Hindu man killed and his brother abducted over petty fight by Muslims in Bangladesh

Case ID : 90a0827 | Location : Chittagong Division, Bangladesh | Date of Incident : Tue, 18 February, 2025

Case ID : 90a0827

Chittagong Division, Bangladesh

18 February, 2025

Hindu man killed and his brother abducted over petty fight by Muslims in Bangladesh

Attack resulting in death

Attacked for Hindu identity

Case Summary

A Hindu man named Ram Das was killed by Muslims in Bangladesh's Barbakund area. After killing him, his body was thrown into the sea, and his brother Gaur Das was kidnapped by Muslims. A video of the incident was posted by an X handle named 'AngrySaffron'. In the video, covered by Bangladesh's local news channel Tapoban TV, the victim's mother and sister narrated what transpired. The mother and sister of the victims cried as they stated how a minor dispute between some Muslims and the two brothers turned violent and within no time the Muslims took a huge branch of a tree and hit Ram on his head, which led to his death. They then discarded his in the sea. The family rushed to save Gaur, but the Muslims kidnapped him and took him away along with them. The victim's mother and sister cried and begged for someone to save Gaur Das. This incident serves as a stark reminder of the increasing vulnerability faced by Hindu minorities amidst rising hostility in the Islamic state of Bangladesh since the fall of Sheikh Hasina’s Awami League government on August 5, 2024. Since Sheikh Hasina's ouster, Bangladesh has plunged into chaos as Islamist extremists have taken 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. Further, the arrest of three Hindu priests, attempts to ban the Hindu organisation ISKCON and stifling Hindu protests with cases of ‘sedition’ highlight systematic persecution under the interim government of Muhammad Yunus. There have been multiple instances of attacks on Hindus under the pretext of ‘blasphemy.’ The recent cases of Hridoy Pal, Utsab Mandal, Partha Biswas Pintu, Akash Das, Pranta Talukder and Utsab Kumar Gian are shining examples of targeted persecution. So far, there have been many attempts to downplay violence against Hindus as ‘fake‘, ‘exaggerated‘ or ‘politically motivated‘.

Why it is Hate Crime ?

The case has been added to the tracker under the prime category of- Attack resulting in death and within this, the sub-category 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. Here, Islamists brutally murdered a Hindu man and abducted another over a minor dispute. 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 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 drives 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 reasonable doubt proven to be driven by motivations other than religious hostility, it will post-facto be removed from the hate crime database.