The High Court has accepted an appeal filed by Zubaida Rahman, wife of BNP’s Acting Chairman Tarique Rahman, challenging her three-year prison sentence in a corruption case filed by the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC). The court also granted her bail.
Following Wednesday’s hearing, Justice Md Khasruzzaman’s single High Court bench approved Zubaida’s bail until the appeal is resolved.
Zubaida filed the appeal on Tuesday after the High Court accepted her petition condoning a 587-day delay in filing.
Her lawyer Barrister Kayser Kamal stated: “The High Court has accepted the appeal for hearing and granted bail. The court has also stayed the Tk35 lakh fine and called for case records. This was a politically motivated conviction. We’re confident of securing acquittals for both Tarique and Zubaida Rahman during full appeal hearings.”
After his 2008 release from jail, Tarique Rahman went to London for advanced medical treatment accompanied by his wife Zubaida and daughter Zaima. They did not return during Awami League’s tenure, preventing him from legally contesting various cases.
Following the Awami League government’s ouster, Zubaida’s sentence in this case was suspended for one year on October 2, 2024. She returned to Bangladesh from London on May 6 with her mother-in-law Khaleda Zia before her lawyers filed the High Court appeal.
The ACC had originally filed this case on September 26, 2007 against Tarique Rahman, his wife Zubaida Rahman and mother-in-law Syeda Iqbal Mand Banu at Kafrul Police Station.
On August 2, 2023, Dhaka’s Senior Special Judge and Metropolitan Sessions Judge Md Asaduzzaman sentenced Tarique to nine years and Zubaida to three years’ imprisonment along with fines in the case.