Writ Filed in High Court Challenging Referendum Results

On Tuesday (February 17), Advocate A B M Ataul Majid Touhid of the Supreme Court of Bangladesh submitted the petition in the public interest.

The petition also requests a declaration preventing any future interim or caretaker government from arranging a referendum.

It may be noted that voting for the 13th National Parliamentary Election and the referendum took place on Thursday (February 12). Later, in the early hours of Friday (February 13), the Election Commission of Bangladesh (EC) officially published the referendum results and issued a gazette notification.

According to the declared results, the total number of registered voters was 127,711,793. The voter turnout stood at 60.26 percent. Among the votes cast, 48,074,429 were in favor (‘Yes’) and 22,565,627 against (‘No’). A total of 7,422,637 ballots were declared invalid.

The referendum, organized to endorse the ‘July National Charter’ and proposed constitutional reforms, reportedly received significant public backing. With the publication of the gazette, the legal pathway for implementing the proposed state reforms has been formally opened.

The EC stated in its notification that the results were officially declared in accordance with Section 16(3) of the Referendum Ordinance, 2025.