Hindu freedom fighter and his wife brutally murdered in Bangladesh amidst ongoing rampant persecution of Hindus

Case ID : 45f505a | Location : Rangpur District, Bangladesh | Date of Incident : Sat, 6 December, 2025

Case ID : 45f505a

Rangpur District, Bangladesh

6 December, 2025

Hindu freedom fighter and his wife brutally murdered in Bangladesh amidst ongoing rampant persecution of Hindus

Attack resulting in death

Attacked for Hindu identity

Case Summary

In Taraganj, Rangpur, Bangladesh, Hindu freedom fighter Jogesh Chandra Roy, aged 75, and his wife, Suvarna Roy, aged 60, were brutally murdered by unknown attackers. The accused also slit the throats of the victims. Jogesh Chandra Roy was a respected teacher and former headmaster of a government primary school, and a recognised veteran (Muktijoddha) of Bangladesh’s 1971 Liberation War. He had retired in 2017. Locals described the couple as quiet and unassuming; there was no known history of disputes or conflict involving them. As per media reports, the police recovered the dead bodies of the Hindu couple from their home in the North Rahimpur area of the Kursha Union sub-district on 7th December 2025. When neighbours repeatedly called out to them, but the door remained unopened, they climbed the stairs to the house and opened it. Neighbours found Jogesh Chandra Roy's blood-soaked body in the dining room, while Suvarna Roy's body was found in the kitchen. Police arrived shortly thereafter and sent the bodies to a nearby hospital for post-mortem examination. Caretaker Deepak Chandra Roy stated that his family had cared for Jogesh Chandra Roy's home for the past 40 to 50 years. He had gone to work on the morning of 7th December 2025, as usual. When no one came out of the house by 7:00 a.m., he became suspicious. When he called out to them and received no response, he informed his neighbours. Reports confirmed that the deceased victims had two sons. The elder son, Shoven Chandra Roy, lived in Joypurhat, while the younger son, Rajesh Khanna Chandra Roy, worked in the police in Dhaka. The couple lived alone in their village home. Taraganj Police Station Sub-Inspector Abu Chaiyum stated that preliminary investigations indicated the couple was murdered by blows to the head. An investigation was underway to determine the motive behind the murder. This incident sparked outrage and fear within the local Hindu community and among minority-rights groups. It was seen as a sign of the rising vulnerability of minority communities. Some local leaders urged swift police action and demanded a transparent investigation, warning that failure to deliver could fuel mistrust and unrest. This case serves as a stark reminder of the growing Muslim extremism and anti-Hindu sentiments in Bangladesh, which have only increased manifold since the fall of Sheikh Hasina’s Awami League government on August 5, 2024. After her violent ouster, Bangladesh plunged into chaos as Islamist extremists took advantage of the political turmoil to unleash a wave of terror and violence against the Hindu community. The Islamist mobs have attacked Hindu homes, burned them to the ground, and abducted women in a horrific descent into anarchy. Several temples have been destroyed in various parts of the Islamic country in a major crackdown on Hindus. Reports have exposed how Muslim students forced around 60 Hindu teachers, professors, and government officials to resign. Exiled Bangladeshi activist Asad Noor has also revealed that the minority Hindu community is now being coerced into joining ‘Jamaat-e-Islami’. Hindu religious events have been repeatedly targeted. On 6th September, a procession carrying Lord Ganesha’s idol was attacked in Chittagong. Ahead of Durga Puja, multiple incidents of idol vandalism occurred, including attacks in Mymensingh, Pabna, Rajshahi, Kishoreganj, and Dhaka. On 29th November, a violent Muslim mob attacked three temples in Patharghata, Chittagong, immediately after Jumma Namaz. The crackdown on Hindu voices has also escalated. On 30th November, Hindu journalist Munni Saha was arrested in Dhaka. Muslim mob attacks have increased in Bangladesh, for example, on 22nd May 2025, a Muslim mob carried out arson attacks selectively on Hindu homes in Dahar Mashihati village in Abhaynagar upazila in Jessore district of Bangladesh. Even ISKCON leader Chinmoy Krishna Das Prabhu and his aides have been targeted, and attempts have been made to ban ISKCON and suppress Hindu protests through sedition charges. These arbitrary actions point to a systematic pattern of persecution under Muhammad Yunus’s interim government.

Why it is Hate Crime ?

This case has been added to the tracker under the primary category- Attack resulting in death. The subcategory selected is- Attacked for Hindu identity. In several cases, Hindus are attacked merely for their Hindu identity without any perceived provocation. A classic example of this category of religiously motivated hate crime is a murder in 2016. 7 ISIS terrorists were convicted for shooting a school principal in Kanpur because they got ‘triggered’ seeing the Kalava on his wrist and tilak that he had put. In this, the Hindu victim had offered no provocation except for his Hindu religious identity. The motivation for the murder was purely religious, driven by religious supremacy. Such cases where Hindus are targeted merely for their religious identity would be documented as a hate crime. Under this category, cases where the attack led to the death of the Hindu victim/s would be documented. In this case, while the available details do not explicitly indicate a religious motive, the broader context cannot be ignored. When there is an ongoing ethnic cleansing based on religious identity, every crime in and of itself is assumed to be motivated by the same religious animosity, even if there is a lack of a specific religious marker in the immediate crime. During an ongoing ethnic cleansing, the dehumanisation of people based on their religious identity and the normalisation of religious hostility drive the crimes committed against them, even when there is a lack of stated religious motive. For the purpose of documenting the 2024 ethnic cleansing of Hindus in Bangladesh, the Hinduphobia Tracker is assuming religious motivation ab initio. If a case is specifically and beyond a reasonable doubt proven to be driven by motivations other than religious hostility, it will post-facto be removed from the hate crime database. The brutal murder of Jogesh Chandra Roy, a 75-year-old Hindu freedom fighter and revered headmaster, and his wife, Suvarna Roy, in their Taraganj home stands as a stark instance of an anti-Hindu hate crime. The attackers singled out this quiet, unassuming couple—veterans of Bangladesh’s 1971 Liberation War with no history of disputes—and savagely slit their throats, leaving their blood-soaked bodies in the dining room and kitchen. The ferocity of the assault, with blows to the head and throats deliberately slashed, signals not random violence but targeted hostility rooted in their Hindu identity, evoking deep contempt and a chilling intent to terrorise the Hindu community. Amidst the escalating persecution of Hindus since Sheikh Hasina’s exile on 5th August 2024—including Islamist mob attacks and murders of Hindus across Bangladesh—this killing fits a grim pattern of religiously motivated offences designed to subordinate and instil fear in the Hindu minority. The symbolic brutality—throats slit in their own home—amplifies exclusion and dread, mirroring documented crackdowns that have left Hindu communities vulnerable. This convergence of the victims’ proud Hindu identity, the brutal manner of their killing, and the broader backdrop of Hinduphobia firmly qualifies the case as an anti-Hindu hate crime, warranting its inclusion in the Hinduphobia Tracker's hate crime database.