One year after Sheikh Hasina’s sudden ouster from power on August 5, 2024, a grim reality has taken hold across Bangladesh—one that has placed the country's 13 million-strong Hindu population in a state of unprecedented fear and flight. 

In the political vacuum left behind, a wave of communal violence has surged across the country, exposing the depth of animosity now operating with institutional approval.

A new report jointly compiled by HinduVoice, a diaspora advocacy platform, in collaboration with local human rights defenders and minority rights activists, has revealed a chilling catalogue of abuses against the Hindu minority in Bangladesh.

Covering a period from August 2024 to July 2025, the report documents 26 major incidents where Hindu individuals—students, teachers, artisans, and daily-wage earners—have been falsely accused of blasphemy, brutally assaulted by mobs, arbitrarily detained, and in many instances, driven into exile.

The starkest revelation, in at least 14 of these 26 cases, attempts at mob lynching were made.

Khulna and Tangail districts emerged as epicentres of this violence.

In both places, minor Hindu boys were targeted after blasphemous content was posted from fake social media accounts bearing their names. Before facts could emerge, mobs had already formed, temples were desecrated, and homes were ransacked.

From targeted to exiled

The post-Hasina era has seen an alarming shift in both the nature and scale of communal attacks.

Where earlier violence was sporadic and state-enabled through selective application of law, the violence today carries the unmistakable hallmark of state sanction—or at least, deliberate state blindness.

Take the case of Rupam Saha, a 17-year-old student from Tangail, accused last October of posting anti-Islamic memes.

Within hours of the post appearing on Facebook—later proven to be created from a proxy server traced to an IP outside Bangladesh—Rupam’s school was surrounded by an angry crowd.

He was dragged out, beaten, and arrested by police for “hurting religious sentiments” under the Cyber Security Act (CSA). No action was taken against those who assaulted him.

His family fled to India weeks later, joining what local activists estimate to be hundreds of Hindu families forced to abandon their homes over the past year.

Digital framing as the new weapon

What’s particularly sinister about the recent wave of attacks is their digital genesis.

According to the HinduVoice report, digital framing—where fake or hacked social media accounts are used to post inflammatory content—has become a common tactic to incite mobs against Hindu individuals.

This tactic, now systematic, exploits the charged atmosphere of blasphemy-linked outrage and combines it with the legal machinery of the state.

In nearly every case, victims are not only attacked by mobs but are also later arrested and prosecuted under the very charges fabricated against them.

“Blasphemy has become the go-to weapon for social and political control in Bangladesh,” says a Dhaka-based human rights lawyer who contributed anonymously to the report. “It’s used not just to suppress dissent or religious minorities—it’s used to erase them.”

Mob justice, institutional complicity

In regions like Rangpur, Sunamganj, and Dinajpur, collective punishment has been documented in shocking detail.

Entire communities have faced coordinated attacks, leading to mass displacement.

The HinduVoice report reveals that at least 150 Hindu families were forced to flee their homes in these districts between September 2024 and March 2025.

Temples have not been spared.

In Dinajpur’s Chirirbandar upazila, the century-old Shree Shree Kali Mandir was set ablaze in January this year after rumours circulated about a local priest’s son liking a “blasphemous” post.

The post turned out to be a manipulated screenshot—but not before the temple, along with 12 Hindu houses in the vicinity, was destroyed.

Not a single arrest was made in connection with the arson.

Judiciary turned on its head

Perhaps the most disturbing element detailed in the report is the role of Bangladesh’s law enforcement and judicial apparatus.

In case after case, police and magistrates have either failed to investigate digital forgery or have simply taken the word of the mob at face value.

Arrests are made without forensic evidence, chargesheets filed without independent inquiry, and bail routinely denied.

Meanwhile, those who led attacks remain unnamed, uncharged, and in many cases, publicly celebrated.

This systemic inversion—where perpetrators are immune and victims are criminalised—has gutted any remaining faith in institutional justice.

No leadership, no safeguards

Since the departure of Sheikh Hasina, Bangladesh has been governed by an unelected interim authority whose mandate and legitimacy remain questionable.

While critics had often accused Hasina’s Awami League of stifling dissent and misusing digital security laws, the transitional administration appears to have relinquished all pretence of protecting minorities.

Many observers now point to a calculated rebalancing of power in favour of Islamist factions long sidelined under Hasina’s secularist rule.

This political recalibration, they argue, is being paid for by the blood and freedom of the country's most vulnerable citizens.

“It is not merely neglect,” says one minority rights activist based in Sylhet, speaking on condition of anonymity. “What we are seeing is complicity at every level—from police inaction to judicial bias. The message is clear: Hindus are no longer protected.”

The price of silence

Amidst this growing darkness, silence has become a coping mechanism.

Hindu teachers have stopped attending schools in districts like Naogaon. Artisans in Netrokona have reportedly changed their names to avoid suspicion. Daily-wage labourers have fled work sites in fear of violent reprisals.

The cost is not only spiritual or emotional—it is material. Displaced families have lost their lands, temples, and businesses.

The physical and economic erasure of Hindus is being matched by a digital cleansing—online hate speech, doctored content, and coordinated misinformation campaigns aimed at portraying the community as hostile or disrespectful to Islam.

What’s striking is the near-total absence of public condemnation from political leaders or media institutions.

A slow disappearance

What began as isolated incidents has metastasised into a pattern—a pattern of fear, expulsion, and disempowerment.

The use of fake digital content to spark real-world violence has blurred the lines between virtual manipulation and physical destruction.

One year after Sheikh Hasina’s exit, Bangladesh’s minorities, especially the Hindu community, stand at the edge of an existential crisis.

With every temple burned, every child jailed, and every family exiled, the very idea of religious coexistence is being rewritten—one fabricated Facebook post at a time.

And in this slow, systematic disappearance, the silence of the state echoes loudest.