For fifteen years, people across Bangladesh were taken from streets, homes, and workplaces by men who never



gave their names, held in rooms that officially did not exist, and returned — when they were returned



at all — under orders to say nothing. When the Awami League government fell in August 2024, the



Commission of Inquiry on Enforced Disappearances began documenting what those rooms had been. What it found



was not a series of isolated abuses but the functioning of a system: a network of cells inside police



headquarters, battalion compounds, intelligence facilities, and unmarked “safe houses,” each



with its own routines of interrogation and torture.

He was around 15 when he was picked up in 2019, a ninth grader. When he was returned two years later, his



fingernails and toenails had been pulled out and he had lost his mind. The boy only foamed at the mouth



and



laughed. Held in the grave-like cells of Rab’s Taskforce for Interrogation (TFI) cells, the boy would cry



constantly, and the guards would reportedly respond by escalating the physical abuse.

“I used to stay in the cell, when I went to the bathroom — that's when they beat me with



sticks.



I used to cry a lot; I was in pain. I used to feel like going home. But they used to say, 'It's daytime,



lie down. It's night, sleep. Don't speak. Don't make noises',” the boy told the commission.



“Now I don't feel pain, but back then it hurt a lot inside. When I came home, I felt really happy.



I felt like I had gotten the whole world.”

The father told the commission how he found his son at a police station almost two years after he was



picked up:

“I saw him from a distance, spoke, and went closer. He recognised me and smiled, but didn't say



anything else. I asked, 'Where did your nails go? Show me your hands, your feet.' The nails on both feet



were gone. The thumbnails on both hands were also gone,” narrated the father.

The father asked the police where they found his son and was told that he was in Rab custody. The teenager



was taken to jail twice, once to Kashimpur, another time to Keraniganj. The father tried to apply for bail



but because he was a poor man, and could not manage the expenses. It took him one and a half years to



process



the paperwork.

“He used to study. Now he just laughs by himself, foams at the mouth when spoken to, and can't



speak



properly. Not like before. I took him to a doctor. They prescribed medicine, but he doesn't take it. He



says his body shakes, he falls asleep. He throws the medicine away,” said the man.