Bangladesh: The Anatomy of a Political Arrest

“It was 3 in the morning when they came,” 21-year-old Jiaul recounted. “I was shaken awake by my uncle who shouted – They’re taking your father away! Come out!”

But there was nothing Jiaul or his mother and little sister could do. His father could barely put on a shirt before he was dragged away by Mirpur Model Police Station’s subinspector Bajlur Rahman and his team of around seven officers.

What transpired in the week following the pre-dawn raid on 44-year-old Mozammel Hoque Chowdhary’s modest house in Narayanganj, Bangladesh, is a dark yet typical example of what is rapidly becoming normal in Bangladesh’s politics. It’s yet another story of how civil rights activists across the country are declared criminals and pre-emptively locked up while the criminal justice system hunts for suitable crimes to put against their name. It’s also a story of how the Awami League-led ruling alliance has swung from massive popularity to unhinged paranoia.

Chowdhary is the general secretary of the Jatri Kalyan Samity – a group advocating rights for passengers of public transportation. For the 12 years that Chowdhary has been with the organization, neither he nor his NGO has had any participation in politics or partisan affiliation of any significance. According to their own records, the most militant of their activities has been conducting awareness campaigns regarding traffic laws.

And yet, for a country that claims to be battling terrorism, drug cartels, and sedition plots, Bangladesh’s government has spared no effort in arresting and extending the remand of this most benign of civic campaigners.

“They said they had a warrant, and held a few sheets of paper in their hand when they came,” Jiaul recounted. “But officer Bajlur wouldn’t let me read what was written in it. He didn’t even tell us what the charges against my father were. When I kept asking, he finally grunted: can’t help, orders from top. They left no official record of arrest and handed me his visiting card and asked me to come to the police station in the morning.”

Chowdhary would spend the remaining hours of the night locked in a grimy cell with more than a dozen other convicts. His requests for leniency on health grounds, then for access to a lawyer and at last just a place to sleep, would fall on deaf ears.

It wasn’t until 10 the following morning that Jiaul was verbally informed that his father had been arrested for extorting money from a member of the Mirpur Road Workers’ Committee. But neither he nor his mother was allowed to talk to Mozammel. Nor were they given a copy of the First Information Report (FIR) that detailed the claimed charges.

When contacted by The Diplomat, Bajlur maintained his stubborn refusal to talk or give any details of the case. His senior officers didn’t open up either.

But the FIR, a copy of which has been obtained by The Diplomat, helps explain both the obvious reasons why the police aren’t talking and the Kafkaesque farce the case has become.

The report says Chowdhary extorted money from 48-year-old Mohammed Dulal, who works in the transport business and is the secretary of the Mirpur Road Workers’ Committee. According to the FIR, Dulal is a resident of house number 9 on road 18, at a place called Gudaraghat. The amount Chowdhary allegedly asked for was 200,000 Bangladeshi taka (about $2,386).

The report further states that Chowdhary had asked Dulal to meet near the Sony Cinema on September 3 at a little past 5 p.m. and hand over the money.

But upon attempting to verify the names and addresses, not a single line of the FIR story has been found to be true.

There is no Mohammed Dulal who lives at house number 9. In fact, there is no house number 9 on Road 18. The last house on Road 18 is numbered 8.

All that stands on the adjacent plot is a tin hut where a bunch of workers live temporarily.

The plot on which the tin hut stands is owned by a local political strongman named Dulal Talukder. In talking to The Diplomat, he said, “I haven’t filed any case against anyone and don’t know who Mozammel Chowdhary is. And nobody by the name of Mohammed Dulal lives or has ever lived here.”

There also appears to be no organization called the Mirpur Road Workers’ Committee, of which the fictitious complainant is said to be the secretary.

“This is an absolute farce,” Jyotimoy Barua, Mozammel Chowdhary’s lawyer, said when speaking to the press. “This is nothing but a political witch hunt of an innocent man. A travesty of justice in the complete sense.”

“He only managed to say one line to me,” Jiaul said, speaking of when his father was led from the police station to the court and thereafter custody. “Talk to the press – there is no other hope.”

The real reason for Chowdhary’s arrest is the government’s fear in the wake of protests in August, which saw students take over the streets, protesting unsafe roads and poor policing. Bangladesh’s government is increasingly wary of criticism and civilian challenges to its authority, and apparently worried that Chowdhary’s long activism for safer roads could become a focal point for further agitation.

But what is shocking to most is the blatant abuse of Bangladesh’s law enforcement and justice systems to achieve political censorship.

“The truth is, it was Father’s interview to ATN Bangla that got him arrested – not some extortion or any other real crime,” Jiaul explained.

On September 3 at a little past 5, Chowdhary had indeed left his home. But it wasn’t to extort the fictitious Mohammed Dulal. He was heading to a popular Bangla news channel to attend a panel to discuss the state of traffic and how school-going children, during their traffic protests, had succeeded in reining in Dhaka’s chaotic traffic far more efficiently than the police.

In fact, Chowdhary’s case has a striking resemblance to that of world renowned photojournalist Shahidul Alam. Alam was picked up after he went on air with Al Jazeera and criticized the government’s efforts to crush the student protests.

“The government has become complacent and deaf to its citizenry,” Sheepa Hafiza, a veteran human rights activist and executive director of Ain o Salish Kendra, explained. “I mean, it’s some kind of paranoia and a sense of invincibility that’s working here. Who needs to attack students who are voluntarily managing traffic in a city and doing such a fantastic job of it? It [the traffic movement] wasn’t political — it wasn’t supported or led by the opposition. The movement was made political by the government party and its student wing, who attacked it.”

In private, even senior police officers agree that the case against Chowdhary is a farce and only intended to shut him and his activism down.

Speaking to The Diplomat over a secure line, a deputy commissioner of the Dhaka Metropolitan Police laughed and said: “Don’t look for reason. This is a political case. The case is being directed by high officials under the guidance of one of the most powerful ministers of the Awami League. Chowdhary will be kept in jail at any cost.”

According to sources close to both the police and Chowdhary’s defense lawyer’s office, there was next to no chance the extortion charge would hold, and he would surely be given bail at the end of his police remand.

But the police moved swiftly and charged him with a second case — this time with terrorism and sedition charges, to ensure refusal of bail and longer custody.

A copy of the papers regarding the new case, seen by The Diplomat, reveal charges as vague and baseless as the extortion claim.

The case names a man, Abidur Rahman Abid, as the prime perpetrator accused in a plot to blow up a police station in Mirpur and says he had anywhere between 40 to 45 unknown accomplices. The case is over a year old and since no explosion ever happened, it’s long been closed as a cold case.

The police now claim that Chowdhary is one of those unnamed accomplices. Ignoring the very public and open life of Chowdhary, the police named him an absconder.

At the time of this report going to press, Chowdhary was given bail in both the extortion and the terrorism case for lack of evidence. He was released on a bail amount of 10,000 taka.

“I’m very weak — I cannot talk much,” he said in a phone call with The Diplomat. “I’m thankful to the honorable court, my lawyer Barua who worked pro-bono, and the press. But I don’t know how long my freedom will last. Those who want to see me locked up are powerful people.”