River crime in numbers: 2,494 bodies recovered in five years and nine months, cases up 1,314 in a year

Crimes such as murder, robbery and extortion on the country's waterways have risen alarmingly. Reporting on river-centred crime shows that criminals are choosing the waterways as a way to erase evidence of crimes such as murder and rape.

According to River Police data, 2,494 bodies were recovered from rivers across the country in the five years and nine months from January 2021 to September this year.

Among the recovered bodies are victims of homicide, as well as people who died accidentally after falling into rivers and people who died by suicide after jumping in. In that period, 1,739 bodies were identified; 755 remained unidentified.

Criminologists say the real number of crimes is far higher. Criminals dump bodies in rivers to erase evidence and avoid arrest; in many cases fingerprints are washed away and faces are disfigured, making identification impossible.

The case statistics also show the rise clearly. According to the River Police, 2,085 cases were filed over various river-centred crimes in 2024. In 2025 that rose to 3,399—an increase of 1,314 cases in a single year.

The crimes rising on the waterways include murder, robbery, extortion, kidnapping, snatching, drug trafficking and illegal sand extraction. Fishermen have been shot dead by pirates while fishing; boat workers have been attacked for refusing to pay extortion money, and cargo has been looted from goods-carrying vessels.

River Police members themselves have also come under attack while conducting drives against criminals. Organised gangs, especially river robbers and pirates, do not hesitate to attack the police, the reporting notes.

The country's waterways stretch about 7,500 kilometres in the monsoon season and about 4,500 kilometres in the dry season. Keeping effective watch over that vast network with the River Police's 124 outposts is not easy.

The security gap is especially stark after evening in remote char areas and on waterways along district boundaries, and criminals are taking advantage of it. The number of bodies recovered from the waterways is rising by the day.

In this situation, emphasis has been placed on identifying crime-prone waterways, char areas and likely body-dumping spots and increasing regular surveillance there, installing CCTV cameras at important points, and filling the River Police's shortages of personnel, modern vessels, equipment and training.

The reporting also stresses the need for effective coordination among the River Police, the Coast Guard, district and metropolitan police and other agencies, and for regular joint drives in crime-prone areas.