Multiplicity of problems hinder criminal justice

Justice delivery system, specially the administration of criminal justice of Bangladesh has been somewhat utterly different to its original concept admitted by prominent leaderships, think-tanks and role-players as well as endorsed by numerous research report and perception studies. So, is it bad? If yes, how bad is it? Let's explore and find out the answer for ourselves.

Inter-linkages and territory of Administrationof Criminal Justice:
The Justice Sector of Bangladesh is a relatively complex setup with multiple of agencies and with diverse range of services offered to the citizens of Bangladesh. Here, the Administration of Criminal Justice comprises three dimensions of agencies and their staffs. These are- investigating agencies like police, the judiciary as trial management agency and the prison. These prime agencies are also assisted by a number of other agencies when it comes to cases of legislative support, law enforcement, providing legal support to citizen etc. By definition, the Administration of Criminal Justice basically knits all agencies involved in promoting rule of law in the country.

Challenges so far
The Administration of Criminal Justice has been suffering from multiplicity of problems, most prominent of them are-
Delayed delivery of justice: starting from reporting of criminal cases, investigating, trial management process, sentencing and finally responding to verdicts and managing sentenced persons in prison; it takes an extensively long procedural and administrative set of processes to completely dissolve a criminal case. Although, there are time frames for stages of a criminal case earmarked by relevant legislations- often it's a challenge for all the agencies to put concerted efforts in maintaining the least time the case might require. This challenge is attributed specially to the lack of technical knowledge of the staffs in both general and specialised cases, practice of encouraging and engaging power and money to receive verdicts in favour, slow inter-agency communication and follow-up process, out dated legislative provisions etc.
Low conviction rate: Bangladesh has a conviction rate of around 10% which is frighteningly low when comparing with the healthy figure of conviction rate of some developing countries. The low conviction rate arises out of lack of trust of general people in the justice delivery mechanism, insecurity and visible threats to the victim and witnesses of a case and delayed processes as mentioned above. This low rate of conviction contributes to the factor that the offenders frequently getting discharged without being convicted as the Administration of Criminal Justice is yet to be known of discharging justice in an efficient, transparent and timely manner. This at the same time obstructs the opportunity of using guilty-plea as an effective tool of dissolving a case in a speedy manner. Furthering an alternative dispute mechanism in criminal cases (like plea bargain) is likely to be a bigger challenge for this particular reason also.
Effective Case and Court Management: Case Management relates to the management of cases and involves all the agencies as mentioned earlier. The process flow mechanism of Administration of Criminal Justice of Bangladesh is flawed because of the absence of unified channel of communication among agencies for a case, question of institutional superiority ruling out willingness of officials to coordinate and complement each other's work, non-engagement of information and communication technologies in managing cases and an increasing fear of confronting transitional difficulties and loosing confidentiality. As an example- the chain of information in a case of investigation by police, different stages of trial by court and prisoner management by prison authority often stays disconnected as neither any visible coordination is seen among the agencies nor there is a sustainable and effective process is in place for information management, prioritisation of cases, informing clients/justice seekers and pinpoint specific achievements. There is also this challenge existent of having ineffective and insufficient court management in terms of case allocation, close monitoring, record management, interaction and decision making in participation of a broader forum for a particular type or priority case.
Lack of logistical, administrative and technical resource: The Justice sector in Bangladesh as a whole has never been adequately budgeted as required. This trend left the sector (including the Administration of Criminal Justice) with inadequate human resource, insufficient infrastructural support, shortage of technical assistance and limited budget for technical skill-buildingand many more kinds of problems to deal with. Despite the national government and international development agencies putting their cumulative effort in providing assistance in a need-based manner; unless the national budget of Justice sector is increased especially in staff management, technical capacity building and enhanced administrative function- the goal of having a strengthened Administration of Criminal Justice will still be unfulfilled.

Lessons and plans for future
As I mentioned earlier, the government's firm intention and increased commitment coupled with international communities' persistent support have been bringing in significant positive changes in the system, still, there are rooms to incorporate more innovative changes.Here are few of them-
Legislative reform: there are a number of laws which need to be reviewed and adjusted through amendments to reassign the timeframe for specific cases and also to smoother processing cases. Laws are also to be enacted/reviewed to incorporate practical measures to enhance the quality of justice. As an example- the Nari o sishu nirjaton domon ain in the area of timeline reduction, Evidence Act to allow electronic evidence which speeds up the evidence production process and appropriate ADR mechanism for criminal cases may be reviewed in this connection.
Public awareness and knowledge distribution mechanism: the government lack proper system and strategy to create public awareness about the services those are offered by the Administration of Criminal Justice of Bangladesh. This is the opportune moment for the government to plan a nation-wide knowledge dissemination and management drive which should ideally encompass important information related to services such as specific mandate of the courts, periodic information on justice policy and sectoral budgeting, legislative briefing etc. issues. There can ideally be an administrative unit established and positioned in the justice sector to manage these tasks. This will bring back the trust of citizen into the administration of criminal justice of Bangladesh as end result.
Client-focused service delivery: another important addition in this task list is the transitioning of mind-sets of service providers and helping them to adopt a pro-client policy to act. This will require initial and periodic briefing and debriefing about the important responsibilities of the providers to the receivers. Merit-based recruitment at the onset and time to time arrangement of interactive sessions on ethics and morale can also assist the staffs to maintain their commitment to the people they serve and to keep their integrity intact.
Improved inter-agency relationship: the Criminal Justice agencies are required to function in a coordinated and complementary manner to get the best out of each other while disposing a criminal case. There should be a cross-cutting and multi-sectoral platform established for them to discuss on coordination mechanism, improved visibility and continued commitment towards an efficient case management system. Assistance of automation strategy and ICT integration should be sought to develop an affordable, durable, replicable and manageable mechanism to help case and court management.
National ownership: it is the increasing political will and substantive nature of leadership engagement which can ensure the full partaking of agencies of Administration of Criminal Justice of Bangladesh in the successful paradigm shift and turning into outstanding sectoral performers. Developments of policy, strategy, plan and programmes for justice sector and increasing national budget to rational proportion; these are to name a few of those that show the increased ownership and nationalization of efforts.
 A sectoral reform approach for the Administration of Criminal Justice of Bangladesh will not only ensure a better functioning justice sector for the society but also will improve the rule of law situation of the country to a greater extent. The sooner we realise and act upon it, the better it is.

Disclaimer: “This write-up is the personal expression of the writer and does not officially represent his employer's view in anyway.”

THE WRITER IS INTERNATIONAL LEGAL RESEARCHER FOR RULE OF LAW IN UNDP AFGHANISTAN