Footage of Bangladesh student clashes falsely shared as Hindu killing
- Published on February 3, 2025 at 06:26
- 3 min read
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"At Sheikh Mujibur Rahman College, Dhaka, Bangladesh. Hindu students were identified, segregated and killed," read an X post that shared the video on December 8.
Hindus make up about eight percent of the mainly Muslim nation of 170 million people.
Student hospital death
A reverse image search of the video on Google found a longer version posted on YouTube by Bangladeshi newspaper Daily Jugantor on November 25.
The video is titled: "Clashes between Kabi Nazrul and Suhrawardy College students with Mahbubur Rahman Mollah College".
Bangladesh's Kalbela newspaper broadcast a livestream of the clashes on November 25, in which a journalist explains that Mollah College students began attacking students who descended on their campus from Kabi Nazrul and Shaheed Suhrawardy Colleges (archived link).
The incident was the latest in a spate of violence that spilled over from protests following the death of a Mollah College student in hospital due to alleged negligence, Bangladesh's Daily Star and Prothom Alo newspapers reported (archived here and here).
Below is a comparison of the footage shared on social media posts (left) and Kalbela's video (right), with similarities highlighted by AFP:
Around 100 people were injured in the November 25 clashes -- while police denied online rumours that two people were killed, according to the Daily Star.
"Students from two colleges attacked our campus, leaving 25 students injured from my college," Mollah College principal Md Obaidullah Nayan told AFP on January 23.
"There were no Hindu students among the injured and it was not an attack targeting Hindu students."
Police spokesman Faruk Ahammad, officer-in-charge of Jatrabari station, also said the fighting had "no connection with communal violence".
A hospital spokesman confirmed the death of the Mollah College student was not related to religious tensions in Bangladesh.
"Dhaka National Medical College Institute Hospital authorities have investigated the death of the student and found no link with communal conflict," Dr Md Rezaul Haque, the hospital's deputy-director told AFP on February 2.
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