ICT-BD [ICT-21] Miscellaneous Case No. 01 of 2014 Order: 02 December 2014 21. In Halsbury's Laws of England, 3rd Edition at page 346, it has been described as: "Courts of record. Another manner of division is into Courts of record and Courts not of record. Certain Courts are expressly declared by statute to be Courts of record. In the case of Courts not expressly declared to be Courts of record, the answer to the question whether a Court is a Court of record seems to depend in general upon whether it has power to fine or imprison, by statute or otherwise, for contempt of itself or other substantive offences if it has such power, it seems that it is a Court of record." 22. Further, according to Jowitt, Dictionary of English Law, a Court of Record means; 'A Court whereof the acts and judicial proceedings are enrolled for a perpetual memory and testimony, and which has power to fine and imprison for contempt of its authority." 23. What the Statute of 1973 says? Section 11(4) empowers the Tribunal constituted under this statute as below: "A Tribunal may punish any person, who obstructs or abuses its process or disobeys any of its orders or directions, or does anything which tends to prejudice the case of a party before it, or tends to bring it or any of its members into hatred or contempt, or does anything which constitutes contempt of the Tribunal, with simple imprisonment which may extend to one year, or with fine which may extend to Taka five thousand, or with both." 24. Therefore the Tribunal set up under the Act of 1973 is a 'court of record' and is empowered to punish the contemptuous act. 25. In Morris [Morris V. The Crown Office (1970)1 All ER 1079] Lord Justice Salmon Spoke: "The sole purpose of proceedings for contempt is to give our Courts the power effectively to protect the rights of the public by ensuring that the administration of justice shall not be obstructed or prevented." 26. It is thus quite transparent that the Act of 1973 has made the Tribunal equipped with the power and jurisdiction of punishing for the offence of contempt, to protect the administration of justice from obstruction of any kind. Understandably a duty of protecting the interest 8