UPDATE (Bangladesh): A woman tortured by police while pregnant gets help from the courts after three years; police harassment continues

Dear friends,

The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has issued regular updates on the case of Mrs. Shahin Sultana Santa, a pregnant woman who was brutally tortured and whose unborn child was killed by police after she became caught up in a political demonstration. One witness has been killed, and at least two others have been arrested and detained under false charges. The victim’s case was dismissed by the Fourth Special Tribunal for Prevention of Women and Children Repression of Dhaka, and after three years her challenge, via a revision petition, has been heard. In September, a court of Dhaka ordered the Dhanmondi police station to register the torture as a criminal case. The victim and her family continue to be threatened by perpetrators among the police.

UPDATED INFORMATION:

On 12 March 2006, Shahin Sultana Santa, diabetic and pregnant, suffered two fractures and severe injuries to her thighs, lower abdomen, back, waist and hips, after an extended assault by police. Among other methods of torture, officers tied a rope around her abdomen and pulled it tight, kicked her genitalia and walked on top of her body in the police van until she fainted; she lost her child. She had been waiting for her son outside his school. Please see the victim’s photos [photo1], [photo2] and [photo3]. 

As described in various special reports and updates since then (linked below), her case has seen continual, often openly corrupt setbacks. This has included fabricated complaints being lodged against her family by members of the police; threats, offers of bribes and physical attacks officers; a weak judicial probe and primary court case; and threats being made against those willing to testify on her behalf.

Witness intimidation: Of the key witnesses, one has died mysteriously; Mr. Ripon, an electrician by trade, was killed in a trap allegedly set by police and a source in Mohakhali, Dhaka in 2007; and another, Mr. Omar Faruk Keru has spent two months in Noakhali Jail and five months in Dhaka Central Jail, where he was reportedly tortured and faced with ten fabricated charges. Santa’s husband and lawyer Mr. Atiur Rahman has claimed that various charges have been systematically fabricated against him over the last three years. 

Judicial flaws: We have been informed that on 21 May 2006, despite strong evidence, the Fourth Special Tribunal for Prevention of Women and Children Repression, Dhaka, dismissed the torture allegations and dropped the charges of molestation and sexual abuse. The judge ruled that the police did not molest and sexually abuse the victim deliberately. The abuse had been proven by a judicial probe commission headed by Metropolitan Magistrate of Dhaka, Mr. Shafique Anwar (for further details, please click here: UP-112-2006). 

On 30 October 2006 Santa registered a Revision Petition with the Metropolitan Sessions Court of Dhaka, which challenged the tribunal’s cancellation of her torture case. The complaint has been pending for almost three years, with nineteen successive hearings called, and delayed. 

Police action and inaction: On 27 September 2009, the Court of Fourth Additional Sessions Judge of Dhaka heard the Revision Petition. This was file by Santa to challenge the order of dismissal given by the Chief Metropolitan Magistrate of Dhaka. The judge granted Santa’s Revision Petition and cancelled the previous order of the Magistrate Court. The Chief Judicial Magistrate then ordered the police to record the complaint (at this point still a petition, instead of a First Information Report (FIR) due to the abuse of the system by police). 

That same evening at 8:05pm the Dhanmondi Police Station of the DMP finally registered the complaint as a FIR as case no. 47 (under Sections 341, 323, 325, 326, 354, 394, 506, 109 and 34 of the Penal Code of 1860). It had taken three years. 

Santa’s petition complaint (No. 312/2006) of torture was lodged with the Chief Metropolitan Judicial Magistrate’s Court (formerly known as the Chief Metropolitan Magistrate’s Court) of Dhaka on 14 March 2006, against the police. It cited former Deputy Commissioners of the Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP) Mr. Kohinoor Mian and Mr. Mazharul Haque, an inspector, along with 25 other police personnel. The case had ended with the release of a final report by Mr. Kawsar Haidary, an officer of the Criminal Investigation Department (CID). 

The FIR recorded under the non-bailable sections of the penal law, yet no arrests have been made. The DMP claims that it has since made several unsuccessful attempts to arrest the alleged perpetrators, particularly Mian (currently a SI of Police attached to the Rajshahi Range) and Haque (who was promoted to Additional DIGeneral of Police and became the Vice Principal at the Sarda Police Training Academy). Officers say that both are in hiding. Mr. Nur Hossain, Police Inspector of the detective branch of the Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP) has been appointed as Investigating Officer (IO). 

In anticipation of their arrest Mian and Haque have reportedly filed a writ petition with a bench of the High Court Division of the Supreme Court of Bangladesh on 1 October 2009 seeking ad interim bail. They were suspended from service after the case was registered, under orders given from the Minister of Home Affairs Ms. Sahara Khatun. 

The police headquarters has also reportedly started a ‘Departmental Proceeding’ against the alleged police officers, helmed by a Mr. Md. Humayan Kabir, a Joint Commissioner of the DMP. Six witnesses from Santa’s case testified before him on 30 November 2009, and on the same occasion the witnesses statements were recorded by the IO of the case inspector, Hossain. 

This case is becoming a landmark trial for the flaws it has exposed in the criminal justice system. Please find case analysis in our special report in periodical, Article 2: Lawless law-enforcement and the parody of judiciary in Bangladesh (Vol.5, no. 4, August 2006) or follow the progression of the case through our original appeal and updates: UA-105-2006, UP-058-2006, UP-062-2006, UP-083-2006, UP-096-2006, UP-101-2006, UP-112-2006, UP-114-2006, UP-181-2006, UP-207-2006, UP-026-2007 and UP-040-2007. 

ADDITIONAL COMMENTS: 

It should be noted that The Fourth Special Tribunal for the Prevention of Women and Child Repression is one of many tribunals set up in each of Bangladesh’s district headquarters, and was partly established in response to the country’s ratification of the Convention on the Elimination of All forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) in 1995. To ratify this international law, a country must not only change discriminatory laws but also introduce new gender-sensitive laws and policies to ameliorate and adjust unequal power balances between men and women. The case of Shanta begs the embarrassing question of its usefulness, and its power. Its inability to either protect or support a woman whose genitals was beaten and whose child was killed while inside her body by law enforcers, speaks of both a lack of understanding of the convention, and a lack of will to take it seriously. 

SUGGESTED ACTION:
Please write to the relevant Bangladesh authorities listed below and demand their urgent intervention into this case. Please also urge them to provide safe environment to the victim and her family as well as the witnesses of the torture case in no time. 

The Asian Human Rights Commission has written separate letters to the UN Special Rapporteurs on Question of Torture and Violence against Women urging their interventions into this case. 

To support this case, please click here: SEND APPEAL LETTER