Dhaka, Oct 1 (SocialNews.XYZ) Bangladesh has come under renewed scrutiny over allegations of immigration officials subjecting unmarried women travelling abroad to intrusive questions about their personal lives, travel plans and reasons for going overseas, with such questioning and conduct becoming almost routine, a report mentioned.
Recently, three young women were stopped from travelling to Nepal and sent back from the airport, prompting them to move the High Court last month, where a bench is now seeking accountability over the incident, according to a report in the 'Times of Bangladesh'.
“On 8 August, three friends — Rifa Tamanna, Sohani Islam Samapti and Naznin — decided to travel to Nepal. All three are adults, carrying all the documents and papers, have no criminal cases against them, and had their families’ consent. But an immigration officer at Shahjalal International Airport refused to let them proceed. The reason, they say, was that they had no male companion and none of them was married. They were sent back from the airport. In protest, they sought legal recourse,” the report detailed.
“On 31 August, the three victims submitted a written complaint to the Additional IGP of the police’s Immigration Branch, seeking preservation of CCTV footage, action against those responsible and compensation. As the police took no action even after a month, they sent a legal notice on 6 September. When there was no response to that either, they filed a writ petition with the High Court on 15 September,” it added.
The report suggests that the writ petition names the officer-in-charge of the Immigration Police as a respondent.
During Tuesday’s hearing, a bench comprising Justice KM Kamrul Kader and Justice Fatema Anwar issued a rule asking “why preventing adult female citizens from legally travelling abroad solely because they are unmarried, travelling without a guardian or on gender-based grounds should not be declared to be without lawful authority.”
The court also instructed the Additional IGP to dispose of the women’s complaint within seven days and submit a compliance report, the report mentioned.
“Police cannot prevent anyone from travelling abroad without a court order or a criminal case. If an adult woman has a valid passport, the police have no scope to see whether her family has given consent or not,” Times of Bangladesh quoted the three women’s lawyer, Ishrat Hasan, as saying.
Stressing that a deeper social psychology lies behind such behaviour by immigration police in Bangladesh, former Inspector General of Police (IGP) Baharul Alam told 'Times of Bangladesh', “This society is not women-friendly. When police see a woman traveling alone at night, they approach her in a way that she is a bad woman. If a young woman returns home at night, another woman may also make negative comments. These stereotypes exist within our society itself.”
Source: IANS
About Gopi
Gopi Adusumilli is a Programmer. He is the editor of SocialNews.XYZ and President of AGK Fire Inc.
He enjoys designing websites, developing mobile applications and publishing news articles on current events from various authenticated news sources.
When it comes to writing he likes to write about current world politics and Indian Movies. His future plans include developing SocialNews.XYZ into a News website that has no bias or judgment towards any.
He can be reached at gopi@socialnews.xyz