Bail of militant suspects remains a concern

Ariful Karim Chowdhury alias Adnan was arrested by police in 2015 over his involvement with banned militant outfit Harkat-ul-Jihad al-Islami (Huji). He was then a senior officer in a private bank.

Ariful, who completed a diploma in computer science, lost his job after being arrested in a case filed with Khilgaon Police Station under the anti-terrorism act.

Coming out of jail on bail, he got involved with Ansarullah Bangla Team (ABT), another banned militant outfit, and started activities using online platforms. Soon, he became the ABT chief of a part of Dhaka city and in-charge of fund collection, said Rab officials.

Rapid Action Battalion arrested him again in the capital's Mirpur on December 19, 2019. He has been behind bars since then.

Samiun Rahman alias Ibn Hamdan is one of the top militants with experience of fighting for the Islamic State in Syria. Detectives of Dhaka Metropolitan Police picked him up from Dhaka on September 28, 2014. But he too managed to secure bail.

He later collected an Indian passport illegally providing false information and fled the country. On September 17, 2017, New Delhi police arrested Samiun.

The cases of Ariful and Saimun are not isolated ones. Many other militants managed to secure bail and continued their activities.

A database of Police Headquarters (PHQ) shows 4,881 people were arrested over their involvement with different militant outfits in 16 years since 2005. Of them, 2,456 walked out of jail on bail. A total of 251 suspects out of 2,456 went into hiding.

As many as 1,324 cases were filed against 5,202 people during this period. Of them, 62 militant suspects were handed the death penalty, according to the database.

Officials working on countering extremism said collecting evidence against militant suspects often takes time which gives them the chance to secure bail.

Also, a lack of public prosecutors experienced in dealing with militant cases goes in favour of the suspects, they added.

"Militants going out of jail on bail is definitely a threat," said Md Moniruzzaman, additional deputy inspector general of the Anti-Terrorism Unit (ATU).

"To address the problem, we have already taken some measures like proper monitoring of every case pending trial. We are also analysing cases to check if there were any loopholes and holding talks with the prosecution," he told The Daily Star.

Steps have also been taken to monitor the militant suspects coming out of jail on bail, said Moniruzzaman.

In 2017, a small team of counter-terrorism unit (CTU) was formed in every police unit across the country. The ATU is communicating with CTUs regularly to monitor the whereabouts of militants who are on bail, said the officer.

"We often send dedicated teams to different districts to check and collect data on these militants, what they are doing, whom they are communicating with so that they do not have any scope to reorganise," the additional DIG said.

According to court sources, a small number of militant suspects, who are on bail, appears before the court during the hearing.

Banaj Kumar Majumder, chief of the Police Bureau of Investigation, said it is not true that all militant suspects return to extremist activities after securing bail.

Some suspects tried to return to normal life, but they did not have the scope, he said.

"Law enforcers cannot deal with such an issue. There should be an independent body who would look after this from the very day a suspect is granted bail," said Banaj Kumar.

He said the body would assist the families and society in welcoming the suspects.