Rab detains Badrunnessa College teacher for questioning for ‘communal violence disinformation’

Rapid Action Battalion detained a teacher of Begum Badrunnessa Government Girls College for interrogation on charge of spreading on social media an old video footage of a murder in Dhaka’s Pallabi as the killing of Jatan Kumar Saha during recent communal violence in Noakhali.
Ruma Sarker, an assistant professor of the college, has been taken to Rab Headquarters for quizzing,
Jatan, a Durga Puja organiser, was beaten to death by religious fanatics last Friday amid a spate of attacks on Hindu homes, businesses and places of worship, leaders of the Hindu community said. Noakhali police said Jatan died of a “heart attack”.
RAB disclosed Ruma’s detention in a statement on Wednesday but did not mention when or where she was detained.
Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan said at an event at the RAB Headquarters on Tuesday that the authorities were aware of a disinformation campaign over the death of Jatan.
Lt Col Mashiur Rahman, chief of RAB’s intelligence wing, said the video clip of Shahin’s hacking death was uploaded as Shah’s killing from India’s Kolkata.
The post was uploaded from a profile named ‘Debadrita Bhowmik’ on Facebook before another person spread it on other platforms.
Mashiur said a group is intentionally spreading such misinformation to tarnish the image of Bangladesh.
RAB said cyber and intelligence surveillance is active to gather information of those “bent on spoiling communal harmony” and involved in spreading “provocative and misleading content”.



