Last Change:
05/09/2025
The Constitution of the People's Republic of Bangladesh
Year: 1972
Type: Domestic law
Rights Category: Asylum, Education, Freedom of movement, Health, Housing, land & property, Liberty & security of person, Nationality & facilitated naturalization, Social protection, Work & Workplace rights, Family life, Documentation
Description
The Preamble of the Constitution of the People's Republic of Bangladesh establishes the guiding principles and aspirations of the country. It highlights the commitment to establish a just and egalitarian society based on freedom, human rights, social justice, and the rule of law. The Preamble emphasizes the importance of preserving democratic values, ensuring fundamental rights and freedoms for all citizens, promoting equality, and fostering national unity and solidarity. Additionally, in Part I, the Constitution discusses the fundamental rights of citizens, including equality before the law, freedom of speech and expression, freedom of religion, and protection against discrimination.
Selected provisions
The State shall adopt effective measures for the purpose of –
(a) establishing a uniform, mass oriented and universal system of education and extending free and compulsory education to all children to such stage as may be determined by law;
(b) relating education to the needs of society and producing properly trained and motivated citizens to serve those needs;
(c) removing illiteracy within such time as may be determined by law.
The State shall base its international relations on the principles of respect for national sovereignty and equality, non interference in the internal affairs of other countries, peaceful settlement of international disputes, and respect for international law and the principles enunciated in the United Nations Charter, and on the basis of those principles shall
(a) strive for the renunciation of the use of force in international relations and for general and complete disarmament;
(b) uphold the right of every people freely to determine and build up its own social, economic and political system by ways and
means of its own free choice; and
(c) support oppressed peoples throughout the world waging a just struggle against imperialism, colonialism or racialism.
(1) All existing law inconsistent with the provisions of this Part shall, to the extent of such inconsistency, become void on the commencement of this Constitution.
(2) The State shall not make any law inconsistent with any provisions of this Part, and any law so made shall, to the extent of such inconsistency, be void.
(3) Nothing in this article shall apply to any amendment of this Constitution made under article 142.
To enjoy the protection of the law, and to be treated in accordance with law, and only in accordance with law, is the inalienable right of every citizen, wherever he may be, and of every other person for the time being within Bangladesh, and in particular no action detrimental to the life, liberty, body, reputation or property of any person shall be taken except in accordance with law.
No person shall be deprived of life or personal liberty save in accordance with law.
(1) No person who is arrested shall be detained in custody without being informed, as soon as may be, of the grounds for such arrest, nor shall he be denied the right to consult and be defended by a legal practitioner of his choice.
(2) Every person who is arrested and detained in custody shall be produced before the nearest magistrate within a period of twenty four hours of such arrest, excluding the time necessary for the journey from the place of arrest to the Court of the magistrate, and no such person shall be detained in custody beyond the said period without the authority of a magistrate.
(3) Nothing in clauses (1) and (2) shall apply to any person :
(a) who for the time being is an enemy alien; or
(b) who is arrested or detained under any law providing for preventive detention.
(4) No law providing for preventive detention shall authorise the detention of a person for a period exceeding six months unless an Advisory Board consisting of three persons, of whom two shall be persons who are, or have been, or are qualified to be appointed as, Judges of the Supreme Court and the other shall be a person who is a senior officer in the service of the Republic, has, after affording him an opportunity of being heard in person, reported before the expiration of the said period of six months that there is, in its opinion, sufficient cause for such detention.
(5) When any person is detained in pursuance of an order made under any law providing for preventive detention, the authority making the order shall, as soon as may be, communicate to such person the grounds on which the order has been made, and shall afford him the earliest opportunity of making a representation against the order:
Provided that the authority making any such order may refuse to disclose facts which such authority considers to be against the public interest to disclose.
(6) Parliament may by law prescribe the procedure to be followed by an Advisory Board in an inquiry under clause (4)
(1) Work is a right, a duty, and a matter of honor for every citizen who is capable of working, and everyone shall be paid for his work on the basis of the principle “from each according to his abilities, to each according to his work”.
(2) The State shall endeavor to create conditions in which, as a general principle, persons shall not be able to enjoy unearned incomes, and in which human labor in every form, intellectual and physical, shall become a fuller expression of creative endeavor and of the human personality.
Article 34: (1) All forms of forced labour are prohibited and any contravention of this provision shall be an offence punishable in accordance with law.
(2) Nothing in this article shall apply to compulsory labour
(a) by persons undergoing lawful punishment for a criminal
offence; or
(b) required by any law for public purposes.
(1) No person shall be convicted of any offence except for violation of a law in force at the time of the commission of the act charged as an offence, nor be subjected to a penalty greater than, or different from, that which might have been inflicted under the law in force at the time of the commission of the offence.
(2) No person shall be prosecuted and punished for the same offence more than once.
(3) Every person accused of a criminal offence shall have the right to a speedy and public trial by an independent and impartial Court or tribunal established by law.
(4) No person accused of any offence shall be compelled to be a witness against himself.
(5) No person shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman, or degrading punishment or treatment.
(6) Nothing in clause (3) or clause (5) shall affect the operation of any existing law which prescribes any punishment or procedure for trial.
(1) Freedom of thought and conscience is guaranteed.
(2) Subject to any reasonable restrictions imposed by law in the interests of the security of the State, friendly relations with foreign states, public order, decency or morality, or in relation to contempt of court, defamation or incitement to an offence–
(a) the right of every citizen to freedom of speech and expression; and
(b) freedom of the press,
are guaranteed.