Hindu woman brutally attacked by Muslim men in Bangladesh amidst ongoing persecution of Hindus

Case ID : 9958035 | Location : Dinajpur District, Bangladesh | Date of Incident : Tue, 22 July, 2025

Case ID : 9958035

Dinajpur District, Bangladesh

22 July, 2025

Hindu woman brutally attacked by Muslim men in Bangladesh amidst ongoing persecution of Hindus

Attack not resulting in death

Attacked for Hindu identity

Case Summary

In the Bochaganj upazila, located in the Dinajpur district of Bangladesh, a 44-year-old Hindu woman was brutally attacked by a group of Muslim men. The perpetrators were armed with weapons and sticks, and the victim was targeted for refusing to accompany them. The victim was identified as Nila Rani, and the accused were identified as Babul Rahman, Tariqul Rahman, Shariful Islam, and Munna. According to media reports, the incident took place at around 6 pm when Nila was returning home from her agricultural land. She was confronted by the Muslim perpetrators, with whom she had previously had a dispute. They held her hand and demanded she come with them. When she refused to comply, they launched a violent attack on her with weapons and sticks. A disturbing video of the assault appeared on social media, showing Nila Rani lying on the ground in a bloodied state. In the video, one of the Muslim attackers could be seen wielding a dao, a sharp weapon. Following this, the locals rescued the victim and rushed her to the Bochaganj Upazila Health Complex, where she was admitted and received treatment. Nila Rani reported, “They pulled me by my hand. When I refused to go with them, they called in more people. We had previously had a fight. They hit me on the head with sticks. My son was also injured.” Following the incident, Nila’s family decided to file a complaint with the police. This incident is one of the several incidents 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 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. 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 of Hindus 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. Within this, 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. The removal of Sheikh Hasina from power in Bangladesh on August 5, 2024, escalated the persecution and marginalisation of the Hindu minority in the predominantly Islamic nation, intensifying what can be described as a silent genocide. Since her exile, Muslim radicals have carried out unchecked atrocities against Hindus, including physical violence, the destruction of temples and religious symbols, and the systematic displacement of Hindus from their ancestral lands. Hundreds of attacks on Hindu temples, shops, and businesses have been recorded following Sheikh Hasina's removal as Prime Minister. Many Hindus have been brutally murdered or injured in these assaults. Amidst this, reports emerged of a Hindu woman and her son being brutally beaten by a group of Muslim men. The woman was beaten for refusing to go with the Muslim accused. In this incident, a Hindu woman was subjected to a brutal attack by a group of Muslim men simply because she refused to go with them. For this, she was assaulted with sharp weapons and sticks. The Hindu victim was beaten so severely that she had to be hospitalised. The sheer brutality and disproportionate violence inflicted by the Muslim attackers indicate that this was not just an isolated act, but one with clear communal undertones and motivations, particularly in the wider context of ongoing persecution of Hindus in Bangladesh. Such acts of cruelty are perpetrated by the Muslims as they harbour deep-rooted religious hostility towards Hindus and their faith. Such actions make this case a clear example of a religiously motivated hate crime. These actions are a result of indoctrination by the Islamic theology, which supports and promotes the subjugation of non-Muslims, in this case, Hindus, as a virtuous act. In this case, while the available details do not explicitly indicate a religious motive, the broader context of systematic persecution and subjugation of the Hindu minority at the hands of the Muslim majority in Bangladesh 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 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.