Custodial Deaths in Bangladesh: A Pattern Across All Governments, 2001 to 2026

Executive Summary

The Daily Star reported on 26 June 2026 that custodial deaths have occurred under every government in Bangladesh since 2001, covering successive elected governments and the government currently in office. No government has produced a clean record.

The persistence of this pattern across governments raises a structural constitutional concern. The state’s obligation to protect life under Article 32 and to prohibit torture under Article 35(5) does not suspend with changes in government. The pattern appears to reflect a failure of law, oversight, and institutional accountability rather than isolated conduct by individual officers.

Despite the enactment of the Torture and Custodial Death (Prevention) Act 2013, accountability has remained near-absent. The reported accountability gap documented by civil society organisations requires constitutional and institutional scrutiny.

What Happened

According to The Daily Star report of 26 June 2026, custodial deaths have been documented under every government in Bangladesh since 2001, spanning approximately two and a half decades and multiple political governments. The report appears to draw on data compiled by domestic human rights organisations.

According to the report, Odhikar stated that 486 custodial deaths due to torture were recorded between 2001 and 22 June 2026. Ain o Salish Kendra (ASK) separately documented 138 deaths allegedly caused by physical torture at the hands of law enforcement agencies between January 2013 and May 2024, along with 923 deaths in jail custody during the same period. A Human Rights Support Society report published in April 2026 found that 39 individuals reportedly died in custody in the first three months of 2026.

CW treats these figures as reported civil society data, not independently verified state data. The figures cited are drawn from civil society monitoring and media reporting. Primary state records on custodial deaths are not consistently made public in Bangladesh.

Why It Matters Constitutionally

Article 32 guarantees that no person shall be deprived of life or personal liberty save in accordance with law. A person in state custody is under the most complete form of state control, and the state bears direct responsibility for that person’s physical safety. Any death in custody that results from torture, negligence, or unlawful treatment directly engages this guarantee.

Article 33 is also relevant because safeguards at the point of arrest and detention are designed to prevent precisely the kind of abuse that may occur when a person is held under state control. Article 35(5) explicitly prohibits torture and cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment. This is an absolute prohibition. Where deaths in custody are reported and investigations do not follow, or prosecutions are not pursued, the state’s compliance with this provision requires scrutiny.

Article 27 is also engaged where access to investigation, remedy, or compensation appears unequal between ordinary victims and cases that receive institutional priority. The Torture and Custodial Death (Prevention) Act 2013 was enacted to operationalise these constitutional protections. The documented gap between reported incidents and successful prosecutions under that Act raises a serious question about whether the constitutional safeguards it was meant to protect are being given practical effect.

Legal Questions Raised

• Does the documented cross-government pattern of custodial deaths reflect a systemic institutional failure to uphold Article 32, and if so, what accountability mechanisms are constitutionally required?
• Where deaths in custody are alleged to have resulted from torture or ill-treatment, has the state met its obligation under Article 35(5) by conducting independent and prompt investigations?
• Given the near-absence of convictions under the Torture and Custodial Death (Prevention) Act 2013 since its enactment, does the enforcement gap make the statutory protection ineffective in practice?
• Do existing oversight mechanisms, including the judiciary, the National Human Rights Commission, and parliamentary standing committees, constitute adequate institutional safeguards against custodial abuse?
• Where families of persons who died in custody have received no investigation, remedy, or compensation, has the state met its obligations under Articles 27 and 31 to provide equal protection and legal recourse?
• Does the routine non-disclosure of custody records and cause-of-death findings obstruct the right to protection of law under Article 31 and impede access to remedy?

Possible Justification or Counter-View

State authorities may argue that custodial deaths include deaths from natural causes or pre-existing conditions unrelated to official conduct. They may further contend that the 2013 Act, the Code of Criminal Procedure, and the supervisory jurisdiction of the High Court Division together provide sufficient legal remedies. It is also arguable that some periods saw genuine improvements in documentation capacity rather than any increase in actual abuse.

These arguments deserve consideration. The constitutional concern, however, does not rest solely on whether every individual death involved deliberate misconduct. It rests on whether the state has in place effective, transparent, and independent systems to investigate each death, pursue accountability where evidence warrants, and provide remedy to affected families. The documented gap between reported incidents and institutional responses suggests those systems have not been functioning at a constitutionally adequate level.

Constitutional Assessment

The reported cross-government continuity of custodial deaths in Bangladesh raises a serious constitutional concern under Articles 31, 32, and 35(5) of the Constitution. The concern is not that any single government has been uniquely culpable, but that no government has treated this as a constitutional obligation requiring structural remedy. The enactment of the 2013 Act acknowledged the problem in law; the near-absence of convictions under that Act over more than a decade suggests that acknowledgment has not translated into enforcement. This appears to engage a broader question of institutional accountability: whether any arm of the state has adequately discharged its duty to protect the right to life and the prohibition on torture as guaranteed by the Constitution. No judicial finding of a generalised constitutional violation has been made, and CW does not make such a finding here. However, the pattern requires institutional accountability, not merely periodic acknowledgment.

What to Watch Next

• Whether the government currently in office issues any formal response to the June 2026 reporting, including acknowledgment of the documented pattern.
• Whether the National Human Rights Commission initiates any systemic inquiry into the cross-government custodial death record.
• Whether any legislative body schedules scrutiny of the enforcement record under the Torture and Custodial Death (Prevention) Act 2013.
• Whether the High Court Division takes suo motu cognisance, or any public interest petition is filed addressing the structural accountability question.
• Whether Bangladesh moves to adopt internationally recognised forensic protocols such as the Istanbul Protocol and the Minnesota Protocol, as recommended in a concurrent Daily Star opinion piece of the same date.
• Whether civil society organisations are permitted to operate freely in documenting and publishing custodial death data.
• Whether compensation or remedy has been provided to families of verified custodial death victims as required under the 2013 Act.