Fresh discussion about a child has recently begun on social media. A couple have claimed the child as their own. The child’s present family has denied the claim. There has also been a demand for a DNA test to settle whose child she is. The woman who claims the child as her daughter is the one who has made the demand.
The case has raised questions. Can anyone in Bangladesh have a DNA test done to establish a child’s paternity or maternity simply by asking? Where does one apply for the test? And by what process can it be done?
Officials of the government bodies concerned say there are two government laboratories in Bangladesh for forensic DNA tests to establish paternity or maternity. But there is no scope for going there directly and having the test done at one’s own wish. Tests are usually carried out at these laboratories as part of a police investigation or on a court’s order. In certain cases the test is also done for needs such as immigration and kidney transplants.
Why the child is being discussed
Several cases of missing children have recently been discussed in Bangladesh. On 6 September a press conference titled “Where is my child” was held to demand state action to find missing children. It was organised by a non-government organisation, the Zero Missing Children Foundation, at the Dhaka Reporters Unity in Segunbagicha, Dhaka. News of the press conference was published in various media.
The families of several missing children were present at the press conference that day. Among them was the family of a missing child from Kamrangirchar in Dhaka. A picture also shows the child’s father holding a card with “915 days” written on it. By the family’s account, the child went missing in 2024.
The family said the child was lost while playing in front of the house. They claim the child was later seen on a TikTok account. The family alleges that law enforcers took no effective action even after being told of this.
The case filed over the child’s disappearance went first to the detective branch of Dhaka Metropolitan Police and then to the Police Bureau of Investigation (PBI). The family had complained at the press conference that even then no trace of their child had been found.
Discussion of the child has recently begun again on social media. Claiming that the child had been sold, a woman demanded a DNA test. She also accused the police of not cooperating.
Md Azharul Islam, officer-in-charge of Kamrangirchar police station, said, however, that he knew nothing about the matter. He asked for details of the child and the disappearance, and said he would make enquiries and report back.
Contacted again that afternoon, he said: “We have found nothing. I am trying hard. There is no missing child or general diary under a name like that at this police station of mine. I have checked.”
Saiful Islam, officer-in-charge of Khilgaon police station, said he could not say at once whether a case had been filed over the incident, because he had joined the station only 12 days earlier.
In his words, a general diary (GD) is filed at the police station in many cases of missing children. Whether one was filed at Khilgaon over this particular case would have to be confirmed from the records.
“There are many like this; which one it is has to be checked. If it is sent to me I can look and say,” he said, and asked for the information to be sent.
What the child’s present family says
On the family’s Facebook page, meanwhile, the child’s mother has posted a video expressing anger at what has happened. She claims the woman has been harassing their family for about a year and a half.
She said the woman has not been able to show any specific proof in support of her claim that the child is hers, and will not be able to in future either.
In the video the mother says a tug of war is going on over a woman’s motherhood and over a child, which will affect her child’s future, and that the child understands none of it.
She also maintains that her child was born long before the Kamrangirchar child went missing.
By her account, the child was born in July 2021, and the Facebook page was opened around October that year.
She said the page has pictures and videos of the child at various ages from birth onwards. In another post she said the Kamrangirchar child had gone missing on 5 March 2024, and asked how, in that case, she could have posted a video of the child three days earlier, on 2 March.
The woman who claims the child as her own did not respond when contacted for her comment.
What a DNA test is
DNA, or deoxyribonucleic acid, is the biological material that carries a living thing’s hereditary information. Hereditary traits pass from parents to a child through DNA.
According to a government website, a DNA test identifies genetic changes by analysing the structure of DNA or chromosomes. A sample is usually collected with a swab from cells inside the cheek. The sample is then analysed in a laboratory and a DNA profile is made.
The test is used to establish a person’s genetic traits, hereditary diseases or relationships of paternity and maternity by analysing the sequence of their DNA.
Abu Sufian, a scientific officer at the National Forensic DNA Profiling Laboratory of the Ministry of Women and Children Affairs, said DNA tests are generally of two kinds, forensic and diagnostic.
He said forensic DNA tests are done to investigate crimes such as rape or murder and to identify unidentified dead people. Diagnostic DNA tests are done to identify genetic defects, diagnose particular genetic diseases or learn the risk of a disease. Tests of that kind can be done at various diagnostic centres.
Where parentage is tested
Abu Sufian said forensic DNA tests to establish paternity or maternity are done at two government laboratories in Bangladesh. One is the Forensic DNA Laboratory of the police’s Criminal Investigation Department (CID). The other is the National Forensic DNA Profiling Laboratory under the Department of DNA Laboratory Management of the Ministry of Women and Children Affairs.
“If you want to know about a child’s parents, you have to go to the CID’s forensic DNA lab or the National Forensic DNA Profiling Laboratory. And if you want to know about a child’s genetic disease, there are various labs,” he said.
No one can go to these government laboratories privately and have a test done to establish paternity or maternity, however. A police case or a court order is needed.
“There has to be a court case, there has to be a police case. That is, when the police or the court gives permission, the two government labs do the forensic DNA test to learn the identity of the child’s parents. Without a case this test cannot be done, because they were built for forensic DNA testing,” Abu Sufian said.
He added that in some cases forensic DNA tests are also done for immigration. As an example, he said a father may live abroad and want to take his wife and child there; in such a situation a DNA test may be needed to verify his biological relationship with the child. The embassy gives the instruction in such cases.
In Bangladesh a forensic DNA test to establish the family relationship is also compulsory for kidney transplants. The test is done on the instruction of the hospital concerned and carried out at the same two government laboratories, Abu Sufian said.
How to apply
Md Sufi Ullah, a special superintendent of police at the CID, said no DNA test is done at the CID’s laboratory for commercial purposes without a court order.
“It is all case-related, that is, due to a court order. No DNA test is done without the court’s order,” he said.
He said an application has to be made through a set process to have a DNA test done to establish paternity or maternity. When the child now under discussion was mentioned, he said that in cases of this kind a general diary or a case can be filed directly at a police station to establish paternity or maternity. A case can also be filed directly in a trial court in Dhaka. The DNA test is then done once the court orders it.
“In this situation anyone can also go directly to the cognisance court and file a case. Or they can file a general diary or a case at the police station and seek the court’s order for a DNA test. Once the court gives the order, the CID does the test,” Md Sufi Ullah said.
In other words, no one in Bangladesh can go directly to a government laboratory and have a DNA test done to establish paternity or maternity simply because they wish to. A legal process has to be followed, and the test is carried out on the basis of a police investigation or a court order.
বাংলায় মূল প্রতিবেদন পড়ুন · Read the original Bengali report