Hasnat and Sarzis withdrew from the writ petition against the Awami League

Leaders of the *Students Against Discrimination* movement, Hasnat Abdullah, Sarzis Alam, and Hasibul Islam, have withdrawn from a writ petition that sought an order to halt political activities of 11 parties, including the Awami League.

Their lawyer informed the High Court today of the decision to withdraw these writs and also stated that they would no longer pursue the writ challenging the legitimacy of the last three national parliamentary elections.

Senior lawyer Ahsanul Karim, representing the petitioners, relayed this to a High Court bench consisting of Justice Fatema Najib and Justice Shikdar Mahmudur Raji. Consequently, the court dismissed both writ petitions as not formally presented.

The previous day, Sarzis Alam, Abul Hasnat (Hasnat Abdullah), and Hasibul Islam had filed two separate writ petitions in the High Court. One petition requested an interim order to prohibit 11 parties, including the Awami League, from conducting any political activities, alleging these parties were involved in indiscriminate killings, the destruction of democratic institutions, and unconstitutional power grabs through illegal means. The targeted parties included the Bangladesh Awami League, Jatiya Party (Ershad), Jatiya Samajtantrik Dal (JSD), Bikalpa Dhara Bangladesh, Tariqat Federation, Communist Party of Bangladesh (CPB), Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), Jatiya Party (Manju), Ganatantri Party, Marxist-Leninist (Barua), and the Bangladesh Socialist Party. Notably, there is no officially recognized political party in Bangladesh under the name Marxist-Leninist (Barua).

The other writ petition sought a ruling on why the last three national parliamentary elections should not be declared invalid and called for the cancellation of the gazettes for these elections.