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On the evening of April 4, 2013, Marufa Islam Ruma’s husband, Mofizul Islam Rashed, was abducted by men claiming to be from the Detective Branch (DB) of Bangladesh Police from a tea stall near their home. Witnesses reported that Rashed was taken away in a gray microbus. Marufa initially believed the arrest was related to his opposition party affiliation, but law enforcement denied detaining him when she visited police and RAB offices. On April 8, 2013, the family filed a missing persons report, but police refused to acknowledge the abduction in the general diary. Photographed in savar on June 5, 2024. © Mosfiqur Rahman Johan.
Hasina Banu, 55, the mother of Selim Reza Pintu, who was abducted on Dec. 12, 2013, speaks about the unshakable hope she holds for her son’s return. “Remembering him I stay awake, even when I am asleep. I constantly wait to hear him calling me ‘Maa,’ saying, ‘I have returned.’” She adds, “I never doubt if my son is alive or dead. I think he is alive. I believe that by the grace of Allah, my son is alive. He is still alive and will return. I read the Quran and talk to my Allah, and my prayers are always with him.” Photographed in Dhaka on Dec. 25, 2023. © Mosfiqur Rahman Johan.
Sanjida Islam Tulee, coordinator of Maayer Daak, received reports from journalists about a possible secret detention center at the Detective Branch (DB) offices where victims’ families might find their missing loved ones. Upon hearing the news, families of the disappeared gathered outside the DB offices, hoping for reunions. However, no one was found, photographed in Dhaka on Aug. 7, 2024. © Mosfiqur Rahman Johan.
Wife to a disappeared individual (Firoz Khan), A single mother fights against financial crisis and mental trauma to ensure basic education for her child, living in a congested, dark room. Firoz Khan was abducted in 2012. The photograph was taken in Pirojpur, on September 15, 2022. © Mosfiqur Rahman Johan.
Raita was six years old when her father, Sajedul Islam Sumon, was abducted on December 4, 2013. Families of the victims accused Rab1 of taking their loved ones, yet they have not received justice for the last 11 years. In anger over this event, Raita wrote, 'I hate them' referring to those who abducted her father. Sajedul Islam Sumon disappeared from Block-I, Bashundhara neighborhood, Dhaka city, on December 4, 2013. The photograph was taken in Dhaka on August 4, 2022. © Mosfiqur Rahman Johan.
After the fall of Sheikh Hasina on 5 August 2024, the interim government formed an Inquiry Commission on Enforced Disappearances to investigate cases across the country and identify victims. In Rajshahi, a consultation was jointly organized by the United Nations, the Inquiry Commission, and Maayer Daak, where families gathered to share their testimonies and long years of uncertainty, grief, and search for justice. Fawzia, the eight-year-old daughter of Md. Murshidul Islam—who was forcibly disappeared on 19 April 2017—sat among them, carrying a story shaped by absence, waiting, and unanswered questions.This photo was taken on December 21,2024. © Mosfiqur Rahman Johan.
Sanjida Islam Tulee, coordinator of Maayer Daak (Mothers’ Call), stands by the banks of the Padma River with Fawzia Muskan. Fawzia is the eight-year-old daughter of Md. Murshidul Islam, disappeared on 19 April 2017. Tulee’s brother, Sajedul Islam Suman, also disappeared on 4 December 2013 along with seven others. Maayer Daak is an organisation of the families of the disappeared, where survivors sustain one another with courage and collective resistance.This photo was taken on December 21,2024. © Mosfiqur Rahman Johan.
The preserved letter of Mohammad Chowdhury Alam, written to his wife from jail in 1992 after he was arrested in political cases, is seen in this photograph taken on June 5, 2025. Alam was forcibly taken on the evening of June 25, 2010, when several men in plain clothes pulled him into a white microbus in Dhaka; he has remained missing since. The letter is kept by his family as one of the last personal traces of his life and memory. © Mosfiqur Rahman Johan.
“The last time my father came home was on 2 December 2013. That day, he was asking to see everyone. He met everyone. He took me in his arms and held me close. I believe that if my father ever returns, I will hold him the same way—so tightly that no force in the world, no fascist government like Sheikh Hasina’s, can take him away again, and cannot disappear him from in front of us. I said this into the microphone: since you have disappeared my father, if you cannot tell us where he is, then disappear me too. Leave me in the same place where you left my father, so that I can see him, so that I can touch him. I still call his phone number just to see if it rings. But it always says: switched off.” — Hafsa Islam Raita (daughter of Sajedul Islam Suman),sumon was abducted on December 4,2013 in0 Dhaka. © Mosfiqur Rahman Johan.
“You see this carefully decorated home—he did it all. I cannot leave this love behind. I cannot go anywhere, step out for a while, cannot leave the children behind, by themselves. I only wait, what if he’s back and I’m not here? In Old Dhaka, you know what guardians do—if a woman’s husband dies or goes away, they arrange her remarriage. I tell them: if Jahir comes back, will you be able to tell him you married me off? If he can see and accept that, and you can answer him, then I will marry—no problem. My elder brother says, can a person live like this? I say, why not? What is the problem? Nine years have passed for others, but for me, life stopped in 2013.” — Reshma Akter,wife of Chanchal who was abducted on 2 December, 2013. The photograph was taken on June 5, 2025, Dhaka. © Mosfiqur Rahman Johan.
“One year inside those walls feels like two thousand years. Breathing was difficult. At first, they said I would be released soon. But as months turned into years, I stopped holding on to hope. Food was inadequate inside that airless, dark room. The mental pain became so agonizing that I told them to kill me rather than keep me alive like this. Even now, I cannot sleep at night. The slightest sound startles me. My return feels astonishing to me, and miraculous to others. It feels like a kind of rebirth.” — Michael was forcibly disappeared in April 2019 and held for over five years at “Aynaghor,” a secret detention center operated by the DGFI in Dhaka. He was released on Aug. 7, 2024, when unidentified men blindfolded him and left him in Chattogram, where his family retrieved him—photographed in Dhaka on Dec. 31, 2024. © Mosfiqur Rahman Johan.
In an attempt to preserve proof, the family members of the enforced-disappeared individuals carefully keep the newspapers featuring the news regarding their kin's disappearance. Firoz khan and Miraz khan were abducted on 2012. The photograph was taken on September 16, 2022, Barisal. © Mosfiqur Rahman Johan.
The Inquiry Commission on Enforced Disappearances has stated that a total of 1,913 complaints were submitted to the commission. After verification and review, 1,569 of these complaints were identified as cases of enforced disappearance under the defined criteria. Among them, 287 cases fall into the category of “missing and dead.” More than 350 people have never returned from enforced disappearance, and their families do not know whether they are alive or dead. “The number could range from four to six thousand. When we make contact with some of the victims of enforced disappearance, we learn through them about other victims who have not contacted us—either because they do not know about us, or have moved to another country. There have been many individuals whom we reached out to ourselves, but were unwilling to speak on the record.” — Nabila Idris,commission meber of The Inquiry Commission on Enforced Disappearances.This photo was taken on august 11, 2024. © Mosfiqur Rahman Johan.
Hazera Khatun, founder of Maayer Daak, holds a photograph of her missing son, Sajedul Islam Sumon, in this image taken on February 12, 2025. Sumon, a leader of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party, was allegedly abducted by members of the Rapid Action Battalion in Dhaka in 2013 and has remained missing since. © Mosfiqur Rahman Johan.
In his testimony, one of the accused, Major Arif Hossain, stated that the bodies were taken by boat under cover of darkness, weighted down with sacks of bricks, and disposed of in the Shitalakkhya River to prevent them from resurfacing. On July 6, 2025, Raita visited the river where her father is suspected to have been thrown after his disappearance, standing by the water that may hold the last trace of him.This photo was taken in july 6,2025. © Mosfiqur Rahman Johan.
Farjana, the wife of Parvez Hossain, who was detained on December 2, 2013, from Shahbagh Crossing in Dhaka, speaks about the painful burden of concealing her husband’s disappearance. “In my building, all the other flat members’ families know that my husband lives abroad. No one actually knows that my husband has disappeared. Even in my child’s school, everyone knows that he lives abroad. We can’t say his father has disappeared because of the government agency. What kind of word is that! People are not aware of enforced disappearance,” she says. For the past 10 years, she has hidden the truth, with her sons telling others their father is “okay abroad.” She adds, “Even in my office, nobody knows about my husband’s reality because they could kick me out of the office since the law enforcement agency took him. Our relatives are even afraid to keep connections with us.” The truth, however, has gradually come to light through news and protests, leaving Farjana unsure of how to explain the painful reality. Photographed on July 25, 2022, Dhaka. © Mosfiqur Rahman Johan.
“I used to stare at the homeless men on the streets for a long time. Perhaps one of them could be his father? People said they would drive people mad with injections and then release them. Even on a bus, if I saw someone wandering the streets, I would get down and look closely—does his face resemble my husband’s? Or someone I knew—like Khalid Hasan Sohel, or Parvez, or Uncle Sohel? They said they let people go after turning them insane. So every time I saw someone like that, I would stop and search his face. If he wore a shirt like the one Ahad’s father wore the day he left, I would stare.”— Reshma Akter,wife of Chanchal who was abducted on 2 December, 2013. The photographs are from our last trip to Cox’s Bazar—moments once filled with memories—now slowly fading, like memories that refuse to disappear yet cannot fully remain. © Mosfiqur Rahman Johan.
In the aftermath of the July Uprising, the corrupts official try to destroy the evidence from secret detention centres, these photos are from secret detention centre in Rab 1, in Dhaka. The photograph was taken on March 4,2025. © Mosfiqur Rahman Johan.
"Inside RAB One there was a large space: on one side they kept dogs, on the other side rabbits. I was watching them when suddenly I saw a building. It was very old and looked horrible. Seeing that building, I somehow felt there were people there and that my father was there. After Aug. 5, when I was brought out from the RAB office, they took me to that building — the place I had wanted to go 12 years ago; my father was in those cells. If, 12 years ago, my father had known I was there, I believe no power in the world — not even Sheikh Hasina — could have separated me from him. It pains me that I could not bring my father out." — Hafsa Islam Raita ,daughter of sajedul islam sumon.Sumon was abducted on december 4,2013 in Dhaka. © Mosfiqur Rahman Johan.
The July Uprising in Bangladesh and the subsequent revolution have brought these issues into sharper focus, particularly as individuals once detained in secret facilities began to emerge, bearing testimony to the harrowing conditions of their captivity and the state's tactics of suppression. Their stories provide further illuminating evidence of the systemic nature of these enforced disappearances.This photos are taken from the secret detention centre in Rab 2, on March 15, 2025, Dhaka. © Mosfiqur Rahman Johan.
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Mosfiqur Rahman Johan

Mosfiqur Rahman Johan is an anthropologist and documentary photographer, born in Bangladesh in 1997. He has a passion for documenting humanitarian issues, environmental concerns, and socio-political events. Over the years, Johan has traveled extensively throughout Bangladesh to capture compelling visual narratives that raise awareness about social issues and shed light on lesser-known stories that deserve attention.

Johan studied anthropology to deepen his understanding of the complex issues he documents. There, he honed his skills in ethnography and research-based documentary techniques, which have helped him better capture the nuances and complexities of the cultures and societies he photographs.

Johan’s artistic approach merges with long-term immersion, where he actively engages as a participant observer. Close contact with his subjects and systematic repetition help him avoid superficial interpretations, allowing him to convey layered, sensitive, and sometimes contradictory observations on complex issues such as enforced disappearance, the death penalty, police brutality, forced displacement, and environmental challenges. By exploring the memories of interlocutors, he addresses themes of resistance and resilience—often overlooked, yet crucial in shaping the broader socio-political narrative. Through narrative-driven documentation, he aims to portray the complexities of social dynamics and cultural identities, challenging perceptions and established discourses on state violence, securitization, gender subjectivity, policing, forced displacement, development, and environmental issues.Johan also explores a visual journal that delves into the profound psychological impact of losing one’s space and belongings. Through his work, he strives to connect fragmented memories and fading realities with the broader world, seeking solace and understanding in the shared human experience. His visual narrative explores loss, memory, and the unyielding passage of time, as he navigates the delicate balance between life and nothing more.

Johan’s works have been awarded, exhibited, and featured in international media and platforms worldwide.

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