Constitution amendment committee to submit final report by December: Home minister

The special parliamentary committee on constitutional amendments will submits its final report before the house by the end of the year, said Home Minister Salahuddin Ahmed on Sunday.

Salahuddin, also the president of the committee, outlined the timeline at a press briefing held after the second meeting of the committee hosted at the Parliament Building in the capital.

From now, the committee members will convene a meeting once every week, and prepare the final report by December, which would then be sent to the law ministry for preparing a bill, Salahuddin told reporters.

The committee wants to move “very fast,” Salahuddin added.

He said that the committee invited all the 26 signatories of the July Charter to its meetings, and 15 have attended in-person.

AB Party has sent a written response, and Jatiya Gonofront could not take part due to “health reasons” but has voiced support for the process in a phone conversation, Salahuddin said.

He said that it was “completely untrue” that the treasury bench, led by the ruling BNP, was pushing through constitutional reforms as it sees fit due to the huge majority it enjoys in the parliament.

The BNP-led lawmakers will implement the July Charter “exactly as it was signed by the political parties,” he added. The “notes of dissent” BNP had placed during charter implementation talks hosted by the interim government will be reflected in the constitution reform process, Salahuddin said.

In its election campaign, the BNP had clearly stated its “notes of dissent” on the July Charter, and received resounding public support in the general elections.

The treasury bench will implement the July Charter by including the "notes of dissent" as people overwhelmingly supported the "notes" by voting BNP to power in the national elections, he said.

The proposed 100-member upper house of the parliament will include the proportionate number of seats each political party has won in the national elections, he said.

The Opposition bloc, led by Jamaat-e-Islami, demands the upper house be formed based on the proportionate representation (PR) system, which takes into account total votes each party won in the elections.