Editorial
International HR body's report
Its emphasis on probe merits positive response
Washington-based international human rights body, the Human Rights Watch (HRW), in its 2012 report has urged the government to take necessary steps to probe and prosecute cases of extra-judicial tortures and killings.
The local HR bodies, the civil societies as well as the media have also been pressing on the government for long to take prompt action in this matter.
But more often than not, the government either dismissed those out of hand, or if it ever accepted any such report, departmental enquiries were instituted into the incidents. And in most cases, the findings could hardly ever see the light of day.
The HRW report further noted that even though there was a remarkable drop in the number of "'cross fire"-related deaths last year (2011), it was overcompensated by what it termed "enforced disappearances."
While the government is largely in a denial mode about these reports, the number of such incidents has only piled up over the years. Since creation of the elite crime busting force, the Rapid Action Battalion (Rab), some 1,600 extra-judicial killings have taken place, the HRW report adds.
Unfortunately, far from taking the reports into cognisance, or responding to the criticisms from the intelligentsia and the media about those seriously, the government has rather been intolerant towards its critics over its inaction.
As a result, the members of the law-enforcement agencies have only become inured to the tendency of continuing with their errant practices. We wonder how the government gains from what amounts to an erosion of its authority and its avoidable alienation from the public.
The government can no longer ignore the adverse publicity it is getting due to the excesses committed by a few. Thus it should face the matter squarely considering it a question of its credibility as well as the image of the country.
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