Hindu farmer's field targeted and burnt by Muslims in Bangladesh amidst ongoing religious persecution of Hindus

Case ID : 8da1998 | Location : Chittagong District, Bangladesh | Date of Incident : Thu, 13 November, 2025

Case ID : 8da1998

Chittagong District, Bangladesh

13 November, 2025

Hindu farmer's field targeted and burnt by Muslims in Bangladesh amidst ongoing religious persecution of Hindus

Attack not resulting in death

Attacked for Hindu identity

Case Summary

In the Mahanagar village of Harualchhari Union in Fatikchhari Upazila of Chittagong (Chhattogram) district, Bangladesh, the paddy field of a Hindu farmer was targeted and burnt down by a group of Muslims. According to local sources, the incident occurred at around 3 a.m. on 14th November 2025, when a group of Muslims intentionally set the field ablaze. By the time local residents noticed the flames and rushed to the spot, the fire had already engulfed the entire field, reducing the nearly ripe paddy crop to ashes. The affected Hindu family, who depended entirely on the land for their livelihood, was left without any source of income. Family members said that the paddy harvest had been their only financial support for the year, and its destruction had pushed them into a state of extreme uncertainty. The farmer was devastated by the loss. She said: “We are poor people. This land and these crops were all we had. Now everything has turned to ashes. We don’t know how we will survive.” Local residents stated that attacks on Hindu minority families in the area were not new. However, the absence of timely justice and effective legal action had emboldened the perpetrators, leading to repeated acts of violence. Despite the family filing a formal complaint with the authorities, no arrests had been made so far, and no concrete measures had been taken to ensure their safety. The incident triggered outrage among minority-rights groups, who demanded an immediate investigation, the arrest of those responsible, and adequate compensation for the affected family. This case serves as a stark reminder of the continued persecution of Hindus in Bangladesh, which has 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 not 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. In this case, while the available details do not explicitly indicate a religious motive behind the crime, 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. Since the political exile of Sheikh Hasina on 5th August 2024, the persecution of Hindus in Bangladesh has intensified to an alarming level. In her absence, radical Islamist groups descended onto the streets, unleashing a violent rampage against the Hindu population. Hindus were attacked and killed for their religious identity; their homes, shops, and temples were attacked and desecrated; and countless Hindu women were abducted, raped, and forcibly converted to Islam. Even Hindu men and young children have not been spared. What is unfolding in Bangladesh is an ongoing campaign of ethnic cleansing — an attempt to systematically erase the Hindu community from its ancestral land. Amidst the heightened environment of terror in Bangladesh, the selective targeting and arson of a Hindu farmer’s paddy field by Muslim extremists cannot be dismissed as an isolated or random act of aggression. This incident was a deliberate act of religious persecution embedded within a broader atmosphere of terror aimed specifically at Hindus in the country. The farmer’s field was targeted fundamentally because of her religious identity as a Hindu, reflecting a calculated and intentional attempt to harass and intimidate the Hindu minority community. Such attacks are clear manifestations of deeply entrenched religious animosity, aimed at asserting Islamic supremacy in Bangladesh by instilling fear, powerlessness, and a shared sense of humiliation among Hindus. These acts are not mere personal disputes or isolated conflicts; they are strategic tools wielded by extremist elements to assert dominance over the Hindu population. They constitute unequivocal hate crimes motivated by religious hatred, designed to enforce communal subjugation and marginalisation of Hindus. Given that this incident incontrovertibly meets the parameters of a religiously motivated crime, it has been added to the hate crime database of the Hinduphobia Tracker.