Sara Hossain is a barrister practicing in the Supreme Court of Bangladesh, mainly in the areas of constitutional, public interest and family law. She is a partner at the law firm of Dr. Kamal Hossain and Associates (www.khossain.com.st.org.bd) she is a member of advisory boards, including the Women’s International Coalition on gender Justice (WICG), and earlier served as a Commissioner of the International of Jurists (ICJ), and a founding member of the South Asia Women’s fund (SAWF). She is an Overseas bencher of Middle Temple.
Sara’s casework has included public interest litigation before the supreme Court of Bangladesh on freedom of expression, personal liberty and women’s rights, (challenges to ‘fatwa’ violence, ‘forced veiling’ and the ‘two finger test’ among others). Sara writes and speaks on public interest law, human rights and women’s rights and access to justice, Her publications include “Confronting Constitutional Curtailments: Attempts to Rebuild Independence of the Judiciary in Bangladesh, “in Oaul Brass (ed) Handbook of Politics in South Asia (Routledge, 2010), “Wayward girls and Well Wisher Parents: Habeas Corpus, Women’s Rights to Consent and the Bangladesh Courts” in Aisha Gill (ed) Forced Marriage (Zed, London 2010); (with Binda de Costa) “Redress for Sexual violence before the International Crimes Tribunal in Bangladesh: lessons from history, and Hopes for the future’ in Criminal Law Forum , Volume 21, Number 2, 331-359;(Co-edited wuth Dina M. Siddiqi) Human Rights in Bangladesh 2007 (ASK, Dhaka, 2008). Sara was educated at Wadham College, Oxford (MA(Hons) 1988), called to the Bar from Middle Temple (1989), enrolled in the High Court Division of the Supreme Court of Bangladesh (1992) and then in the Appellate Division in 2008. She has received awards from the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights (now Human Rights First), the Us State Department (Women of Courage) and was selected as a World Economic Forum Fellow and an Asia 21 fellow.