A video of houses burned down to ashes was shared on social media with the claim that Islamists torched 19 Hindu households and abducted 7 Hindu girls in Madaripur, Bangladesh.
An X user posted the video, claiming: “During the night in Madaripur, Bangladesh, Islamist militants targeted 19 Hindu households with arson and kidnapped 7 Hindu girls.”
A Facebook page named Sanatan TV shared the video with a Bangla caption that translates to: “Miscreants set fire to 19 Hindu houses and abducted 7 Hindu girls in the dead of night in Madaripur.”
Sudhangshu Das, the Minister of Welfare of Scheduled Castes in Tripura, also posted the video on his Facebook with a similar claim.
Some posts making the claim can be found here, here, here, here, and here.
Fact-Check
Rumor Scanner found that the claim about 19 Hindu households being torched and 7 Hindu girls being abducted in Madaripur is false. The video shared with the claim is not from Madaripur but from an accidental fire in Shariatpur. Additionally, the affected households belong to Muslims, not Hindus.
While investigating we found the same video posted by Facebook user named Arafat Roman on February 14, 2025. “The post caption translates as : In Bepari Kandi village of Domshar Union, Shariatpur, a fire started from a kitchen and burned down 20 houses to ashes.”
The post states that the fire occurred in Shariatpur and suggests the cause was accidental. To verify this, we conducted a keyword search on Google and found several reports on the fire in Shariatpur that burned down 17 households.
A report from Dhaka Mail published on February 14 states: “A fire broke out in Domshar, Shariatpur Sadar Upazila, on February 14 due to a short circuit, burning down 17 houses. Locals managed to control the fire after an hour, but by then, 10 residential houses and 7 kitchens were completely burned to ashes.”
We found the names of two affected individuals in the reports—Razzak Bepari and Sujan Bepari—both of whom are Muslims.
We contacted Md. Shahin, a family member of the affected households, who confirmed that none of the victims were Hindu and that the information circulating on social media is false.
We also spoke with Nafis Elahi, Assistant Commissioner (Land) of Shariatpur Sadar Upazila, who told Rumor Scanner that the family members of the affected households were not at home during the incident. He confirmed that no one has made allegations of a planned attack, and the fire is initially believed to have been caused by an electrical fault.
The Chairman of Domshar Union Parishad, Md. Mujibur Rahman Khan, also confirmed to us that the information circulating on social media is a rumor.
Additionally, the same video had previously gone viral with the claim that Awami League activists’ houses were set on fire by BNP-Jamat, which was fact-checked as false by Rumor Scanner. We found no reports of recent fires in Hindu households in Madaripur, nor did we find any credible information about 7 Hindu girls being abducted. Our investigation revealed that the claim of 7 Hindu girls being abducted in Madaripur is fabricated and baseless.
Therefore, the claim that 19 Hindu households were torched and 7 Hindu girls were abducted in Madaripur, Bangladesh, is false.
Sources
- Facebook post
- News report on the incident
- Statements from the Union Chairman, affected individual, and local Assistant Commissioner (Land)
