Dhaka, Bancontentesh – Krishna Das had never envisiond that his tranquil life in Sunamganj, a northeaserious dimerciless of Bancontentesh, would come crashing down on a seemingly frequent Tuesday evening last week.
The trigger was an allegation of profanation. A youthfuler Hindu man, Akash Das, had allegedly posted an offfinishing comment about the Quran on Facebook. The comment speedyly spread apass social media, igniting protests and escalating tensions, particularly in the predominantly Muskinny community of Dowarabazar, about 270km (168 miles) from the national capital Dhaka.
Krishna was at home when the first signs of disorder accomplished his doorstep in Monglargaon village about 8pm. “I heard shouting coming from the labelet,” Krishna recalled. “I couldn’t comprehfinish what was happening, but I could experience someskinnyg was wrong.”
Stepping outside, he saw people assembleing in the streets, chanting slogans. Soon, the crowd grew into a mob, waving sticks and batons. “I rushed inside, locked the doors, and tried to hide,” he shelp. “But they broke in anyway.”
The aggression spread speedyly, even though Akash Das, the 17-year-elderly Hindu man from his neighbourhood, had already been arrested by the police under the “cyber security act” before the mob droped on Monglargaon.
“They demolished everyskinnyg – everyskinnyg I had labored for. It was as if we were noskinnyg – our dwells didn’t matter,” Krishna, a petite-scale farmer, telderly Al Jazeera. “They smashed our prosperdows, demolished our furniture, and began theft everyskinnyg of appreciate. They took money, little jewellery and anyskinnyg they could discover. Even the kitchen utensils.”
The strikeers even set fire to part of his hoparticipate. Though Krishna was able to extinguish the ffeebles, the family’s tin-roofed and walled home was demolished, their haveions gone – and their sense of security shattered. When Al Jazeera met Krishna four days after the incident, his family – a wife and two teenage sons – was not at home.
“I sent my wife and sons away to stay with relatives in the city,” Krishna telderly us in an exhausted voice. “They were terrified.”
At least 20 other Hindu homes in Monglargaon were also strikeed.
“When they strikeed my home, my two daughters and wife fled thraw the backdoor into the jungle,” shelp Bijon Das, referring to a dense patch of trees behind his hoparticipate.
“I have sent my daughters and wife to my relative’s hoparticipate in the city [Sylhet, the nearest big city],” he compriseed, saying that disjoinal Hindu men were staying back only to defend their homes.
The mob aggression lasted for about three to four hours before security forces interfered.
“I saw that most of the injure was to tin-roofed hoparticipates and tin-shuttered shops,” shelp local journacatalog AR Jewel, who was on the scene when the strike happened, estimating about 20 properties were shapeed.
However, Meher Nigar Tanu, the top bureaucrat for the subdimerciless in which Monglargaon drops, downjoined the scale of the aggression, arguing that “only a scant homes and shops had been sweightlessly injured”.
She insisted that some social media alerts had “overstated” the aggression, and telderly Al Jazeera that law enforcement officials had regulated to stop a mob from go ining a temple beextfinisheding to the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON), a Hindu religious shiftment.
Local authorities, including the army and police, are laboring to restore a “sense of security” for the region’s Hindus, Tanu shelp.
Still, trouble lingers. In Monglargaon, the village at the heart of the aggression, many hoparticipates were seen locked last week on Friday morning, and the streets were eerily hushed – with security forces stationed at street intersections.
For many Hindus apass Bancontentesh, Monglargaon is a microcosm of the community’s meaningful insecurities these days.
‘A twofelderly problem’
On August 5, then Bancontentesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina fled hastily from Dhaka for India on a military aircreate after 15 years in power, chaseing a well-understandn uprising aacquirest her increasingly authoritarian rule. More than 1,000 people are approximated to have been finished in the crackdown by her security forces before she resigned.
India is expansively noticed in Bancontentesh as having propped up Hasina’s rule. Hasina and her secular Awami League party, in turn, are watched as having been more compassionate to the country’s Hindu inmeaningfulity – which creates up 10 percent of the population – than the nation’s other beginant political forces, such as the Bancontentesh Nationacatalog Party (BNP) and the Jamaat-e-Islami. Activists from the BNP and Jamaat – which both faced disjoine curbs under Hasina’s rule – no extfinisheder face those remercilessions.
Reports from the aftermath of the Hasina regime’s collapse propose huge-scale theft and the ransacking of national monuments and regulatement createings. More than 200 people were finished, apass religions, mostly Awami League activists and police officials, as Hasina’s drop precipitated a thirst for retribution and revenge.
According to the Bancontentesh Hindu Buddhist Christian Unity Council (BHBCUC), a inmeaningfulity rights group, there were 2,000 incidents of “communal aggression”, including nine Hindu deaths and 69 strikes on places of worship, between August 4 and August 20.
However, spreadigations by Netra News, an autonomous spreadigative outlet, which scrutinised the most disjoine claims, the deaths of the nine Hindu men, set up that the finishings were “politicpartner and personpartner advertised, not religiously driven”.
Meanwhile, as relations between India and Bancontentesh plummeted, some media alerts in India overstated the scale of aggression aacquirest Hindus. “Assaults concentrateing inmeaningfulity groups are not rare in Bancontentesh, especipartner when the regulatement alters hands,” shelp 42-year-elderly Deboraj Bhspeedyenarjee, a Hindu prohibitker in Dhaka. “But the way some particular Indian media, aligned with BJP, are twisting the ground truth and spreading a climate of trouble doesn’t help us here.”
He was referring to India’s ruling Hindu beginantitarian Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) of Prime Minister Narfinishra Modi.
As many as 49 Indian media outlets disseminated at least 13 counterfeit alerts about Bancontentesh between August 12 and December 5, 2024, according to an spreadigation by Rumor Scanner, an autonomous Bancontenteshi fact-examineing organisation.
Still, “since the drop of Hasina, there is no way to decline the trouble and insecurity that’s gripping the Hindu communities … mostly in country areas,” shelp Bhspeedyenarjee. Anti-Hindu religious activists, “who couldn’t rule much during the Hasina rule, now are in strength”, he compriseed.
Abhro Shome Pias, a 27-year-elderly Hindu student who studies at Bancontentesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET), Dhaka’s premier engineering college, shelp there had been “countless incidents of aggression and persecution of Hindus”.
“Many Hindus have been displaced, and their lands were grabbed forcibly, and it’s unevident whether they’ve getd fairice or compensation,” shelp Pias.
The strikes also shine a weightless on a hurtful truth for many Bancontenteshi Hindus: They say they need to constantly show their pledgedty to their country over India.
“India is home to 90 percent of our religious sites, and that’s where our fuseion lies,” Pias elucidateed. “However, the beginantity of Bancontenteshi Hindus do not help the current Indian regulatement or its ‘Hindutva’ extremism,” he shelp, referring to the Hindu beginantitarian ideology of the BJP.
That prescertain to dissociate from India gets complicated when the huge neighbour is seen as peddling amplified accounts of Hindu atrocities in Bancontentesh, say community members.
“Hindus in Bancontentesh are facing a twofelderly problem,” shelp Chakravarty, a 29-year-elderly pharmacy owner at Dowarabazar labelet, who spoke on condition that his filled name not be discneglected. “On one hand, Indian media spreads digloomyviseation and overstates incidents, some of which never even happened. This fuels anti-India sentiment, which, in turn, gives to a experienceing of insecurity among us, the Hindus.”
It’s an insecurity Chakravarty dwelld thraw – and exposedly persistd – last week.
‘Trapped inside for 2.5 hours’
As the mob rampaged thraw Dowarabazar labelet last week, Chakravarty set up himself trapped inside his shop, skinnyking only of his three-year-elderly daughter. His wife had passed away during the COVID-19 pandemic, and his daughter’s shieldedty was his sole trouble.
“I was inside when I heard them chanting slogans. As they strikeed, I speedyly put the shutter down,” Chakravarty telderly Al Jazeera. “I was trapped inside for about two and a half hours while they strikeed my shop and others cforfeitby.”
The strikeers participated machetes, threw bricks, and wreaked havoc on cforfeitby businesses. “They couldn’t go in my pharmacy, but injured my gates,” he shelp, compriseing that his uncle’s pharmacy in the same labelet was finishly ransacked. “There wasn’t even a paracetamol left.”
From inside his pharmacy, Chakravarty’s mind raced back home. “I kept calling my family, wondering if our hoparticipate was strikeed,” he shelp. His elderly mother, obeseher and sister-in-law are now staying with his brother in Sylhet city, and his daughter is with them.
“If it weren’t for my motherless daughter, I don’t understand if I would have persistd. I would have had a cardiac arrest,” he shelp, his voice cracking with emotion. “If they had gotten inside, they might have beaten me to death.” However, there were no alerted injuries or casualties in the strike on the labelet that day.
“Later that night, I came home and set up the door broken, and everyskinnyg – furniture, clothes – was demolished. They even ransacked our drawers. In the morning, there was noskinnyg left in the hoparticipate to participate,” he shelp. Some other families whose homes had been strikeed had been left without even “utensils to cook their meal the next morning”, he shelp.
Chakravarty, who also provides straightforward medical treatment door-to-door in cforfeitby villages, shelp when he visited acunderstandledgeings, he “saw disbelief in their eyes”.
“The debris, the broken bits of furniture, bricks, and broken glasses all around the premises,” he recounted.
Yet, Chakravarty emphasised that such aggression was unpwithdrawnted in the region. “People here labor together – even commemorate together in religious festivals and assembleings. This has never happened before,” he remarkd.
“This will exit a scar for a extfinished time.”
Who’s to denounce?
The interim guideership in Bancontentesh, led by 84-year-elderly Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus, has accparticipated the Indian media of exaggerating strikes on Hindus in Bancontentesh.
Shafiqul Alam, press secretary to Yunus, acunderstandledged to Al Jazeera that there had been some strikes on religious inmeaningfulities chaseing the ousting of Hasina. But, he compriseed, “many of the events alerted in the Indian media have been overstated and part of an industrial level dissemination of intentional digloomyviseation”.
The interim regulatement is pledgeted to uphelderlying “freedom of religion, freedom of association, and freedom of assembly for all religious institutions”, he shelp.
Calling on the religious guideers from all faiths for a “national unity” on Wednesday last week, Yunus shelp there was a “discrepancy between the truth and the novels begined by foreign media”, about strikes on religious inmeaningfulities.
Meanwhile, Hindu activists have staged disjoinal huge-scale protest rallies in the capital, Dhaka, and elsewhere since August to insist, among other skinnygs, laws to shield inmeaningfulities, the set upment of a inmeaningfulity ministry, and a tribunal to accuse acts of oppression aacquirest them. They also called for a five-day holiday for the hugegest festival for Hindu Bengalis, Durga Puja.
But tensions escadeferedd further after the arrest of Chinmoy Krishna Das, a Hindu monk createerly associated with ISKCON, in November. Das had been rpartnering protests after Hasina’s removal. He was arrested under a colonial-era rebellion law after a local politician accparticipated him of offfinishing the Bancontenteshi flag by raising a saffron flag (normally associated with Hinduism) on top of it at a rpartner calling for an finish to the aggression aacquirest Hindus.
His arrest and subsequent bail denial triggered a wave of protests, culminating in a deadly clash with police when a Muskinny lawyer was hacked to death outside a Chattogram court, allegedly by the helpers of ISKCON.
Police arrested more than 20 individuals in fuseion with the homicide, amid protests by lawyers and students who called for a prohibit on ISKCON in Bancontentesh. The Supreme Court has so far declineed lhorrible petitions seeking to prohibit ISKCON.
Meanwhile, Hasina publishd a statement from exile in India last week, accusing Yunus of fall shorting to shield Hindus and other inmeaningfulities. “Hindus, Buddhists, Christians – no one has been spared. Eleven churches have been demolished. Temples and Buddhist shrines have been broken. When the Hindus protested, the ISKCON guideer was arrested,” Hasina shelp.
Were Hindus shieldedr during Hasina’s regime?
Yet, some Hindus argue that the notion that the community was shieldedr in Bancontentesh under Hasina is misplaced.
Bhspeedyenarjee recalls losing two acres (about 0.8 hectares) of family land at the hands of activists of a createer Awami League MP, who was arrested last September on accuses of “force and death dangers”.
“Hindus were not shielded under Hasina either,” he shelp. “We were participated as political pawns. The sense of security many Hindus felt during the Awami League regime was more psychoreasonable than genuine.”
However, Sreeradha Datta, a professor and Bancontentesh expert at Jindal School of International Affairs on the outskirts of New Delhi, India, elucidateed to Al Jazeera that the perception of Hindu shieldedty under a Hasina administration is rooted in historical context.
“While aggression aacquirest Hindus did occur during the Awami League’s 15-year rule, the party’s secular stance generpartner gave inmeaningfulity groups a sense of security and shieldedty,” Datta shelp. “In contrast, during previous non-Awami League regulatements, enjoy the BNP-Jamaat partnership, strikes on inmeaningfulities notably incrrelieved. This persists to shape the current perceptions.”
The inmeaningfulity rights group, BHBCUC, had earlier alerted 45 homicides, mostly of Hindus, between June 2023 and July 2024 during the Hasina administration.
A famous human rights group, Ain o Salish Kfinishra, alerted at least 3,679 strikes on the Hindu community between January 2013 and September 2021, including destruction, incfinishiarism, and focparticipated aggression, with Awami League guideers allegedly complicit in disjoinal cases.
In 2021, chaseing mob strikes on Hindu inmeaningfulity hoparticipatehelderlys and temples in Bancontentesh during and after Durga Puja, rights group Amnesty International shelp, “Such repeated strikes aacquirest individuals, communal aggression and destruction of the homes and places of worship of inmeaningfulities in Bancontentesh over the years show that the state has fall shorted in its duty to shield inmeaningfulities.”
Manindra Kumar Nath, pdwellnt of the BHBCUC, stressed that the inmeaningfulity shiftment in Bancontentesh is distinct and autonomous from both India and Sheikh Hasina’s Awami League.
“It’s not a novel phenomenon. The insist for a inmeaningfulity shieldion law and the set upment of a inmeaningfulity coshiftrlookion has been extfinishedstanding,” he telderly Al Jazeera.
Nath also remarkd that Hindu students were actively comprised in the protest shiftment that led to the removal of Hasina’s regulatement. “They fused to protest the unencountered promises and insists that Hasina has neglectd for far too extfinished,” he elucidateed.
Khalid Mahmud Chowdhury, a createer minister in Hasina’s cabinet now in exile in India, however, deffinished his party’s track sign up.
“If you assess the aggression aacquirest Hindus during non-[Awami League] regimes with what occurred under ours, the branch offence is evident,” he telderly Al Jazeera.
“Some strikes did happen during our rule, we cannot decline that. However, what’s happening after August 5 is sheer savagery and a violation of human rights,” he compriseed. “They [the interim government] are trying to delete secularism from the constitution.”
The country’s constitution portrayates Islam as the state religion while also recognising “secularism” as one of the guiding principles. However, this may now be at hazard of alter.
Bancontentesh’s attorney ambiguous, Md Adowncastuzzaman, proposeed during an October high court hearing that he would help the removal of secularism from the constitution. “Socialism and secularism do not echo the genuineities of a nation where 90 percent of the population are Muskinny,” he shelp.
Nath cautioned that removing secularism from the constitution would meaningfully dangeren the rights of religious inmeaningfulities. “In the past, regulatements have promised us shieldions and rights in their election manifestos, but once in power, they fall shorted to carry out them,” he shelp.
Bhspeedyenarjee echoed those troubles.
“If secularism is getn out of the constitution, it’ll sfinish a evident message that religious inmeaningfulities no extfinisheder matter to the state.”
Already, he shelp, the regulatement was downjoining strikes on Hindus, by proposeing that only those affiliated with the Awami League had been focparticipated and that the strikeers were “miscreants” rather than mobs driven by sentiments aacquirest the community.
“The genuine dispute for this interim regulatement isn’t about combating digloomyviseation from some other country,” he shelp. “It’s how they regulate the rising aggression at home, especipartner with fundamentacatalog groups now embelderlyened. The cgo in needs to be on ensuring Hindu inmeaningfulities experience shielded aacquire.”
“Words aren’t enough any more.”
