jail in the Zia Charitable Trust graft case.
Amid the Covid-19 pandemic, the government temporarily freed Khaleda from jail through an executive order suspending her sentence on March 25, 2020, on the condition that she would stay in her Gulshan house and not leave the country.
She has long been battling various ailments, including liver cirrhosis, arthritis, diabetes, and issues relating to the kidneys, lungs, heart, and eyes.
Although the then government had extended the period of her conditional release on multiple occasions, it denied BNP鈥檚 call to take her abroad for better treatment.
About three dozens of cases were filed against Khaleda Zia during the past three consecutive terms of the former prime minister Sheikh Hasina-led AL government.