30-year-old Abrar Elias, who lives in east London and works as an immigration lawyer, is reminded of difficult times by the upcoming elections in Bangladesh.
In 2012, when he was in his last year of high school in Dhaka, his father Ilias Ali, who was a well-known politician and organizer with BNP, went missing along with his driver.
Mr Elias said he and his family were very sure that he was taken by force because of his involvement in opposition politics in Bangladesh.
A few years later, Mr Elias went to London to learn about law, hoping to become a barrister in the future.
He now lives in Pontoon Docks and says that the pain never goes away.
Mr Elias said that his mother cries every day because she misses him a lot.
“One day your father is very important to you, the next day, you don’t know where he is. ” It’s really sad.
Bangladesh’s Foreign Affairs Ministry told BBC London that there are currently no reports of people going missing during the election.
“Before, when people accused the government of doing bad things, the government quickly did things to show that the accusations weren’t true. ”
Mr Elias and Mr. Rahman are sitting in their apartments in east London, and they are worried about their home country.
Mr Rahman says he still has bad dreams about what happened to him, and how he was tortured for no reason.
“My body still needs to get better, but I will always remember those things. ” I want to be able to speak openly and have others listen so that what happened to me doesn’t happen to anyone else.
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“I haven’t seen my father in captivity for 11 years” – Lawyer Abrar Elias
