WHILST some attacks on the Hindus, many actively involved with the Awami League, and their establishments have, indeed, taken place in some areas soon after the downfall of the authoritarian rule of Sheikh Hasina, they have now been contained. The Muslims along with the Hindus immediately started guarding the Hindus and their establishments in many areas. Besides, the attacks that took place in the political vacuum from August 5 until the installation of the interim government on August 8 and the absence of police deployment for a couple of more days are hardly sectarian. They are, rather, political; and some Awami League people, both Muslim and Hindu, and their establishments are reported to have been attacked by their political opponents 鈥� repressed, harassed and tortured for years 鈥� and, obviously, some opportunists. Immediately after the initial attacks, the Muslims have guarded, especially overnight, the places of worship of the minorities, religious and otherwise. Most of the people are well aware of the rights of minorities. But frenzied campaigns by many Indian media outlets and some sections in Bangladesh that religious minorities are indiscriminately killed, attacked and harassed in a show of sectarianism in Bangladesh is bad.
Many, perhaps most, of the news items and video clips on attacks on the Hindus are, keeping to fact-checkers, forged or fake meant to destablise the situation in Bangladesh. Two people are reported to have exploded handmade bombs at the gate of Sri Sri Radhagobinda Temple at Sirajdikhan in Munshiganj about 11:00pm on August 9. The one captured admitted to having done the job as ordered by the union unit Awami League鈥檚 general secretary although the Awami League leader brushed it aside the allegation. In another incident, the police on July 24 arrested a leader of the Baizid Bostami unit of the Sramik League, along with another, at Hathazari in Chattogram, when the mayhem born out of the student protests for reforms in civil service job reservations was in the thick of it, on charges of setting fire to a bus of the Road Transport Corporation. This is an example of the Awami League鈥檚 involvement in, at least, some incidents. In yet another incident, an eight-second video clip 鈥� which first came up on August 8 on an X account attributed to a Hindu group, shows a group of people seemingly carrying a girl by the hand and leg into a microbus allegedly at Senbag in Noakhali. The video surfaced on an Instagram account the next day and on a web site called Sanatan Prabhat, which aims at establishing 鈥榯he Hindu rashtra鈥� the day after. The incident is portrayed as the abduction of a Hindu girl by the Muslims with no authenticity whatsoever.
The government, society and Hindu leaders know that the Muslims in their thousands have guarded the Hindus and their establishments to ensure the rights of the Hindus as citizens. The government has already said that it would hold all attackers on the Hindus to justice. The sections of Hindutvadadi media in India and some sections in Bangladesh must, therefore, stop playing the Hindu minority card and stay off the game of disinformation even in the genuine interests of the minority communities.