Human Rights Monitor
'Are people receiving justice?'
Shakeel Anwar
Child, yet not a child
Surrounded by raised walls like a jail, Poolerhat juvenile correction centre stands at one end of the Jessore district town. Simply put, it is a jail for juvenile offenders.
On the other side of the huge iron gate, 20 to 25 youths are enthusiastically playing cricket in a rain-drenched field. Some of them are here for murder cases, some for arms, and some merely for stealing or running away from home.
Mojibur Rahman, the Centre Supervisor, gave permission for a few of them to talk, though for legal reasons their real names and identities are not mentioned here.
'Shafiq' was fielding in the slip with his trousers rolled up. He had been sentenced to eight years for an arms case in the Khulna Court. At the time of the crime he was only fifteen-years-old, though he was not judged according to the Children's Act.
“Before coming here I was in Khulna Jail with adults for two and a half years. Very painful. The adults used to beat me up. I always had to run errands for them. They wouldn't let me sleep,” Shafiq said with his head bent downwards.
'Kader' is almost eighteen. “Mine is a murder case. Thirty years in jail.” When the judgement was delivered, at the beginning of 2003, Kader was fifteen years old. The judgement at his trial says that it was made according to the Children's Act, yet he was sentenced to 30 years.
Mujibur Rahman, the centre supervisor told the BBC that “we often see these kinds of strange, self-contradictory judgements. According to the Children's Act, there is no provision for punishment for more than ten years. It seems to me that a lot of learned judges do not have a clear idea about the Children's Law.”
“There's a lack of clarity in the explanation of the law regarding some important issues” he added. “For example, we can't keep anyone in the centre who has reached 18 years of age. What will we do with those who cross that age? Will we send them to the jail? If so, what's the point of keeping them here and correcting them for all these years?”
Pointing towards a boy of 12 years old, Mojibur Rahman said that the police caught him and sent him here from Barisal nine months ago on a simple stealing charge. He's written three times to the court over the past nine months to try to get his trial started. But he hasn't had any reply. Mr. Rahman informed us that there is one boy whose case has been under trial for four years.
According to the law of Bangladesh all these adolescents were supposed to be judged by the Children's Act 1974. Under no circumstances were they supposed to be with adults in a normal jail. But very few of the juveniles of Poolerhat have been fortunate enough to receive such protection.
Shorupjan Bibi: At the doors of the Law
Sharsha is a village of Tala thana in Shatkhira, situated on the banks of the river Kopotaksha. It is like any other Bangladesh village. After a long search we found Shorupjan Bibi's house: a straw-covered thatched-roof earthen hut, a tiny courtyard.
Coming out of her kitchen made of bamboo laths and seeing people she didn't know, the elderly lady, Swarupjan bibi, shrivelled a bit at first. After learning our identities she spread out a mat, woven of date-palm leaves, on the veranda. Then she started to share her story slowly.
Widowed with a son at a young age, Swarupjan bibi, received approximately an acre of land in writing from her mother. But to protect this, Swarupjan has been fighting for over a decade. In 1989, by producing fake documents, an influential person of the village grabbed that piece of land. From then on, for the last 15 or 16 years this widow has been shuttling from court door to court door.
While showing us the court papers, Swarupjan bibi said that “the verdict of the Shatkhira Zilla Judge Court in 1992 was in my favour. I thought Allah had saved me. But then they took the case to the Dhaka High Court.”
When the hearing day is fixed this illiterate widow collects from here and there and travels 200 miles to the court in Dhaka.
“I think I have been to Dhaka 50 times. Even after all these days, I can't repay the 20,000 Taka I borrowed on interest and paid to the advocate. I collect money through begging, asking people and give it to the court”, Swarupjan bibi said in her local accent of Shatkhira.
Yet she had a stroke of luck recently. She is now receiving legal assistance from a local non-governmental organisation.
However, visit any court in Bangladesh and one will find frustrated and bewildered people with minor cases shuttling backwards and forwards for years on end. The cases have left many of them utterly ruined.
But there are problems inside the court too.
On the veranda of the court
Chuadanga district court. Even before the clock has struck ten, the veranda of the court, the courtyard and the long hall of the advocates are spilling over with people.
Two clients were on the heels of Mahtab Hossain, a renowned lawyer in this district. Both have hearing dates today. But they do not know whether their hearings will take place.
After filing a case to evict a tenant, Mahfuzul Islam has been coming here for ten years. There is no special bench in Chuadanga to try such minor cases. It is difficult for his case even to be listed in other benches.
Osman gani's case is also of eviction. He said, “The SA record is in my name, Dalil [land registry documents] is mine, and I've been enjoying the land for last 33 years. Yet, they are harassing me by lodging a case against me with fake documents”.
The case has been running for seven years. “It doesn't end. The dates of the case are shifting each month. They say that the judge is absent. [It's all about] coming to Chuadanga each month, leaving my job and counting the fees of the advocate”.
However Advocate Mahtab Hossain said that the main reason for the cases' lingering is the shortage of judges. There are two assistant judge posts in Chuadanga. The assistant judge post for two thanas of Alamdanga and Damurhuda have been vacant for the last ten years.
“Moreover, it has become a routine matter that, when government witnesses come to attend the criminal cases the civil cases get adjourned”, Mahtab Hossain added.
In an interview, Law minister Barrister Moudud Ahmed told the BBC, that the lengthy process of litigation is a matter of great anxiety for him.
He spoke about quite a few initiatives taken to solve this problem. For example, the courts are given targets of time to dispose of the cases. Severe prohibited orders were made to stop the wilful adjournments.
“We are mostly trying to reduce new court cases”. Mr. Ahmed said that, “30% of cases in the country are of small issues. We are trying so that these cases can be disposed of by mediation outside the court”.
For this, alternate dispute resolution, i.e. mediation, has been given a legal footing. In four months 4,000 cases have been disposed off through mediation, the Law Minister added.
There are approximately 10 lakhs of cases pending in Bangladesh, of which 80% are civil cases, especially land-related disputes. In Dhaka alone, there are approximately 100 cases which have been going on for the past 35 years or more. One case in Khulna was adjourned for 1,266 times.
How long the initiatives articulated by the Law Minister will take to achieve results is uncertain. However, victims claim that so many unresolved cases have created a public loss of confidence in the whole judicial system
Bangladesh Sanglap 1: “Are People Receiving Justice” is broadcast this evening [Thursday] on BBC Bengali Radio after 'Probaho' from 8pm on special frequencies SW 31 & 41 metre band (9395 & 7520 kHz) and FM 100 MHz in Dhaka. The Daily Star is also a media partner of this. It will be shown on Channel i on Sunday from 8pm
The author is working with BBC
