SC revising seniority list of judicial officers

Gulam Rabbani :
The seniority list of the members of Bangladesh Judicial Service (BJS) has not been revised or reformulated since 2015. As a result, various complications are being created in conducting the supervisory activities by the Supreme Court on the members of the judicial service as described in the Constitution of the country, according to a notification of the Supreme Court.
Since the seniority list is important in the matter of formation of the panel for promotion of members of Bangladesh Judicial Service by Selection Committee and Full Court Meeting, giving advice on posting by GA Committee, appointment of investigating officers regarding complaints brought against judicial officers, absence of an up-to-date seniority list is threatening to create various types of administrative chaos, said the notification issued by Md Golam Rabbani, Registrar General of the SC.
However, the Supreme Court administration has taken an initiative recently to prepare a seniority list of the Bangladesh Judicial Service members. It has already prepared a draft of the list where a total of 1,925 subordinate court judges have been included.
According to the list, there are a total of 306 District and Sessions Judges in the country and 51 judges are under process of promoting to this post. The number of Additional District and Sessions Judges is 359, Joint District and Sessions Judges is 215, Senior Assistant Judges is 455 and Assistant Judges is 539.
All the officials have been given an identification number following a model that included the year of joining
in the service, Bangladesh Civil Service (judicial) or Bangladesh Judicial Service code, batch number and the merit list number obtained by the official in the Public Service Commission (PSC) or BJS recruiting process.
The draft has been posted on the Supreme Court website with a view to receiving and resolving the objections of the judicial service members before finalising it. The members of the judicial service have been asked to submit their objections over the list by October 25 through their concerned higher authorities or by post or email.
“Identification number’ has already been introduced among the members of other services of the country who have been appointed through the Public Service Commission (PSC). As a result, it becomes possible to take decisions easily and quickly on any administrative matter. Therefore, the necessity of launching an identity number for judicial officers of Bangladesh like other service officers of the republic has been felt for a long time,” also read the notification.
Realising all these issues, the Chief Justice gave instructions for the drafting of the seniority list of the members of the judicial service. In the light of the said instructions, the seniority list of the members of the judicial service has been drafted by this Court.