In the area of criminal justice, Bangladesh has not taken steps towards democracy or improvement of the rule of law.
In the lower courts, it is the civil servants that exercise judicial power. This allows the police to get whatever they wish from these courts where no proper scrutiny of the papers filed by the police takes place. The result often is prolonged detention of many people who have to have recourse to higher courts to get bail through appeals. Meanwhile, while the appeal process takes place, they are kept in custody. The attempt by the Supreme Court to end the practice of civil servants exercising judicial power and to transfer this power to judicial magistrates where it properly belongs has not yet received a positive response from the government.
The corruption of the Bangladeshi police is frequently experienced by ordinary people in the country as it is often not the law but money that is behind arrests and illegal detentions. The guilty can escape through payments to the police with the innocent substituted in their place.
Moreover, the use of torture is endemic within the policing system of Bangladesh. The police are also utilised to suppress political dissent by opponents of the government and to use violence to control political or trade union demonstrations.
The most dismal aspect of human rights in Bangladesh is that there is no means by which victims can make complaints and have them investigated. The internal process of discipline within the police force itself does not exist. Even in cases where an inquiry begins due to public agitation, investigations are commonly characterised by corrupt interventions. Fundamental reform of the police is not only a necessary condition for democracy and the rule of law but also for the maintenance of any form of rational order within the country.
The Rapid Action Battalion (RAB), brought into force to deal with increased crime, is itself engaged in serious crimes, such as extrajudicial killings, torture and abductions. The concept of the control of crime is not to improve criminal investigations and to institute prosecutions but to deal with alleged criminals by extralegal means. This policy itself is an acknowledgement that the law enforcement system has collapsed under the weight of corruption. Since the law cannot be imposed through legal means due to institutionalised corruption, a more naked use of force is now used. The RAB, in effect, simultaneously acts as informers, judges and executioners.
In recent times, the chief justice and the attorney general have also come under severe criticism for being politicised and biased. All these factors cause tremendous confusion to the people and disrupt the development of more rational forms of administrating society and ensuring security.
