Hindus protested on Tuesday in the Indian capital of New Delhi after a Hindu man was lynched and burned alive by a mob in Dhaka, the capital of Bangladesh.
Hundreds of demonstrators in New Delhi demanded justice for the slain man, and accused Bangladesh of not doing enough to protect its Hindu minority.
The protest was centered on the Bangladesh High Commission in New Delhi, which houses the Bangladeshi diplomatic mission to India. The protesters grew agitated and tried to force their way past security barriers erected by the police, who pushed them back with metal batons.
Similar protests were held in other Indian cities, including Hyderabad and Kolkata. The government of Bangladesh was alarmed enough by the demonstrations to summon the Indian ambassador on Tuesday and complain about inadequate security for Bangladeshi consulates in India.
Tensions between India and Bangladesh have been growing throughout 2025, as part of a regional realignment that saw Pakistan courting Bangladesh after turning against its former allies in Afghanistan. India then stepped in to befriend the Afghan Taliban regime.
The spark that could detonate the simmering powder keg of tension between India and Bangladesh was the assassination of Bangladeshi student leader Sharif Osman Hadi in Dhaka last week.
Hadi was a prominent leader of the student uprising that deposed Bangladesh’s Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in 2024. Hasina’s government was brought down by massive protests against an ethnic quota law for government jobs. After she was forced out of office, she fled to India, whose government she had always been on good terms with. The interim government that replaced her was much less favorably disposed toward India.
Hadi was also highly critical of India, and was planning to run for a seat in the parliament of Bangladesh next year. He was riding through the streets of Dhaka in a battery-powered rickshaw on December 12 when two or three gunmen riding a motorcycle pulled up alongside him and shot him in the head. He was taken to Singapore for emergency neurological treatment, but died in Singapore General Hospital on Thursday, December 18.
Hadi’s student protest organization, Inquilab Mancha (“Platform for Revolution”), announced his death with a Facebook post that read: “In the struggle against Indian hegemony, Allah has accepted the great revolutionary Osman Hadi as a martyr.”
As its name and statements would suggest, Inquilab Mancha is a radical Islamist organization whose agenda includes completely disbanding Sheikh Hasina’s party, the Awami League. Hadi has accused Awami League enforcers of hunting down and murdering leaders of the protest movement that drove Hasina from power, and his supporters believe that is exactly the fate that befell him.
Hadi’s funeral turned into a violent riot on Thursday, including attacks on Indian diplomatic facilities and accusations that India was harboring Hadi’s killers. The mob set about looking for someone to kill. They found their victim in Dipu Chandra Das, a young Hindu garment factory worker in the Bangladeshi city of Mymensingh.
According to Mymensingh police, a group of angry Muslims surrounded Dipu Chandra Das, accused him of making derogatory remarks about Islam’s Prophet Muhammad, beat him to a pulp, tied him to a tree, and set him on fire.
Tensions are running high in both Bangladesh and India after the murders of Hadi and Das.
Hasina’s successor as prime minister, Muhammad Yunus, vowed to bring Hadi’s killers to justice, but that promise was not good enough for Inquilab Mancha. The group issued an ultimatum at Hadi’s funeral on Sunday, threatening to bring down the Yunus government if the assassins were not quickly brought to justice.
On Tuesday, members of Inquilab Mancha swore an “oath of martyrdom” in Hadi’s name. While the surviving leaders of the group insisted Hadi “did not believe in violence,” and the group wished to remain true to his ideals, they issued some ominous threats at their event on Tuesday.
“We must remain prepared to continue the struggle. We will give blood again and again. If blood is needed to establish justice on the soil of Bengal, we will give it. And if blood must be taken, it will be taken. Blood cannot be repaid with civility,” said Inquilab Mancha “Member Secretary” Abdullah al-Jaber.
“Bullets were not fired, only aiming at Osman Hadi. They were fired at Bangladesh. Even if all of us are killed, if one person remains alive on this land, justice will be served,” he declared.
Al-Jaber said that if the Yunus government treats Inquilab Mancha as a threat, then “the government itself is an enemy of Bangladesh, and an enemy of justice.”
Meanwhile, India’s ruling party BJP – which rose to power on a platform of Hindu nationalism – condemned Bangladesh for not doing enough to protect its Hindus. The statement named some other Hindus who were killed before the brutal murder of Dipu Chandra Das.
Speaking from exile in India, Sheikh Hasina likewise blamed Yunus for destabilizing Bangladesh by empowering extremists and allowing minorities to be victimized. She also blasted Yunus for embracing Pakistan at the expense of relations with India.
“India sees the chaos, the persecution of minorities, and the erosion of everything we built together. When you cannot maintain basic order within your borders, your credibility on the international stage collapses. This is the reality of Yunus’ Bangladesh,” she said on Monday.
“The strain you are witnessing is entirely of Yunus’ making,” she said. “His government issues hostile statements against India, fails to protect religious minorities, and allows extremists to dictate foreign policy, then expresses surprise when tensions rise.”
“India has been Bangladesh’s most steadfast friend and partner for decades. The ties between our nations are deep and fundamental. They will outlast any temporary government,” she said.