DHAKA City Corporation councillor and local BNP leader Chowdhury Alam has been missing since he was reportedly abducted by some men late in the evening of June 25. Begum Zia and her colleagues in the BNP have accused the government of being behind Alam's disap-pearance and have demanded that he be traced and returned safe and sound to his family. Alam's family and his party have alleged that law enforcers in plain clothes were involved in the abduction. The Rapid Ac-tion Battalion and the police authorities have, however, denied any involvement in the incident. As for tracing Alam's whereabouts, they have said that they are yet to have any clues in the matter whatsoever.

Any act of abduction or disappearance is a serious af-fair. In the present case, the matter is much more than the kidnapping or disappearance of a politician or pub-lic figure. It is simply a worrying case of a citizen vanishing or being made to disappear. And in the nineteen days that have elapsed since the incident, the government or the law enforcers have been unable to do anything about recovering Alam or finding out what elements have been involved in the sordid affair. That is not only deeply disturbing but also outrageous. One hardly needs to be told, least of all the government and its agencies, that it is the moral and legal responsibility of the state to ensure the security of all its citizens. When a citizen vanishes or is kidnapped, such respon-sibility becomes doubly important in that the state must go all the way to recover the individual in ques-tion. We will urge those trying to make capital out of the issue not to do so. We find the opposition claim that the government is behind it, unfounded; basically because there is no evidence to accept such an interpretation. But contrarily, we must express our deep disappoint-ment at the laid-back attitude of the law enforcement people to trace him out, which lends credence to the opposition claim. Indeed, we are of the opinion that until the opposition's claims are corroborated beyond question, the disappearance of Chowdhury Alam must be dealt with as an urgent case of a citizen, and quite a well-known one at that, vanishing into thin air.

A word or two about the role of the police must be said here. Alam's family has claimed that the police re-fused to record the case of the abduction being com-mitted by plain-clothed law enforcers and only obliged when the family accused unidentified persons of being behind the act. The police should have gone into im-mediate action once the disappearance was reported. It is not their job to tell families of crime victims how they should file cases or who should or should not be made accused in the complaint. There are clear, specific laws in operation to deal with such crimes and the police should have applied those in trying to trace Alam and those who made off with him, even if those accused were law-enforcers. That they have been sitting on the matter demonstrates a clear laidback attitude on the part of those who we expect to do better.

We demand that concerted, full-fledged efforts be made to recover Chowdhury Alam. The disappearance of a citizen is no light matter. And the state cannot and must not give the impression that it has nothing to do about it. The home minister must see to it that a full, swift and efficient operation is launched to have Alam recovered and restored to his family.