With the prosecution failing to produce any witness before the court concerned, most drugs-related cases are reportedly being disposed of without the suspect being handed any punishment.
Many of the accused also remain out on bail as the courts are backlogged with drugs-related cases. Repeated deferrals of the cases also lead to the number of such cases to keep climbing, said legal specialists.
Home Ministry sources said efforts were on to introduce mobile courts for tackling the narcotics trade, while the ministry was also working on the draft of the Narcotics Control (amendment) Act 2013 to introduce sterner control over the growing hazard.
Sources said the Department of Narcotic Control (DNC) filed 10,111 cases against 10,990 people in 2013, while over 50,000 drugs-related cases remain pending with different courts. Each year, around 2,000 drugs-related cases were being disposed of on an average, the sources added.
Court officials said at least 50,000 drugs-related cases are filed each year.
Three years ago, a person alleged of carrying phensidyl was arrested; while a charge sheet against him was submitted to a Dhaka court within 21 days of his detention; however, since then, the prosecution was unable to produce any witness before the court.
After three years of the case being deferred continuously, the court finally disposed of it. During the entire time, the suspect remained out of jail after securing bail from the court.
According to the Narcotics Control Act 1990, the probe report must be placed before the court within 21 working days. If not, the suspect will automatically be able to get bail.
In a similar case, Jahanara – a tea stall owner who was arrested for allegedly carrying marijuana – faced court proceedings for six years before the court finally dismissed the case against her. At every hearing during the entire trial, the prosecution told the court that it had found no witness against the accused.
In most such cases, courts reportedly end up regularly deferring proceedings as the prosecution teams are usually unable to find or produce any witness before the court.
Prokash Chandra Biswas, lawyer at the Dhaka Metropolitan Magistrate’s Court, expressed hopes that the passage of the amended law would help reducing the backlog of drugs-related cases in the court system as mobile courts will be able to carry out on-the-spot trials for small-scale drugs-related crimes.
On the other hand, anti-narcotics campaigners alleged that corrupt law enforcers were colluding with drug dealers; and as a result, the prosecution was failing to seek out witnesses against suspects.
Riadul Kabir, a campaigner working with anti-drugs body Tarunnyo, said the drug abuse prevention programmes will not succeed unless the government took initiatives to reduce supply. Effective initiatives would automatically lower the number of drugs-related cases, Riadul said, while also admitting that there was also lack of coordination among the groups that were working to prevent drug abuse.