Militants manage to circumvent the system

THE arrest of Ariful Islam, caught after he, along with his accomplices, hacked to death Oyasiqur Rahman Babu, has by default, brought to light some significant inefficiencies in law enforcement. Ariful had been arrested in 2012 for taking training in militancy in Narsingdi. Despite being charged under the anti terrorism act and sent to jail, he managed to secure bail three weeks later. Not only that, he has managed to stay outside the radar of law enforcing agents until March 30, 2015 when passersby caught him while fleeing the crime scene. According to this paper's report, there have been several such cases of militants being apprehended, after which they manage to get bail and carry out deadly missions. A JMB leader, for instance, was arrested last year, released on bail, following which he carried out an ambush on a police van to free three top JMB leaders.

This absence of a strong tracking system has led to terrorist acts being carried out with such ease. Obviously there needs to be a major revamp in the way personal files of criminals are kept and their whereabouts, if they are granted bail, tracked. Introducing a full-proof database of all records of those arrested, charge-sheeted or sent to jail can be an excellent way to make sure that criminals do not find ways to dupe the system and escape. Such database should be available to all police stations in the country. An investment in making our police stations more technologically equipped will make sure suspects with a record of criminality will not get away.