At least 25 houses and four temples of Hindus were attacked and 11 houses set on fire by a group of agitated people at Bongram village of Santhia upazila in Pabna on Saturday following a rumour that a Hindu boy posted something on Facebook maligning Prophet Muhammad (SM).
Locals and the police said that the attacks were carried out in the morning following the rumour was spread by a group of people mostly youths and continued for several hours.
The superintendent of police in Pabna, Miraj Uddin Ahmed, could not confirm whether the posting existed on the social media website, Facebook.
He, however, told New Age, ‘We are investigating to find any such posting on the boy’s wall.’
He claimed that the situation was now under control after daylong ‘trouble’ as additional law enforcers were deployed in the affected area.
Witnesses said that some people at the local bazaar showed a computer printout of the image of a Facebook group that allegedly demeaned Islam and the Prophet.
Being instigated, the locals attacked at the house of Rajib Saha, a class-X student of Miapur High School, who allegedly wrote something on his Facebook wall.
As the attackers did not find Rajib, they picked up his father Babul Saha, tied him and beat him up at the village market at about 11:00am and finally set their house on fire.
They also attacked properties of Hindu community including shops and looted their valuables, the witnesses said.
At least 11 houses at houses at the ‘Hindu-majority village’ were set on fire during the attacks, the witnesses said.
Fire engines rushed the village, but the attackers obstructed them from dousing the fire, said the witnesses.
The agitated people also attacked houses of about 15 families, leaving over a hundred people affected.
The hoodlumism continued for about six hours while most of the police were seen busy in protocol for visiting state minister for home, Shamsul Haque Tuku, also the local lawmaker.
The attackers clashed with the police and Rapid Action Battalion and the clashes continued in phases till evening. The police later rescued Babul but his son remained missing.
Babul Saha at Ataikula Police Station, however, claimed that his son was innocent and could not write any content derogatory to Prophet Mohammad.
Shamsul Haque laid foundation stone at Dakhil madrassah at Ponduriya some ten kilometres off the affected area.
The attackers put blockade on the Dhaka-Pabna highway putting tree-log, suspending traffic till evening.
The state minister, however, visited the affected area in the evening. He could not be reached till 10:15pm for comment.
The witnesses said several hundred families of Hindu community were passing their time with anxiety.
The local administration in a announcement on public announcement system urged the people to be calmed assuring them of investigation into the matters.
Pabna deputy commissioner Kazi Ashraf Uddin said that a probe committee headed by additional district magistrate Munshi Mohammed Moniruzzaman would be instituted today to investigate the violence.
Rice and corrugated-iron sheet were distributed among the affected families, said Ashraf.
Ataikula police officer-in-charge Rezaul Karim said that two cases — one for the rumour and another for the violence — were being filed.
Similar incident violence took place on September 29, 2012 when attackers ransacked, looted and burnt 12 Buddhist temples at Ramu in Cox’s Bazar. They had also looted 50 houses and set 15 of them in Buddhist villages on fire.
The attacks were apparently triggered by a fake Facebook posting of an anti-Islam photograph tagged to a fake account of a Buddhist youth on the social networking site. (source)