Private members’ bill placed with JS Secretariat
Shakhawat Liton
A private members’ bill has been submitted to the Parliament Secretariat for being placed in the House, proposing enactment of a law against torture, and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment in the hands of law enforcement agencies or government officials.
Submitted last week, the bill also proposes stringent punishments, including life term imprisonment and suspension from the services during investigation of charges against an offender, regardless of whether the offender is a member of regular law enforcement agencies or the armed forces, or of any other government office.
According to the bill, officials charged with the offences would not be able to justify their acts citing exceptional circumstances whatsoever including a state of war, internal political instability, a state of emergency, and an order of a superior officer or a public authority.
The bill was submitted by ruling Awami League (AL) lawmaker Saber Hossain Chowdhury, who is also the party’s organising secretary, sources in the secretariat said.
The lawmaker drafted the bill in conformity with the UN convention against torture, and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, which was adopted on December 10, 1984.
Bangladesh signed on to the convention led by a previous AL-led government on October 5, 1998, promising to create effective legislation, and to take administrative, judicial or other measures to prevent acts of torture in its territory.
The country’s constitution also provides safeguard against torture. Article 35 (5) of the constitution addresses it directly, saying, “No person shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman, or degrading punishment or treatment.”
But no successive government, including all AL-led ones, made any move to enact any law to prevent such incidents.
Prior to the December 29, 2008 parliamentary election, there was a rather long period in the country, when a large number of extra judicial killings, torture and abuses of human rights were reported, mainly during the regimes of BNP-led alliance government and the successive immediate past military backed caretaker government.
AL President Sheikh Hasina, who assumed the office of the premier after her party won a landslide victory in the December election, was among the people who strongly opposed extra judicial killings and torture.
The premier on February 11 in the parliament also warned of stern actions against extra judicial killings, saying her government will form a committee to investigate the torture and injustices inflicted upon the people during BNP-led government’s regime.
A number of senior leaders of the ruling AL, who were detained by the joint forces during the immediate past caretaker government, also demanded formation of a parliamentary probe body for taking actions against officials who reportedly were involved in torturing politicians.
In a written statement about the bill, Saber stressed the need for such a law, given the ruthless wanton practices of illegal arrests, detentions, torture, and extra judicial killings in the country.
“The country must legislate urgently in order to criminalise custodial torture and deaths, and to avoid repetition of serious human rights violations — a sad and unacceptable feature of our past,” Saber added.
He is of the view that the legislation is imperative to ensure rule of law in the country.
The proposed legislation is expected to protect the people from abuses, and prevent recurrence of human rights violations.
The Parliament Secretariat officials said the AL lawmaker submitted two bills — one is against torture, and the other is against eviction of slum dwellers, to protect them from whimsical eviction from public lands.
The officials said they will send the bills to the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Private Members’ Bills and Resolutions, which is likely to be formed this week.
“The committee will scrutinise the bills and recommend or disregard those for placement in the House,” a senior official said. Passage of the bill against torture, depends on the government’s will and the House’s sentiment for enacting such a law, the official added.
THE ANTI- TORTURE BILL
According to the bill, torture means any act or omission which causes physical or mental pain to any person, for obtaining from that person or some other person, information or a confession, or for punishing that person for any act or omission, for which that person or some other person is responsible, or is suspected of being responsible, or for intimidating or coercing that person or some other person.
“Any person who tortures any other person shall be guilty of an offence, and any person who attempts to commit, aids and abets in committing, and conspires to commit an offence shall also be guilty of an offence,” the proposed bill stipulates.
It seeks to enact a provision to punish an offender with rigorous imprisonment for a term no less than five years, and also with a fine no less than Tk 25, 000.
In an event of custodial death, if it is proven that the death occurred as a consequence of torture, the person who committed the offence, shall be sentenced to rigorous imprisonment for life, and shall be fined an amount no less than Tk 100,000, the proposed legislation adds.
“An offence under the bill shall be cognisable, non-compoundable, and non-bailable, within the meaning and for the purposes of the Code of Criminal Procedure 1898,” the bill says.
If a person under investigation for an offence punishable under the bill, is a public servant, he or she shall be immediately placed on suspension, if the person under investigation for an offence under the bill is a member of any of the law enforcement agencies in Bangladesh, including the armed forces comprising the army, air force, and the navy, the accused officer shall be immediately relieved of all duties, the bill proposes.
“A person convicted of an offence under the bill shall be terminated from public service from the date of conviction. However, if the sentence is reversed through an appeal, the appellate court shall issue necessary orders to reinstate the person in the service,” the bill says.
The bill proposes that the trial of an offence punishable under it, shall be completed within six months from the date of filing the charge sheet against the accused, while the investigation of an offence must be completed within seven months from the date of recording the first complaint.
An appeal against any verdict in a proceeding initiated under the provisions of the bill shall be concluded within 12 months from the date of filing the appeal, the bill adds.
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