For the first time in the country, the country’s paramilitary force, the Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB), will get the authority to arrest smugglers without any warrant. The BGB will also get the authority to scan, X-ray and search the bodies of suspicious persons, especially smugglers, within five kilometres from the border areas, said sources in the home ministry and the National Board of Revenue (NBR). The authority would be granted as per Sections 158, 160, 161, 163, 164, 168 and 171 of the existing Customs Act, the sources added.

The BGB authorities, however, would have to submit the necessary reports before the customs commissioners in their respective areas within 15 days clarifying why they arrested and searched the suspects, the sources added.

The NBR has already prepared a draft of the gazette notification, which is likely to be issued within a couple of days, according to the sources.  The draft notification says that the authority would not be given to the BGB inside the customs stations/seaports/airports/land ports and the Customs areas.

At present, the border force can search the suspected persons and detain them at different border areas. After detaining any suspected person with contraband items, he/she has to be handed over to the Customs authorities for further steps in this respect.

Talking to The Independent, a high-ranking official of the Public Security Division of the home ministry said on June 16, 2016, the Cabinet committee on law and order had decided to give some authority to the BGB to curb smuggling at the border points. The home ministry, too, wrote to the Customs department, asking it to implement the decision. But the Customs department allegedly did not pay any heed to the order, he added.

When the matter was raised before the home ministry recently by the border force, the ministry further asked the Customs department (under the National Board of Revenue or NBR) to implement the decision, and it is going to implement it, disclosed the official.  The senior secretary of the Internal Resources Division and the NBR chairman Md. Nazibur Rahman told this correspondent that they are scrutinising the decision of the ministries to give some authority to the BGB as per the international goods practice. He declined to make any further comment on the issue.

Former BGB director-general Lt. Gen. Mainul Islam (retd) told The Independent that it will help curb smuggling at the border areas if the BGB is given the authority to arrest. “This is because the BGB may arrest smugglers at the border areas and the Customs can arrest across the country,” he said.

“However, the BGB personnel have to be trained by the Customs staff before conducting operations at the borders. At the same time, the BGB’s senior officials have to monitor the BGB people who work at the border so that they do not misuse power,” he said.

Lt. Gen. Mainul Islam, a former Principal Staff Officer (PSO) of the Armed Forces Division (AFD), advised the deployment of dog squads during BGB operations at the borders to aid immediate identification of smugglers.   

Former inspector-general of police Muhammad Nurul Huda also said it would be easier to curb smuggling and maintain law and order in the border areas if the authorities grant the BGB the authority to carry out arrests.

“The senior officers of the border force, however, have to supervise the activities of the border force personnel working at the borders,” he said.

According to sources, a letter sent to the home ministry recently by the NBR said, “The interference of members of other departments may hamper the trade facilitation policy and the trade environment.” The BGB and other organisations can provide specific “smuggling information” to the Customs authorities, but that is where their function should end, the letter noted.

Clause 159(3) of the Customs Act, 1969, says, “Before making a search under Section 158, the officer of Customs shall call upon two or more persons to attend and witness the search and may issue an order in writing to them or any of them to do so, and the search shall be made in the presence of such persons and a list of all things seized in the course of such search shall be prepared by such officer or other person and signed by such witnesses.”