A writ petition was filed yesterday with the High Court (HC) for directing the government to form a judicial commission to probe into the post-election violence in 2001.

Seven lawyers of Human Rights and Peace for Bangladesh (HRPB) jointly filed the petition as public interest litigation (PIL) that also challenged the inaction of the law I enforcers to prevent the crimes

including killings, tortures, rapes and lootings after the parliamentary polls in 2001.

The HC bench of Justice ABM Khairul Haque and Justice Md Abdul Hye yesterday adjourned the hearing of the petition and fixed the matter for further hearing on Monday (today).

During the hearing, petitioner's counsel Advocate Manzil Murshid told the court that after the holding of the parliamentary election in 2001, hundreds of people were killed and their properties were damaged.

Since the law enforcers did not discharge their legal and constitutional duties to prevent those incidents, the human rights of people were seriously violated, he said.

Manzil Murshid said police even did not accept cases submitted by the victims.

The petitioners are M Asaduzzaman, Sarwar Chowdhury, Ekhlasuddin Bhuiyan, Farhad Ahmed, Tapan Kami Das, Atiar Rahman and Swapan Kumar.

Home secretary, cabinet secretary, principal secretary to the prime minister's office (PMO), insp^cijbr general of police (iGPh additional 1GP and six deputy inspector generals (DIGs) of six divisions have been made respondents in the petition.