Trends and Patterns

A few trends and patterns have appeared from the data collected during the previous 60 months.

During this period, on an average per month, 23.93 cases have been filed, 75.33 persons have been accused, and 25.81 persons were arrested. Within this period, the largest number of cases were filed in 2021- per month average was 39.75 cases; 118.58 persons accused, and 42.42 persons arrested. The number of cases has declined in 2022. Per month the average cases were 21.16, average accused were 82.67 and arrests were 30.67. A press report has drawn attention to the timing of this decline and noted that the declines coincide with the imposition of US sanctions on the Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) and seven of its officials on December 10, 2021(Chowdhury and Lion 2022). The number of cases has declined more in 2023 (until September) because of the announcement of the replacement of CSA (Cyber Security Act). Per month the average cases were 13.11, average accused were 84.89 and arrests were 16.22.

Table 9: Number of cases, accused, and arrests, Oct 2018 – Sep 2023

As mentioned previously, politicians and journalists have been professionals who have faced a significant number of cases in the past 60 months (Table 10 and Table 11).

Table 10: Cases, accusations and arrests of politicians,

Oct 2018 – Sep 2023 Table 11: Cases against, and accused and arrests of journalists,

Oct 2018 – Sep 2023

Journalists were accused of various violations. We attempted to find out how many of these instances were related to their professional duties (Table 12).

Table 12: Reasons for accusation against journalists, Oct 2018 – Sep 2023

Year-wise disaggregation shows that 2020 was the worst year for journalists as they were accused in significantly high numbers. However, it is also worth noting that in 2022, 60 journalists have been accused under the DSA for reports, the second highest number. While the overall number of cases is declining, journalists are finding it difficult to report (Table 13).

Table 13: Year-wise number of journalists accused for reporting, Jan 2019 – Sep 2023

Students are the third highest number of accused persons according to our data. The year-wise breakdown shows that both 2020 and 2021 were years when students faced a large number of cases (Figure 14).

As for the teachers, 46 cases were filed over the period, 34 cases were filed in 2020 and 2021– the number of accused was 42, of which 34 were arrested (Figure 15).

Of these teachers, a total of 20 madrassah teachers were accused; 18 of them were accused in 2020 and 2021, 17 of them were arrested.

One of the key highlights of the use of the DSA is by ruling party activists against private citizens and opposition political leaders and activists. As mentioned previously, during this period, among the cases filed, we could identify 263 cases filed by ruling party activists/leaders accusing 887 people (Table 14).

Table 14: Cases filed by ruling party activists and the number of accused,

Oct 2018 – Sep 2023

These data show that in the past 60 months, ruling party activists have filed 4.38 cases every month, and each case had an average of 3.37 persons accused; or in simple words, every week a case has been filed by a BAL activist against more than three persons for five years under one law. These cases were in addition to the cases filed by law enforcement agencies and government officials. Of the 859 cases where we identified the accusers, 254 were filed by agencies and officials; that is, on average 4.23 cases per month. This shows how pervasive the use of the law had become since it was introduced and how government agencies and party activists used the law against people they dislike.

Of the four sections widely used – 25, 29, 31, and 35 – three were objected to by the journalists even before the law was passed by the parliament. On 22 May 2018, owners of private television channels, the Editors’ Council and leaders of the Bangladesh Federal Union of Journalists met the parliamentary committee and expressed concerns about eight sections – 8, 21, 25, 28, 29, 31, 32 and 43. Section 25 deals with transmission, publication, etc. of offensive, false or threatening data information; Section 29 deals with publication, transmission, etc. of defamatory information; Section 31 deals with offence and punishment for deteriorating law and order, etc. and Section 35 deals with punishment for aiding and abetting any offence under the DSA.

The following three charts (Figure 17,18 and 19) show the annual trends on the use of these four sections.

The DSA came into effect in October 2018, no cases alleging defamation of the PM were filed until the controversial 2018 election was held. The year-wise disaggregated numbers of the 190 cases filed for allegedly defaming the Prime Minister are the following (Table 15).

Table 15: Year-wise cases for defaming Prime Minister, Oct 2018 – Sep 2023

In 2018, in three months, only two case was filed alleging defamation of a minister (Table 16).

Table 16: Year-wise cases for defaming ministers, Oct 2018 – Sep 2023

As for politicians, like others, the year 2021, was the worst since the DSA came into effect in October 2018 (Table 17).

Table 17: Year-wise cases for defaming politicians, Oct 2018 – Sep 2023