Remand benodon (Entertainment).
In the middle ages and in current age in some countries still in the middle age, one of the most popular entertainments was watching torture and execution of the bed elements of the society, the criminals, and the downtrodden. Citizen from all walk of like will gather in the arena to watch and enjoy the unforgettable entertainment of torture and execution of a bed soul. Elites used to get the courtside seats, the general mass in the back seats. Kids used to accompany the parents.
We think we have come a long way from those dark ages. Did we really? The electrifying spread of Saddam execution video, its popularity– does it ring some bell? What about Bangladesh? If we change the context a bit, I do not see much change in the instinct.
In Bangladesh we have a thing called remand. A man/ woman under any sort of suspicion can be taken to undisclosed place by unidentified law enforcement agency people and can be kept for days to months. IN recent years remand lasted from a day to 4 to five months. During this time, the person being held cease to have any kind of basic right. He/ she can’t access any lawyer/ family. He can’t make any communication with anybody. Nobody would know where the person is being taken. People who have been through remand say that during this time they were subjected to all form of torture literally non stop.
Recently torture in the name of remand has become a household feared word. Remand has gained an added dimension by media’s usage of purported remand confessions to make entertaining news. Although torture in police custody is nothing new in Bangladesh, making that event a national entertainment is probably around three years old.
During the military regime of January 2007 to January 2009, almost all of the nation was drunk in a fiesta of entertainment coming out of so called torture confessions. There were two kinds of entertainment values. First the shear fun of knowing a leader of opposing political views is getting a great thrashing while in remand. And second was from all the earth shattering purported confessions being published in the print media. During last military regime, our print media (except the honorable exception of English Daily New Age), gleefully published all the dreadful crimes the political and business leaders committed. And later all the news headlines proved to be false. Not a single media apologized and retracted all the character assassinations they have committed.
During the days of the current elected government the fanfare of remand continued, but with an added spice. One person is picked to get some good thrashing; government’s judiciary provides a remand. Then thrashing starts. And newspapers, as expected, start publishing all the horror stories.
And if the person in remand happens to be a young woman, nothing can get better than that. Invariably erotically charged stories will come out how that women lived with many men, how she was violated, used-reused, how many people married her and divorced her etc. The stories however keep on changing. If one reads same newspaper on three consecutive days, there will be three conflicting version of the same story.
Remains buried under all these sadistic national entertainment— independent-passionate judiciary, responsible journalism and basic human rights.
Who cares.
October 31, 2009 at 9:17 am
Surely public perceptions of characters are important for the politicians and wealthy/influential persons of Bangladesh.
Politicians meddling with the judiciary and administration is nothing new. We have seen different versions of this abuse of power during different regimes.
During Ershad regime active-duty military officers met in secret sessions to try cases ranging from violations of press censorship to vaguely defined “antisocial activities.”
During Awami League regime we saw how cases were brought up against Khaleda Zia.
During BNP era we saw the Jodge Mia drama to divert the August 21 massacre. We saw how the administration was tainted to save the persons behind the 10 truck.
No doubt remand is a form of Bangladesh’s Abu Gharib. You discussed about character assassinations. In Bangladesh influential people never let their character tainted. They always recover.
One example here, An (then) assistant commissioner of customs who caught Lufuzzaman Babar during a smuggling was surprised to see him as a minister a decade later (this is a real life story – not from newspaper). These are the people we choose as politicians. And when he was in remand during the caretaker government for a lot of allegations he confessed to a lot of things and then again after the end of caretaker govt. he used this character assassination drama (denying everything) to ran for elections independently (and was expelled by BNP).
Now, Abdul Jalil can reverse his statements saying all he said was under duress. The men behind the bus bombings can happily get away because their party is in power. People really don’t know whom to believe.
Regarding newspapers I think these stories are fed to them. Nobody can have access to torture cells. But its the information provided by the authorities that ran in the papers. And of course there are tabloid newspapers who sometimes go out of line. But who is to control them? Its the politics that needs a reformation. The rest will fall in place automatically.
Now if the customs official (who does not belong to a party) sees Babar being remanded as a poetic justice and not bother about human rights then should we label it as sadistic? Unfortunately many in Bangladesh see things in this way.
October 31, 2009 at 3:39 pm
Well, I think the whole point is that we don’t decide which person gets to have human rights and who doesn’t: that devolves into a breakdown of the entire structure.
If Babar was a smuggler, then the best time/place to annouce that would be right after he took over as State Minister for Home. I am sure there are plenty of people in our bureaucracy who would have gladly supplied any document bearing that information to Sheikh Hasina.
Whether “many Bangladeshis” are bothered about Babar’s human rights is supremely unimportant. Are they bothered about the human rights of their loved ones? As long as the answer to that is yes, then they cannot be for remand.
November 2, 2009 at 12:44 am
Rezwan
I am new to this world of Bangladeshi bloggers. I may be mistaken, but what I can remember, you and many more writers protested remand and death in remand of many BDR members. Although many of these BDR men brutally killed many of my colleague and brothers in the army; I felt you were right. A wrong can never be responded by another wrong.
But now I am surprised at your change of heart. If you protested against remand of those BDR killers of my ex room mate, how can you support remand of Babar or others. Isn’t this called double standard?
You then made some story of some bad politicians. But you carefully skipped the information and audio CD of Sheikh Selim and Abdul Jalil remand confessions, which clearly implicates present Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina collecting part of the booty of a big government contract. You also forgot to mention how Awami League’s that time Secretary Abdul Jalil’s confessions of collecting monthly extortion from Bashundhora group owner’s son on behalf of Mrs Hasina.
What will you say about this crimes? Do you believe in these confessions?
November 4, 2009 at 10:37 am
Ahsan Habib,
Read my comment closely. I did not support Babar’s remand.
My point was that Babar, despite being a petty smuggler has been made a minister of a political party and now we are making a fuss about his remand when there are a hell lot of human rights violations happening.
On 19th of October a young man named Kamrul Hassan Bappy was killed in crossfire because his name matched with a terrorist.
His death was not much talked about because he does not belong to a party. He does not deserve to be dedicated a couple of posts.
My point was that this post talks about character assassination. Babar’s example (its only one) shows that politicians don’t bother about character assassination. They always recover.
Your attempt to drag me into the boundary of some party was really entertaining when I mentioned about the bus bombers and Abdul Jalil. Keep it up with your jaundiced eyed views. There is something beyond the party lines. Wake up.
Tacit:
“If Babar was a smuggler, then the best time/place to annouce that would be right after he took over as State Minister for Home.”
Who will announce it? The lady who caught him at the airport? Doesn’t she have to earn her leaving and protect her job than to protest a BNP’s MP when BNP was in power?
November 5, 2009 at 2:11 pm
It is an old mini story, but here is the repeat:
“
A tiger was drinking water in a river and on downstream a goat was doing same. Tiger saw the goat and desired to eat it. Tiger needed an excuse to eat so it tells goat that goat spoiled running water by putting its mouth in water and tiger drank spoiled water. Goat pointed out that goat was in downstream and could not spoil water. Having this excused failed, tiger came up with next excuse and said “you called me names two years ago”; goat said she was not even born then. Having this excuse also failed tiger said “well it was your father who called names” and tiger ate the goat.
“
This is what AW is doing with family of old nemesis.
Where Islam teaches no one bears wrongs of other, yet some lawyers’ quotes Sk Rusell incident to justify remand of Mehnaz and her infant daughter. How mind numbing it is when these words come out of lawyers who are suppose to uphold unbiased justice. I guess we should have AW court, BNP court and we already have Martial court that visits periodically. If this is what our justice system comprises with, than truly, what we have is a dysfunctional system that creates mentally diseased people cloaking in word ‘justice’ doing irreversible harm to individuals and society. Sad, isn’t it.