Bangladesh is writing a new definition of protest movements. It seems that protests and demonstrations also mean looting in India’s neighbouring country! Following the anti-reservation movement, former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina fled the country on August 5, 2024. After that, the public took over her official residence Ganabhaban and engaged in rampant looting. Along with furniture like chairs and tables, flower pots, and even Sheikh Hasina’s undergarments were looted!

After the death of Sharif Osman Hadi, the spokesperson of the ‘Inqilab Mancha’, the same scene seems to have been repeated in the protests! This time, along with a renowned media house’s computer monitors, anti-India Bangladeshi students and youth allegedly looted cabbages and cauliflowers as well from a vegetable shop!

After the death of Sharif Osman Hadi, a prominent figure of the July movement and spokesperson of the Inqilab Manch, a volatile situation arose again in Bangladesh on Thursday night. Attacks were carried out on Sheikh Mujibur Rahman’s house in Dhaka’s Dhanmondi, the Indian Embassy, Chhayanaut, and the Awami League office. The agitated crowd killed a journalist in Chittagong. A Hindu youth was also beaten to death. On the same night, offices of two national newspapers, ‘Prothom Alo’ and ‘The Daily Star’, were vandalized and set on fire. It was during this time that the public’s looting began.

A video has gone viral on social media (the authenticity of the video could not be verified). It shows the public vandalizing the office of Bangladesh’s leading English newspaper ‘The Daily Star’. Several people were seen looting monitors, computers, etc. The group of students and youth involved in the protest movement did not even spare cauliflowers and cabbages from a vegetable shop.

A young woman named Arifa Rahman Ruma has posted a video on Facebook. It shows monitors, computers, cauliflower, and cabbage being looted. The caption of the post reads, “What a wonderful sight! After the vandalism, Mahfuz Anam’s beloved Muhammad Yunus’s adopted sons are taking away various equipment from the Daily Star office.” When a journalist from Bangladesh questioned a young man involved in the looting, he replied—”All these are public property.” The journalist did not pursue the matter further.

Sharif Osman Hadi’s death triggers violent protests in Dhaka

Six days after being shot during an election campaign, Sharif Osman Hadi, a key leader of the mass movement against former prime minister Sheikh Hasina, died at a hospital in Singapore on Thursday. His death sparked widespread protests in the capital, which later escalated into attacks on major newspaper offices.

Hadi was contesting the February 12 general election from the Dhaka-8 constituency as an independent candidate.

Newspaper offices targeted

The protests later turned violent, with groups of demonstrators attacking media houses in the capital. The office of leading Bengali daily Prothom Alo in Karwan Bazar, near Shahbagh, was vandalised late Thursday night.

According to reports, protesters damaged several floors of the building, trapping journalists and staff inside, and set fire to the front portion of the office. An eyewitness said hundreds of protesters arrived around 11 pm and surrounded the premises.

The motive behind the attack remains unclear, particularly as Prothom Alo is widely regarded as having tacitly supported Yunus and the interim government. A separate group of protesters also attacked the office building of The Daily Star, Bangladesh’s largest English-language daily.

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