From passing off anti-Hindu pogroms in Bangladesh as “political revenge” and blaming India’s ‘Hindu nationalist government for the same to now blaming India for the devastating floods in Bangladesh, the Western media has been perpetually peddling false narratives against India in its reportage. On the 27th of August, the German public broadcaster DW News published a report on the Bangladesh floods which included a conversation with Farhana Sultana, a Bangladeshi professor at Syracuse University in New York.
Speaking to Deutsche Welle, Farhana Sultana blamed a “dam breach” in India alleging that due to this, a “lot of floodwater came in without any warning” which impacted thousands of people overnight in eastern Bangladesh. She further claimed that more riverine water entered Bangladesh as India opened more dams and barrages upstream. Although Sultana also mentioned heavy monsoon rains as a reason for the floods in Bangladesh, her main focus remained on somehow blaming India for causing artificial floods in Bangladesh as some sort of revenge for ousting Sheikh Hasina.
While DW, notorious for its anti-India bias, not confronting Farhana Sultana over her baseless allegations against India would have not been surprising, however, in this case, it is, since DW’s own report establishes that India did not cause artificial flooding in the neighbouring country.
In its fact-check report, Deutsche Welle (DW) debunked many social media posts, mostly by India-hating Bangladeshis that sharing visuals of water being released from Srisailam Dam in Telangana with the false claim that it was from Dumbur Dam causing flooding in downstream Bangladesh.
Notably, India has twice debunked the allegation that flash floods occurred in Bangladesh because India opened the dam in Tripura. The Indian government clarified that the gates were not opened as claimed by anti-India elements and foreign media, but the automatic release of water due to heavy rainfall was observed. DW News factchecked many such misleading videos posted on social media falsely blaming India for the flooding in Bangladesh. However, on one hand, DW News debunked false such claims, on the other, it platformed a person notorious for her anti-India opinions allowing her to make unsubstantiated claims distorting public opinion about the floods in Bangladesh and needlessly villainising India.
Farhana Sultana also heaped praises on the Mohammed Yunus-led interim government in Bangladesh for handling the crisis caused by the floods. Interestingly, Mohammad Nahid Islam, Bangladesh’s Information and Broadcasting Affairs adviser had also resorted to playing the blame game to cover up the failure of Bangladesh’s early warning systems and claimed that India opened a dam without issuing any prior warning leaving no scope for Bangladesh to prepare.
Indian government refuted false allegations against India over Bangladesh floods
On 22nd August, the Indian government issued an official statement clarifying that floods in Bangladesh have nothing to do with the opening of the Dumbur dam upstream of the Gumti River in Tripura. India rejected the allegations and described reports linking India with it as “factually incorrect”.
“We would like to point out that the catchment areas of Gumti River that flows through India and Bangladesh have witnessed heaviest rains of this year over the last few days. The flood in Bangladesh is primarily due to waters from these large catchments downstream of the dam. The Dumbur dam is located quite far from the border – over 120 Km upstream of Bangladesh. It is a low height (about 30m) dam that generates power that feeds into a grid and from which Bangladesh also draws 40MW power from Tripura. Along the about 120 Km river course we have three water level observation sites at Amarpur, Sonamura and Sonamura 2. Heavy rainfall has been continuing since 21 August in the whole of Tripura and adjoining districts of Bangladesh. In the event of heavy inflow, automatic releases have been observed,” the Indian Ministry of External Affairs said.
The MEA further informed that they were on time to time sending relevant data with Bangladesh. “Amarpur station is in part of a bilateral protocol under which we are transmitting realtime flood data to Bangladesh. Data showing rising trend has been supplied to Bangladesh upto 1500 hrs on 21 August 2024. At 1800 hrs, due to flooding, there was power outage leading to problems of communication. Still, we have tried to maintain communication through other means created for urgent transmission of data,” the MEA said.
Flood situation in Bangladesh not due to release of waters from Indian dam on Gumti River, Tripura:https://t.co/8hcnRkoBF1 pic.twitter.com/p5zY0LII7D
— Randhir Jaiswal (@MEAIndia) August 22, 2024
CNN peddled the anti-India narrative to villainise India
Earlier in the day, OpIndia reported how CNN tried to pass off the blame for the Bangladesh floods on India giving legitimacy to the sinister anti-India narrative being peddled by a significant section of Bangladeshis. CNN brazened it out suggesting that India should “apologise” to Bangladesh for inundating its neighbour.
“Bangladesh has the best early warning systems, but there was no warning in this case”, because of which the Bangladeshis are blaming their neighbour for the flooding. She went further to suggest that India should issue an apology to Bangladesh saying, “India denies this…There has been no apology from India..”, the CNN reporter said.
Farhana Sultana: Professor of geography or professor of peddling anti-India lies?
It is pertinent to mention that Farhana Sultana has been peddling anti-India propaganda regarding the floods in Bangladesh. In a long thread posted on X, loaded with disinformation and sheer disdain for India, Farhana Sultana accused India of using “water as a weapon” against India for many years. On one hand, Sultana accused India of using water as a weapon against India on the other, she accused India of backing Sheikh Hasina who ruled Bangladesh for 15 long years.
She lauded a post by Sultan Mohammed Zakaria, which contained misleading videos of Indian dams to claim that India released water from the Dumbur Dam causing floods in Bangladesh. Interestingly, this very post, which Sultana called a “spot-on analysis” was debunked by DW News.
Alongside hatred for India, Sultana harbours disdain for Hindus as well, as evident from her whitewashing of the Islamist crimes against Hindus in Bangladesh. While there have been more than 250 attacks on Hindus, their houses and temples, Farhana Sultana accused India of creating “false hysteria” of Hindus under attack in Bangladesh.
Just a few days back, as Hindus were being singled out, attacked, raped and looted in Bangladesh, Sultana accused Indians, ‘Hindutva fundamentalists’ and “MAGA” supporters of spreading lies about the anti-Hindu violence unleashed by Islamists.
Meet Farhana Sultana, Prof of Geography, Syracuse University. As a Bangladeshi Muslim she is white washing Islamist crimes against Hindus in BD. She calls Hindus "troll farms" and says Hindus are spreading disinformation and propaganda abt BD along with MAGA and Zionists. pic.twitter.com/dOPo2bSdwH
— Stop Hindu Hate Advocacy Network (SHHAN) (@HinduHate) August 20, 2024
Moreover, Syracuse University, wherein Farhana Sultana works as a professor of geography and environment had back in 2021 supported the sinister “Dismantling Global Hindutva”.
It is not surprising that DW News gave a platform to Sultana to further her anti-India narrative since the German public broadcaster itself was recently involved in downplaying the Islamist onslaught on Hindus in Bangladesh. OpIndia had reported how DW News recently published a video, whitewashing attacks on the Hindu community in the Islamic Republic by violent Muslim mobs and accused Indians of fuelling disinformation on social media.
