The Documentary Podcast

Sa’adat Hassan Manto was a writer who confronted social taboos in Indio-Pakistani society. Even though he died in 1955, an alcoholic and penniless, his work still speaks to 21st Century Pakistan. As a film and radio script writer, a journalist and most significantly as short story writer in Urdu, Manto chronicled the chaos that prevailed in the run up to, during and after the Partition of India in 1947.

Since the start of the conflict in Ukraine, huge numbers of men have been conscripted into service on the frontline. Many are now returning home to a civilian society which has little understanding of their experiences or how the fighting has changed them. Reporter David Stern follows of a group of Ukrainian veterans as they attempt to adjust to life after the war fare. He is with Sasha, a young recruit posted to the frontline, as he experiences an emotional reunion with his family after his demobilisation. But questions remain about his ability to cope away from his unit, and the psychological impact of the fighting. As Europe’s only active conflict in a generation enters its third year, the programme will explore the unique pressures and dilemmas that a huge cross-section of Ukrainian men is facing after demobilisation.

Film-maker Rex Bloomstein, who pioneered a British prison television documentary, gains unprecedented access to the largest sex offender prison in Europe, HMP Whatton in the UK. Since the revelations surrounding high profile figures in the UK entertainment industry, there are more sex offenders in English and Welsh prisons than ever before, around 11,600 out of a total population of 86,000. Bloomstein explores the methods used to get prisoners to confront their offending behaviour and to prepare them to go back out into the world.

In March the award-winning Honduran environmentalist, Berta Caceres, was gunned down at home. Of indigenous Lenca origin, for years she was a prominent critic of the government, and campaigned against the Agua Zarca hydro-electric project in the western highlands. Honduras is the most unequal nation in the Americas, but it is rich in minerals with an enormous capacity for the development of hydro-electric power. Since a coup in 2009 removed the left-leaning President, a business-driven government has granted dozens of concessions for the exploitation of precious national resources. But the race for development is creating bitter – and murderous – disharmony: Honduras has become the most deadly nation on earth to be a land or environmental activist. For Assignment, Linda Pressly, explores how the murder of Berta Caceres is emblematic of profound divisions in Honduras.

(Image: A graffiti image of Berta Caceres on a wall in Honduras)

Britain's music scene today is a rich, multi-cultural feast that draws on talent from all corners of society. Unless, that is, your passion is classical music. In Britain, and across Europe, performers, composers, teachers and institutions remain resolutely, predominantly white. Why should this be, and is this a concern?

In Iran, It is not just Ahmadinejad who slams homosexuals, many people also deny homosexuality or know very little about it. So how does one family cope when they realise their daughter is gay? This is the story of the collective struggle of a supportive and close-knit family, who are trying to find a solution for this "crisis", each in their own way.

Each month in a flat piece of English Fenland, a site the size of 40 football pitches, hosts the biggest second hand farm machinery auction in the world. It is both uniquely British and international – buyers from four continents arrive by truck, taxi, or hire car with their tractor shopping lists and hopes.

Speaking together for the first time, four European hostages of so-called Islamic State talk to Lyse Doucet about their period of incarceration between March 2013 and June 2014. Aid worker Federico Motka, journalists Didier Francois and Daniel Rye, and blogger Pierre Torres were all held for between 10 and 14 months each.

Lipika Pelham travels to a remote part of south eastern Bangladesh to report on claims of human rights abuses against indigenous inhabitants of the area. The Chittagong Hill Tracts are home to thirteen indigenous groups with the Chakma, Marma, Chak and Mro mostly practicing Theravada Buddhism. Thousands were forced off their lands from the 1960s until the 1990s. An insurgency that started in the mid 1970s ended in a peace settlement in 1997 under which the army was supposed to withdraw but it continues to maintain a tight grip on the area. The resettlement of tens of thousands of Bengalis from other parts of the country has only added to tensions.

Lipika is one of the few journalists from a foreign media organisation to report from there in recent years. She has returned with first-hand accounts of alleged rape and torture and hears claims that soldiers have been involved in evicting people from their homes. Her report carries details of attempts to forcibly convert young children to Islam as well as accusations of rape by Bengali settlers of girls as young as thirteen.

The BBC's former Pakistan correspondent Owen Bennett Jones continues his exploration of South Asia’s Deobandi Muslim movement. He heads across the border to Pakistan, where Deobandi ideology has provided spiritual guidance for both militant groups like the Taliban and a strictly non-violent missionary movement. So how can a single school of thought follow such different paths? Owen explores the role the Deobandi ideology has played in shaping Pakistan's identity, and how the Pakistani state has tapped into the intolerant elements of Deobandi teachings to fuel state-sponsored jihad - be it fighting the Soviets in Afghanistan or the Indians in Kashmir. Empowered by a ready supply of cash and guns, a relatively small number of Deobandi militants have caused havoc across the country, in the form of sectarian violence, and anti-state violence, as violent groups turn their guns on their masters. Pakistan created a monster by endorsing Deobandi militancy - so how can it bring it under control? (Photo: Owen Bennett Jones meets Maulana Sami Ul Haq, leader of the Darul Uloom Haqqania madrassa in Akhora Khattak. Credit: Richard Fenton-Smith)