Video of rape-accused lynched in Bangladesh shared with claims that Hindu boy beaten & killed in Bengal

Trigger Warning: The story has visuals of graphic violence. Readers’ discretion advised. 

A 90-second-long video of a boy brutally lynched by a mob is doing the rounds on social media. In the clip, the person, already bleeding, is kicked and thrashed with sticks until he collapses. Alt News has only used a screenshot of the posts with the videos owing to their graphic nature.

On April 19, X user @AstroCounselKK shared the video with a Hindi caption claiming that the incident happened in West Bengal. The social media user also alleged that the boy, a Hindu, was lynched and killed by ‘Jihadis’ or Muslim fundamentalists following protests over the Waqf (Amendment) Act. Readers must note that after the passage of the Waqf (Amendment) Act, protests had erupted in several parts of the country. In Bengal’s Murshidabad, these had turned violent. At least three people had died, several others, including police personnel, were injured, and vehicles and property vandalised. 

At the time of this article being written, the post has garnered nearly 13,000 views and has been reshared close to 300 times.  (Archive) 

Another X user, @PraharajDebasis, also shared the video, adding that the kid was six years old. (Archive)

Some on social media, such as Facebook user Pradeepa Gowda, have also alleged that the lynched boy, a 10-year-old, was a Dalit, who was beaten up by a Muslim mob. Gowda’s Facebook post (screenshot below) was shared around 1,200 times at the time of this article being written.

Alt News also received several requests on its WhatsApp helpline (+91 7600011160) to verify the authenticity of these claims.

Fact Check

A relevant keyword search in Bengali led us to a Facebook video, posted on March 19. The caption of the video, when translated into English, says that a youth had raped six-year-old child in the Khilket region of Bangladesh. However, while he was taken to the police station, people took matters into their own hands and thrashed him brutally, eventually resulting in his death, it read.

After carefully examining this video, we were able to conclude that it depicts the same instance of mob violence from a different angle. In both these videos, the victim can be seen wearing identical clothing.

We then searched for local news reports from around that time with relevant keywords, and came across one by a Bangladesh-based publication, The Business Standard. According to this report, a 17-year-old boy, accused of raping a five-year-old child, was critically injured in a mob attack in Dhaka’s Khilkhet area on the night of 18 March. According to police, the suspect was taken into custody but was forcibly taken from the police vehicle and assaulted by a crowd. The mob also vandalised the police vehicle in front of Mannan Plaza, in the Khilket area, despite attempts by officers to control the situation.

We then tried a keyword search in Bengali and found a news report by Samay News, a news outlet from Bangladesh. It said that the youth, accused of rape, was apprehended by the mob, resulting in a situation of chaos in which police officers were also injured.

Another keyword search in Bengali led us to a March 19 news report by ‘Kaaler Kontho,’ a Bangladesh-based news outlet, which identified the youth as Rabiul Hasan.

Other Bangladeshi news outlets, including Dhaka Tribune, Prothom Alo and The Daily Star, also reported on the incident. All of these outlets also clarified that the lynched youth was alive and under treatment owing to critical injuries.

Click to view slideshow.

Alt News also came across a news segment on the YouTube channel of DBC News Live, a Bangladeshi TV news channel, which was uploaded on March 19. It shows the victim of the assault, under treatment at the Dhaka Medical College Hospital.

To sum up, a video from March from the Khilkhet area in Bangladesh showing a boy, accused of raping a child, being beaten up by a mob is being shared on social media with claims that it depicts the mob lynching of a Hindu teenager in West Bengal. Some users also claimed that a Muslim mob was thrashing a Dalit youth. In reality, the person, identified as Rabiul Hasan, is from Bangladesh and the lynching was over rape accusations. The viral allegations are misleading and baseless.

The post Video of rape-accused lynched in Bangladesh shared with claims that Hindu boy beaten & killed in Bengal appeared first on Alt News.

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