The gold smuggling cases in the country are not properly investigated and the facts of smuggling are not unearthed, and culprits are not punished. As a result, gold smuggling is increasing in the country unabatedly. Due to insufficient evidence, gold smuggling cases do not progress. Pathetically, the investigating police officers fail to bring out vital information from the arrestees when they are taken on remand. According to a report of a national daily yesterday, from the period of 2016 to 2020, the CID checked a total of 17 gold smuggling cases and it was found that investigating officers themselves show negligence in interrogating the arrestees.
Now the question that naturally comes to mind, against the backdrop of the present bad reputation of police, are the investigating officers all bribed prior to the production of the cases in court so that masterminds in the gold smuggling activities remain untracked? If this is not the truth, why did a CID official point out, as the report mentioned, that the vital information was sometimes “intentionally” left out while filing the FIR? Obviously, they do so because they want to protect the ringleader and others involved in the criminal act.
Interestingly, Bangladesh Biman, the national flag carrier, was found to be the most used airliner in smuggling of gold rather than the other private airliners. Among the 17 gold smuggling cases that the CID checked, Bangladesh Biman was used 10 times and the rest of the airliners were used seven times together. Doesn’t this also mean that there are syndicates between members of police, Biman staff and the smugglers themselves who in cohort with each other do the illegal act of smuggling? There is reason to make such conjecture as in one case earlier it was found the Biman staff was also among the convicts in a gold smuggling case.
Quoting the CID data the report of the daily mentioned that since 2017, at least 233 gold smuggling cases have been filed in Dhaka alone against 261 people. In the gold smuggling cases, the rate of conviction is so small that it otherwise confirms that the prosecution notoriously fails to prove the cases. For more than a decade now, recruitment in police is made mostly through corruption and political consideration rather than on the basis of merit. The nation can hardly expect proper law enforcement and decrease in crime when its law enforcing agencies are manned in such an outlandish manner.
