A Madrasa student in Bangladesh was arrested on Friday for vandalising three Hindu temples. After the arrest, he said that he targeted the temples because of rumours that the ongoing floods in Bangladesh were caused by water released by India.
18-year-old Rabbi Hossain was caught by locals while vandalising the third temple after smashing idols and other items in two temples and handed over to the police. The incident took place in temples of Pakuria and Kaligram areas of the Rajshahi Bagha Upazila on Friday morning. According to the locals, Rabbi Hossen broke the locks of Hindu temples at Pakuria Palpara, Ghoshpara and Kaligram areas in the Pakuria Union, and vandalised idols and other items in the temples. The name of the targeted temples are Kaligram Sarvajanin Durga Temple, Panikamara Temple and Pakuria Temple.
He was caught red-handed while vandalising the temple in Kaligram’s Pundaripara in Bagh municipality. Arun Sarkar, president of the temple committee, filed a complaint against Rabbi after he was handed over to police.
Upazila Puja Celebration Committee President Sujit Kumar Pandey immediately visited the three temples after receiving the news. Talking about the incident, he said that Rabbi Hossain has admitted that he attacked the temples after seeing the rumours of floods in the country caused by water released by India.
Pandey said, “he smashed the idol in one temple, and vandalised other items in the other two temple. He has admitted in front of the people present at the police station that he did it alone, and nobody was with him. When asked why he did it, Rabbi said that he saw on his sister’s phone that water has been released from India. Because of this, the people of Bangladesh are drowning in flood water. He couldn’t sleep all night watching this video. Unable to control his emotions, he went to break the temples alone.”
In this regard, Bagha Police Station Officer-in-Charge (OC) Abu Siddique said that a case has been registered in the name of Rabbi Hossain in the vandalism incident. Later he was sent to jail by a court. It is being investigated whether anyone else is involved with him or not.
Notably, while Bangladesh is facing floods, anti-India circles in the country had spread a rumour that the floods in Feni, Cumilla, and Noakhali districts caused by release of water from Dumbur Hydroelectric Project on Gumti river in Tripura. Students protests against India over the rumour.
But Indian govt had denied the claim, and explained that the dam is too far away to cause any flood in Bangladesh. MEA said that the floods were caused by heavy rainfall in Tripura and Bangladesh in the downstream areas of the dam.
Rajashi Bagha upazila, where the temples were vandalised by the Madrasa student, is located along the border with West Bengal, far away from the places where floods were claimed to have been caused by water released from Tripura.
