INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
after an article about high food prices went viral.Shamsuzzaman Shams was picked up from his home in the industrial town of Savar just
outside Dhaka at about 4am by plainclothes police, according to his newspaper, Prothom Alo.Rights groups say the Digital Security Act under
which Shams was charged has been widely used by the government to muzzle journalists and critics.The Prothom Alo article was published on
Its currency, the taka, has fallen sharply against the US dollar.The home minister, Asaduzzaman Khan, confirmed that the reporter was
copy of the case file obtained by Agence France-Presse.According to a local thinktank, nearly 3,000 people have been charged under the
Digital Security Act since it was enacted in 2018, including about 280 journalists.This has stoked concerns that under prime minister Sheikh
Hasina, in power since 2009, the south Asian nation of 170 million people is becoming increasingly authoritarian.Reporters Without Borders
ranked Bangladesh 162 of 180 countries in its 2022 World Press Freedom Index
supreme court lawyers in Dhaka.
This article first appeared/also appeared in theguardian.com
