The High Court in a verdict on Thursday (February 16) made it clear that from now it is not mandatory to mention marital status of students during admissions in the educational institutions.
The higher court asked the authorities concerned not to force any admission seeker to disclose their marital status in admission form in the educational institutions.
The HC bench of Justice Naima Haider and Justice Md Khairul Alam delivered the verdict on Thursday (February 16) after hearing on a rule that questioned the legality of educational institutions seeking information on marital status of admission seekers. The rule was issued over five years ago following a writ petition.
Deputy Attorney General Amit Das Gupta represented the state in the court during the hearing.
He said that following the HC judgement, no student can be forced to disclose their marital status for their admission in any institution across the country.
According to him, the High Court also declared illegal the Rajshahi Government Nursing College’s action of asking a rape victim to write in the admission form that she was abandoned by her husband.
The Deputy Attorney General said that details based on which the HC delivered the judgement can be known when the full text of the verdict is released.
On November 14 in 2017, Advocate Fariha Ferdous and Advocate Nahid Sultana filed the writ petition attaching a news item published in a national daily headlined ‘What the girl will do now?’
The High Court issued the rule on December 11 in 2017 following the writ petition. The higher court in the rule also asked the authorities concerned of the government to explain why this should not be declared unconstitutional.
The HC also asked authorities concerned to admit a female student, who gave birth to a baby after being raped, to Rajshahi Government Nursing College.
According to the news item, on June 6 in 2013, a class X girl was violated, but the rapist denied the allegation.
When the girl became pregnant, she was admitted to the one stop crisis centre of Rajshahi Medical College and Hospital. Later, she filed a complaint against the rapist, said the newspaper report.
Police arrested the rapist and a DNA test proved that the rapist was the father of the child.
Later, a court ordered sending the girl to a residential centre under Rajshahi division ‘Women Assistance Programme’ of the government.
While living at the centre, the girl appeared in the SSC examination and during her exam she gave birth to a baby boy on February 19 in 2014.
Meanwhile, she passed the SSC examination and appeared for her HSC examination from there. Later, she was sent to her house and also passed the HSC examination.
On May 30 in 2017, a trial court sentenced the rapist to life-term imprisonment and asked him to bear the expenses of the baby boy. The court also fined the rapist Tk one lakh.
The victim girl was put in the category of married woman during the public examinations though she was unmarried.
The girl was unable to fill up the admission form of the nursing college due to her marital status as she was not married and had a child.
