Despite the constitutional guarantee of equal protection of law many poor people of the country are deprived of this right as they do not have proper access to Justice due to little or no knowledge about the legal aid service.

The Legal Aid Services Act 2000 aims to provide legal aid to the litigants who are incapable of seeking legal help due to financial insolvency, destitution, helplessness and for various socio-economic conditions.

Any poor person can avail free legal aid service, which includes any individual receiving old age allowance, distressed mother holding a VGD card, women and children victims of trafficking and acid throwing, insolvent widow, abandoned or distressed woman, disabled person, poor detainee.

The government has established permanent legal aid office in every district to ensure access to justice for the poor and disadvantaged.

The Act mandated the establishment of National Legal Aid Services Organisation (NLASO) which is responsible for implementation of government legal aid service across the country. The duties and functions of the NLASO are preliminary to- (a) determine the eligibility of the persons who seeks legal aid (b) make schemes for providing legal aid (c) carry out research programs (d) arrange massive advertisement through media and to arrange seminars to create public awareness on legal aid and (e) to supervise, control and inspect the activities of District Legal Aid Committees.

The District Legal Aid Committees determine the eligibility of the persons who seeks legal aid at the District level, they initiate and implement projects on legal aid, arrange awareness programs and also consider the petitions sent by the Upazila and Union committees. In 2011, a regulation was made to formally establish Upazila and Union legal aid committees all over Bangladesh.

One of the barriers to accessing legal aid service was the legal aid fees structure- as the lawyers previously felt that their professional fee is very low in legal aid cases. Due to this poor payment prominent lawyers were reluctant to conduct legal aid cases. However, by amending Legal Aid Services Regulation this barrier was removed to a great extent.

In 2013 the Legal Aid Services Act was amended with the view to strengthen the entire legal aid system. The amended version of the law included, inter alia, provision for establishing a Supreme Court Committee to administer the cases, to initiate plans and programs to implement the legal aid service in the Supreme Court, to take proper action to create awareness etc. The amended Act also has provision to appoint as many legal aid officers as needed to provide legal opinion and also to apply alternative dispute resolution method where applicable.

However, there are some impediments to access legal aid service under the existing system, for example though the amended Act created post for appointing legal aid officers they are not still provided with.  Another problem is in the District Legal Aid Committees the District Judges are responsible for holding meetings whereas the DC is responsible for implementation. Therefore, if DC sends recommendations towards UNO and UPO then the legal aid service will be effective and established in the grass root level and the marginalised will be benefited. Finally the Upazila and Union legal aid committees should be given some incentives and financial support to carry on with their activities.

Farzana Begum is the executive director of Bangladesh Manobadhikar O Poribesh Andolon, and an advocate at the Supreme Court of Bangladesh.