Tribunal decisions

The decision

IN THE UPPER TRIBUNAL
IMMIGRATION AND ASYLUM CHAMBER Case No: UI-2026-000662
First-tier Tribunal No:
PA/63506/2024

THE IMMIGRATION ACTS

Decision & Reasons Issued:
On 23 July 2026

Before

UPPER TRIBUNAL JUDGE LINDSLEY

Between

MAM
(ANONYMITY ORDER MADE)
Appellant
and
SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT
Respondent

Representation:
For the Appellant: Mr A Chelliah, of Direct Access Counsel
For the Respondent: Mr E Terrell, Senior Home Office Presenting Officer

Heard at Field House on 14 July 2026

Order Regarding Anonymity

Pursuant to rule 14 of the Tribunal Procedure (Upper Tribunal) Rules 2008, the appellant is granted anonymity.

No-one shall publish or reveal any information, including the name or address of the appellant, likely to lead members of the public to identify the appellant. Failure to comply with this order could amount to a contempt of court.

DECISION AND REASONS

Introduction
1. The appellant is a citizen of Bangladesh born in 1993. He came to the UK in August 2022 with a Tier 4 student visa. He made an asylum claim on 28th February 2023, and that claim was refused in the decision under challenge dated 24th April 2024. The appellant’s appeal against the decision was dismissed by a First-tier Tribunal Judge after a hearing on the 10th November 2025.
2. Permission to appeal was granted by a Judge of the First-tier Tribunal and I found that the First-tier Tribunal had erred in law for the reasons set out in my decision which is an Annex A to this one. The following factual matters are preserved from the decision of the First-tier Tribunal:
• The appellant puts forward a claim that includes a Convention reason, namely political opinion.
• The appellant was involved with BNP politics, namely with Chatra Dal a Bangladeshi student organisation and came to the adverse attention of the Awami League.
• A bogus case with a false warrant was filed against him by the Awami League following protests in June 2022 and he has provided a genuine FIR and warrant copies as evidence of this.
• Prior to the fall of the government led by Sheikh Hasina in August 2024 he would have been at real risk of serious harm on return to Bangladesh.
3. The matter now comes back before me to remake the protection appeal. It is agreed that the remaking will take place by way of submissions only. The issues to be determined are, in light of the preserved facts, firstly, whether the appellant has a subjective fear of return to Bangladesh and if so, secondly, whether the appellant is at real risk of serious harm on return to Bangladesh. The burden of proof is on the appellant. The first issue is to be determined on the balance of probabilities and the second to the lower civil standard.
4. The appellant’s claim, in short summary, is that he would be at risk of serious harm on return as he would be arrested on arrival in Bangladesh and then not have a fair trial on politically motivated charges which would result in him being detained and then imprisoned as a result of his political opinions in very poor conditions which of themselves would amount to ill-treatment and pose a threat to his life.
Submissions – Remaking
5. Mr Terrell for the respondent argued, in short summary, as follows.
6. He first pointed out that there was no evidence that the appellant still faced the two charges against him, the first charge being essentially that he was amongst a group of BNP supporters who were causing public disorder calling for a new government and fair elections; and the second that he had insulted and defamed the former prime minister of Bangladesh, Sheikh Hasina. He drew attention to the fact that the expert evidence of Mr Tushar showed that many thousands of cases of politically motivated charges had been investigated during the interim government and withdrawn, and that as the appellant had the court documents he should have been in a position to request that this happened to his charges, particularly as he claims to be a high level BNP member/ politician and social media activist in his statement. The expert evidence fails to explain why the appellant could not request that his charges were withdrawn under the interim government, and the appellant has failed to show to the required standard that he still faces these charges.
7. It is submitted that the expert, Mr Tushar’s, main concern with the appellant returning to Bangladesh would appear to have been that the situation in Bangladesh was unstable and insecure, and so it might be that the Awami League, perhaps with the assistance of the army, might return to power and pursue the political charges against the appellant with the result that he faced imprisonment on politically trumped up charged in unacceptable conditions. However, even under the interim government the student wing of the Awami League was banned, and the Awami League was labelled a fascist party; and thousands of political cases were withdrawn. The expert report was written in October 2025, however in February 2026 a new BNP government took power with a significant majority, so, it is argued, there was no longer any reason to think that the change of government away from one dominated by the the Awami League exerting unfair political influence was not secure. Further even under the interim government, as set out in CPIN, the chief judge had been forced from office along with changes in the position of hundreds of other judges, and so there had been a significant change in personnel in the judiciary, which would be likely to deter any pro-Awami League corrupt official from using these anti-BNP political charges against the appellant. In light of this and the change of government it was extremely unlikely that there would be the necessary concatenation of corrupt police, prosecutors and judges to arrest, prosecute and sentence the appellant for the trumped up charges. The appeal should therefore be dismissed on all grounds.
8. Mr Chelliah argued for the appellant in his skeleton argument and in brief orals submissions as follows.
9. The appellant clearly has a subjective fear of return to Bangladesh as it is preserved that he would have been at real risk of serious harm if returned to Bangladesh if he had been returned prior to the fall of Sheikh Hasina’s government in August 2024 as a result of his BNP politics. He argues that the report of Mr Tushar should be given weight as it is written by an appropriate expert with knowledge of the law and politics of Bangladesh. Mr Chelliah accepted he had no instructions as to whether the charges against the appellant were still extant, or whether he had applied for them to be set aside.
10. Mr Chelliah argued however that there were problems under the interim government with reviewing politically motivated cases due to missing information, and that the lower tier judges have not by and large resigned and thus these Awami League associated judges would be the ones that the appellant would face when his charges came to court. It was only false cases lodged between July and August 2024 which were automatically withdrawn. He accepted that the expert report of Mr Tushar had been written prior to the BNP government taking power in February 2026. He argued however that this report showed that under the interim government many Awami League appointed judges remained in power, and might wish to pursue the political charges against the appellant, and thus that the appellant’s cases may proceed against him if he were to return to Bangladesh and that he would likely to be refused bail as an absconder, and it remained uncertain that he would receive a fair trial. The appeal should therefore be allowed on asylum and human rights grounds.
Conclusions – Remaking
11. I find that the appellant has shown on the balance of probabilities that he has a genuine subjective fear that he will be subject to political persecution in the form of prosecution on trumped up political charges, instigated whilst the Awami League was in power on the basis of his BNP political activism, as it has been found by the First-tier Tribunal and preserved by me that had he returned to Bangladesh prior to the fall from power of Sheikh Hasina in August 2024 he would have had a well-founded fear of persecution and so I find it plausible that he might continue to be subjectively afraid of a real risk of serious harm if he returned to Bangladesh, as a result of these false politically motivated charges, particularly given that the expert Mr Tushar has expressed, in his October 2025 report, the opinion that even under the interim government political instability and insufficient progress on the very many false charges brought meant that he could face a substantial risk of serious harm to him given the continuing presence of Awami League supporters in state institutions.
12. I therefore move on to consider whether the appellant has shown to the lower civil standard that he has an objectively well founded fear of persecution for reason of his political opinions at the current time. I have considered all of the evidence in the round including, but not limited to, the witness statement of the appellant, the FIRs, charge sheets, bail refusal, and arrest warrants provided by the appellant, the expert report of Mr Tushar and the CPIN Bangladesh: Political Situation report dated December 2024. For the reasons set out in my error of law decision I find that Mr Tushar is a properly qualified expert and that weight can generally be given to his report, although I have no agreed with all of the conclusions he draws from the evidence he cites, as is clear from my reasoning below, and have had to put it in the context of the very substantial political changes that have happened since it was written.
13. I find that the appellant has not provided evidence which reaches this low standard of proof to show that objectively he is at current real risk of serious harm for the reasons he claims. This is for the following reasons. Firstly, as argued by Mr Terrell, there is no evidence that the politically motivated charges against him are still outstanding in light of the actions of and options under the previous interim government and given the current government led by the party which the appellant supports, the BNP, which came to power five months ago in February 2026.
14. It is clear from the expert evidence of Mr Tushar that the interim government had been very busy addressing political cases lodged in 2025 by the Awami League against BNP and other opposition party activists, and had withdrawn some 11,000 of the 17,000 such cases, and had withdrawn all the cases filed between 1st July and 5th August 2024. Whilst the expert, Mr Tushar, seems to find that this is a limited operation I disagree, and find that this shows that even the interim government had a very substantial commitment to addressing and disposing of false politically motivated cases in the period of just under three months they had been in power at the point when the report was written. Further it is notable that the appellant is represented by a Bangladeshi advocate who is fully aware that the charges against the appellant are false politically motivated ones, as set out in his letter of 8th February 2024, and has a full set of documents relating to the charges so would be in a position to make an application to set-aside these charges, and so would not have the difficulties of not having FIRs and chargesheets, and thus would be able to put his case to the relevant panel as outlined in paragraph 9 of the expert report. I find that, absent any documentary evidence on the activities of the new BNP government since February 2026, that the work of the interim government on this issue will at least have been continued and more likely accelerated as it impacts very substantially on their members and supporters. If the appellant has not applied to have the politically motivated charges against him withdrawn I find that there is no good reason for this inaction, and it is unarguably open to him to do so now, thus removing any risk related to these charges on his return to Bangladesh.
15. Further, changes have been made to the judiciary, as set out in the CPIN at paragraphs 4.1.4 and 13.3.5, the Supreme Court Chief Justice has been replaced along with senior police officers and there is evidence given to the International Crisis Group that the level of politicisation of the judiciary has reduced throughout. In this context I find that it is extremely unlikely that an Awami League sympathiser within the criminal justice system or corrupt law enforcement official would continue to pursue clearly politically trumped up charges against the appellant for protesting in favour of a the change of government which has now taken place or in making defamatory comments against the former prime minister who now has been convicted in absentia of crimes against humanity with respect to the violent suppression of protests, and sentenced to death by the International Crimes Tribunal of Bangladesh.
16. Much of the rest of the report of Mr Tushar concerns the risk of the Awami League returning to power and the insecurity of the political change away from the Awami League. As Mr Terrell identified Mr Tushar repeatedly refers to the situation in Bangladesh at the time he wrote his report, October 2025, being very insecure, see, for instance paragraphs 22 and 69, and to fears that perhaps the army might back a return of the Awami League due to the entrenched position that they had made for themselves in society, as set out at paragraphs 46- 49 and 75 of the report. This may have been understandable at the point of time at which the report was written, with the interim government having had just under three months in power, however clearly the situation has proved to be stable and there has been no return to power of the Awami League. Instead, elections were held and the BNP won a landslide majority. As a result I find that it has not been shown to the lower civil standard that the current government is not secure and set on continuing the path of reforms which the interim government started which means that the appellant has faces no real risk of serious harm if returned to Bangladesh.
17. So whilst the appellant was historically, prior to the fall of the regime headed by Sheikh Hasina and the Awami League, at real risk of persecution and serious harm I find that there are good reasons why a well-founded fear of persecution has ceased to exist. As I find the appellant is no longer at real risk of serious harm if returned to Bangladesh he cannot succeed in his Refugee Convention appeal, his humanitarian protection appeal or under Article 3 ECHR. No separate Article 8 ECHR appeal was pursued.

Decision:
1. The making of the decision of the First-tier Tribunal involved the making of an error on a point of law.
2. I set aside the decision of the First-tier Tribunal
3. The appeal is remade by dismissing the asylum, humanitarian protection and human rights appeals.

Fiona Lindsley

Judge of the Upper Tribunal
Immigration and Asylum Chamber

15th July 2026

Annex A: Error of Law Decision

DECISION AND REASONS
Introduction
1. The appellant is a citizen of Bangladesh born in 1993. He came to the UK in August 2022 with a Tier 4 student visa. He made an asylum claim on 28th February 2023, and that claim was refused in the decision under challenge dated 24th April 2024. The appellant’s appeal against the decision was dismissed by a First-tier Tribunal Judge after a hearing on the 10th November 2025.
2. Permission to appeal was granted by a Judge of the First-tier Tribunal on 11th February 2026 on the basis that firstly it is arguable that the First-tier judge had erred in law firstly by conflating the standards of proof for subjective fear and real risk on return when these are not subject to the same standard under s.32 of NABA 2022. Secondly it is arguable that the credibility assessment was not conducted lawfully. Thirdly, it is arguable that there may have been a failure to consider the country-of-origin materials. Fourthly, it is arguable that if the first errors are made out it may be arguable there was a failure to consider internal relocation. Fifthly, in relation to the Article 8 ECHR appeal it is arguable that the First-tier Tribunal Judge did not properly conduct a proportionality assessment considering the best interests of the children.
3. The matter now comes before me to determine whether the First-tier Tribunal erred in law, and if so whether any such error was material and whether the decision of the First-tier Tribunal should be set aside.
Preliminary Matter – Amendment of the Grounds
4. Mr Chelliah had been instructed in place of Saint Martin Solicitors on 10th April 2026 as direct access counsel. He had sent a skeleton argument to the Upper Tribunal on 13th April 2026. This raised matters not raised in the grounds of appeal. He applied to vary the grounds of appeal to include a new ground, which linked to the third ground above, that the First-tier Tribunal had failed to reason why less weight was given to the opinion of the expert Mr Md Solaiman Tushar with respect to his opinions on “country affairs”, as opposed to his opinions on “court matters”, at paragraph 15 of the decision, in circumstances where Mr Tushar’s CV, contained within the report, provided evidence that he was a political editor of a daily newspaper, a journalist and had written books and other publications on the politics of Bangladesh. Despite the fact that the ground has been raised very late and an application was not put in writing in advance of the hearing I granted permission for this ground to be argued as I found it to be a strongly arguable, and it was raised in the context of an existing ground which asserted that there had been a failure to consider the CPIN country of origin evidence when determining the appeal.
Submissions – Error of Law
5. Mr Chelliah helpfully agreed that he would not be pursuing a number of assertions within the grounds of appeal. He did not pursue the challenge to the dismissal of the separate Article 8 ECHR appeal relating to the appellant’s private life in the UK. He agreed that the only ground he wished to pursue in relation to the protection appeal was that when assessing whether there was first a subjective fear and secondly an objectively well founded fear of return to Bangladesh the First-tier Tribunal Judge had failed to provide reasons for not giving weight to the evidence of Mr Tushar in the context of that evidence being not only from a very well qualified expert but also being more up to date than the evidence of the respondent, in that it was from October 2025 and the evidence of the CPIN was from November 2024. He argued that if the First-tier Tribunal Judge had given this evidence more than little weight then the outcome of the appeal as a result of the expert being qualified to comment on country matters as well as legal ones there could have been a different outcome to the appeal, particularly as the conclusions of Mr Tushar included that the appellant will be likely to be sent to prison on arrival in Bangladesh and is likely to be tried by politically biased judges appointed by the previous regime and reform of the judiciary is likely to take many years.
6. Ms Ahmed relied upon the Rule 24 notice and argued in oral submissions in short summary as follows. She argued that weight to be given to evidence is a matter for the judge; that it was not necessary that all reasoning was set out in the decision, as observed by the Court of Appeal in Ackom v SSHD [2025] EWCA Civ 537 at paragraph 46; and that it was tolerably clear from the decision at paragraphs 18 and 19 that the First-tier Tribunal had considered both the evidence of the expert and the CPIN and preferred that of the CPIN.
7. At the end of the hearing I informed the parties that I found that the First-tier Tribunal had materially erred in law in the treatment of the evidence of Mr Tushar. I set out my reasons below in writing. It was agreed that the remaking of the appeal should take place in the Upper Tribunal as the appellant had been found credible and the factual findings are unchallenged and can be retained, and the appeal can be determined by way of submissions only. I indicated that consideration would be given to whether the remaking takes place after the potential country guidance case which is in progress before the Upper Tribunal but it transpired that as yet there is no date for the hearing of this case and so it was not appropriate to postpone the remaking hearing in this matter to await the country guidance.
Conclusions – Error of Law
8. The appellant produced an expert report from Mr Md Solaiman Tushar at his hearing before the First-tier Tribunal which both parties agreed should be admitted as evidence as set out at paragraph 4 of the decision. The First-tier Tribunal Judge found the appellant to be credible and found that if the appeal had been decided prior to regime change in Bangladesh in August 2024 that he would have had a well founded fear of persecution based on his political opinions, but in light of the fall of the Sheikh Hasina government it was found that this was no longer the case, and so he had not established a genuine subjective fear of return on the balance of probabilities. This conclusion was reached on a consideration of the country of origin evidence contained in the CPIN and the expert report of Mr Tushar. When considering the report of Mr Tushar it is found that “court matters” were within his expertise as at paragraph 15 but the judge attached” less weight to his analysis of country affairs”. No reasoning is given for this distinction. As set out in the submission of Mr Chelliah on the face of the report Mr Tushar is equally qualified as a commentator on the political situation in Bangladesh, and was of the opinion that the appellant remained at real risk of serious harm if returned to Bangladesh. Further, the report was more recent that the CPIN on which greater reliance was placed by the First-tier Tribunal. I find that in these circumstances that the First-tier Tribunal erred in law in not reasoning why less weight was due to the country of origin/ political conclusions of Mr Tushar than the material set out in the CPIN. I find that had the opinions of Mr Tushar been given more weight a different conclusion might have been reached in the appeal and so the error was a material one.
9. The appeal will therefore have to be remade with respect to whether the appellant has a subjective fear on return to Bangladesh and whether the appellant is at real risk of serious harm on return to Bangladesh (in which will be included an assessment as to whether there is sufficiency of protection and the possibility of finding safety via internal relocation). I preserve the following factual findings of the First-tier Tribunal which were not challenged:
• The appellant puts forward a claim that includes a Convention reason, namely political opinion.
• The appellant was involved with BNP politics, namely with Chatra Dal a Bangladeshi student organisation and came to the adverse attention of the Awami League.
• A bogus case with a false warrant was filed against him by the Awami League following protests in June 2022 and he has provided a genuine FIR and warrant copies as evidence of this.
• Prior to the fall of the government led by Sheikh Hasina in August 2024 he would have been at real risk of serious harm on return to Bangladesh.

Decision:
1. The making of the decision of the First-tier Tribunal involved the making of an error on a point of law.
2. I set aside the decision of the First-tier Tribunal
3. The remaking hearing is adjourned.
Directions:

1. The remaking hearing will be listed at the first available date for 3 hours.
2. No interpreter is required.
3. 10 days prior to the hearing date the appellant must file with the Upper Tribunal via CE file and serve on the respondent (Home Office) a bundle of relevant documents including the CPIN and report of Mr Tushar at the email utdirections@homeoffice.gov.uk. Mr Chelliah is reminded that he may only act for an appellant on a direct access basis who is able to deal with administrative aspects of his appeal such as lodging a compliant bundle of documents.

Fiona Lindsley

Judge of the Upper Tribunal
Immigration and Asylum Chamber

15th April 2026