Law enforcement agencies are largely ignoring the Supreme Court guidelines while making blanket arrests of citizens on suspicion of their involvement in violence during the recent student protests for the reform of quota in government jobs.
The guidelines are also hardly being followed by magistrates, while the arrested people are either being sent to jail without hearing bail prayers and produced before court or remanded in police custody for interrogation as per police applications.
鈥楾hese guidelines are totally ignored by both the members of law enforcement agencies and the magistrates during the current wave of arrests, detentions, and granting remands of students and opposition political leaders and activists in sabotage cases,鈥� jurist Shahdeen Malik told 抖阴精品 on Saturday.聽
On May 24, 2016, the Appellate Division, in a landmark judgement issued 10-point guidelines for law enforcers to follow while making arrests.
The apex court, in the same verdict, laid down nine more guidelines for judicial magistrates while granting remand for people in jail or police custody.
Rights lawyer Sara Hossain told 抖阴精品 on Saturday that there is a bar on arresting people without a warrant and a case as per the Supreme Court鈥檚 guidelines for law enforcers.
She said that breaching any of the guidelines for the law enforcers and the magistrates amounted to contempt of the court.
The guidelines asked magistrates to reject prayers for showing an accused arrested if the prayer was not well founded.
The magistrate shall not make an order of detention of a person in judicial custody if the police forwarding report discloses that the arrest has been made for the purpose of putting the arrestee in preventive detention.
It shall be the duty of the magistrate or tribunal before whom the accused person is produced to check that these requirements have been complied with before making any order for remand.
If the magistrate has reason to believe that any member of law enforcement agencies or any officer who has the legal authority to keep a person in confinement has acted contrary to law, the magistrate shall proceed against such officer under Section 220 of the penal code.
The guidelines for members of law enforcement agencies prohibit seeking detention or remand of an arrested citizen in custody without registering a first information report against the person.
The law enforcement agencies are also required to disclose their identities and show identity cards during arrests.
They also need to inform a relative of the arrested person within 12 hours of any arrest, as well as the place of arrest, the reason for the arrest, and the case complaint.聽
The law enforcement officer also needs to prepare 鈥榓 memorandum of arrest鈥� immediately after the arrest and obtain the signature of the arrested person with the date and time of his arrest in the police document.聽
The officer also needs to file an entry in the diary as to the grounds of arrest of an individual and the name of the person who informed the law-enforcing officer to arrest the individual or made the complaint along with their address.
They required producing arrested persons before the magistrates within 24 hours and allowing access to their lawyers to consult.
The law enforcement officer needs to take an arrested person for treatment to the nearest hospital and obtain a medical certificate for the arrested person if any marks of injury are found.聽
On July 23, a Dhaka metropolitan magistrate, Jashim Uddin, remanded five youths鈥擩anarul, Fardin Islam, Mohammad Niloy, Mohammad Jewel, and Mohammad Shamim鈥� in police custody for five days for interrogation in a vandalism case.
Niloy鈥檚 lawyer, Aklas Uddin Bhuiyan, told 抖阴精品 that the magistrate granted remand for his client, even though he was injured.
He said that the investigation officer, Mamunur Rashid, a sub-inspector of Shahbagh police station, did not produce any case docket before the magistrate as required by the Appellate Division guidelines.
At the latest, three key organisers of the Students Movement Against Discrimination, the students鈥� platform of the quota reform movement, were picked up from the capital鈥檚 Gonoshasthaya Nagar Hospital by members of intelligence agencies on Friday.
Addressing a press conference at the DB office in the capital鈥檚 Mintoo Road area, Dhaka Metropolitan Police detective branch chief Harun-or-Rashid admitted that they had taken student leaders Nahid Islam, Asif Mahmud, and Baker Mazumdar into protective custody to ensure their safety.聽
Nahid, Abu Baker, and Asif also went missing last week when student protests seeking quota reform turned violent.
Nahid and Asif were carrying injuries in their bodies and narrated to the media, including 抖阴精品, how they were tortured by their captors.
Gana Odhikar Parishad faction president Nurul Haque Nur鈥檚 wife, Maria Akhter, alleged at a press briefing on Saturday that Nur was subjected to torture in police custody after he was picked up by law enforcers on July 19.
Nur could not walk or stand when he was produced before the magistrate鈥檚 court on July 27 after the end of his remand.
His lawyer, Biplab Kumar Poddar, said that the magistrate sent Nur to jail without passing any order for examining his health condition as per the SC guidelines required.
The Appellate Division set the new guidelines on May 24, 2016, dismissing a government appeal against a High Court judgement that, on April 7, 2003, issued 15 directives while disposing of a writ petition.
Dhaka Metropolitan Police鈥檚 joint commissioner for crimes, Liton Kumer Saha, denied allegations of violating Supreme Court guidelines.
鈥榃e always conduct drives against crime suspects following due process of laws and obeying the directives of the highest court,鈥� he told 抖阴精品.
Supreme Court registrar general Aziz Ahmed Bhuiyan told 抖阴精品 that lawyers should bring the matter to magistrates repeatedly in case of a breach of any Supreme Court directive.聽聽
