Hinduism in Bangladesh

Culture

In nature, Bangladeshi Hinduism closely resembles the forms and customs of Hinduism practiced in the neighboring Indian state of West Bengal, which Bangladesh (once known as East Bengal) was united with until the partition of India in 1947. The vast majority of Hindus in Bangladesh are Bengali Hindus. Goddess (Devi) – usually venerated as Durga or Kali – is widely revered, often alongside her consort Shiva. The worship of Shiva has generally found adherents among the higher castes in Bangladesh. Worship of Vishnu (typically in the form of his Avatars or incarnation Rama or Krishna) more explicitly cuts across caste lines by teaching the fundamental oneness of humankind in spirit. Vishnu worship in Bengal expresses the union of the male and female principles in a tradition of love and devotion. This form of Hindu belief and the Sufi tradition of Islam have influenced and interacted with each other in Bengal. Both were popular mystical movements emphasizing the personal relationship of religious leaders and disciples instead of the dry stereotypes of the Brahmins or the Ulama. As in Bengali Hindu practice, worship of Vishnu frequently occurs in a small devotional society (shomaj). Both use the language of earthly love to express communion with the divine. In both traditions, the Bengali language is the vehicle of a large corpus of mystical literature of great beauty and emotional impact. In Bangladeshi Hinduism, ritual bathing, vows, and pilgrimages to sacred rivers, mountains, and shrines are common practices. An ordinary Hindu will worship at the shrines of Muslim pirs, without being concerned with the religion to which that place is supposed to be affiliated. Hindus revere many holy men and ascetics conspicuous for their bodily mortifications. Durga Puja, held in September–October, is the most important festival of Bangladeshi Hindus and it is widely celebrated amongst Bangladeshi Hindus. Thousands of pandals (mandaps) are set up in various cities, towns, and villages to mark the festival. Other festivals are Kali Puja, Janmashtami, Holi, Saraswati Puja, Shivratri and Rathayatra, the most popular being the century-old Dhamrai Rathayatra. The principle of ahimsa is expressed in almost universally observed rules against eating beef. By no means are all Bangladeshi Hindus vegetarians, but abstinence from all kinds of meat is regarded as a "higher" virtue. The Priestly Caste Brahmin (pronounced Brahmon in Bengali) Bangladeshi Hindus, unlike their counterparts elsewhere in South Asia, eat fish and chicken. This is similar to the Indian state of West Bengal, where Hindus also consume fish, eggs, chicken, and mutton. There are also some vegetarians as well. There are also non-Bengali Hindus in Bangladesh; the majority of the Hajong, Rajbongshi people and Tripuris in Bangladesh are Hindus.

Hindu temples

Hindu temples and shrines are distributed across the country. The Kantaji Temple is an elegant example of an 18th-century temple. The most prominent temple is the Dhakeshwari National Temple, located in Dhaka. This temple, along with other Hindu organizations, arranges Durga Puja and Krishna Janmaashtami very prominently. The other main temples of Dhaka are the Ramakrishna Mission, Ramna Kali Temple, Joy Kali Temple, Laxmi Narayan Mandir, Swami Bagh Temple and Siddheswari Kalimandir.

Many Hindu temples have suffered from the implementation of the Vested Property Act through which land and movable property have been confiscated by agents acting on behalf of successive governments.

Hindu marriage law

Hindu family law governs the personal life of Hindus in Bangladesh. There is no known limit on the number of wives a Hindu man can take in Bangladesh, so polygamy for Hindu men is legal in Bangladesh.

"Under Bangladesh Hindu (civil) law, men may have multiple wives, but there are officially no options for divorce", the United States Department of State 2023 Report on International Religious Freedom: Bangladesh reported. Women are also prohibited from inheriting property under the civil laws for Hindus, the report said. A survey conducted during the year by Research Initiatives in Bangladesh and MJF showed that 26.7% of Hindu men and 29.2% of Hindu women would like to obtain a divorce but did not do so because of existing laws.

Persecution

Hindus and others have been regularly and systematically persecuted; the persecution has occurred during events which include the Bangladesh genocide, the Bangladesh Liberation War and numerous recurring massacres of civilians resulting in a continuous decline in the number of Hindus in Bangladesh due to this ethnic cleansing. According to Professor Ali Riaz, anti-Hindu sentiment in Bangladesh is linked with anti-India sentiment, which has led to accusations of dual loyalty among Bangladeshi Hindus by Islamists and right-wing nationalists.

Bangladesh Liberation War atrocities (1971)

The Bangladesh Liberation War resulted in one of the largest genocides of the 20th century. While estimates of the number of casualties were 200,000–3,000,000, it is reasonably certain that Hindus bore a disproportionate brunt of the Pakistan Army's onslaught against the Bengali population of what was East Pakistan. The Pakistani Army killed many Bengali Hindus during the Liberation War, and most of the Bengali Hindu-owned businesses were permanently destroyed. The historic Ramna Kali Temple in Dhaka and the century-old Rath at Dhamrai were demolished and burned down by the Pakistani Army.

Post-liberation period (1971 onwards)

Persecution of Hindus continued in independent Bangladesh. According to the report of the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) in 2018, Hindus are among those who are persecuted in Bangladesh, with hundreds of cases of "killings, attempted killings, death threats, assaults, rapes, kidnappings, and attacks on homes, businesses, and places of worship" against religious minorities in 2017. Hindu temples in Bangladesh have also been vandalised.

According to Dr. Abul Barkat, no Hindus will be left in Bangladesh 30 years from now if the current rate of "exodus" continues as on average 632 people from the minority community leave the Muslim-majority country each day. From 1964 to 2013, around 11.3 million Hindus left Bangladesh due to religious persecution and discrimination which means on average 632 Hindus left the country each day and 230,612 annually, he said at the book launch ceremony at Dhaka University (DU).

Sheikh Mujib era (1972–1975)

In the first constitution of the newly independent country, secularism and equality of all citizens irrespective of religious identity were enshrined. On his return to liberated Bangladesh, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman in his first speech to the nation, specifically recognized the disproportionate suffering of the Hindu population during the Bangladesh Liberation War. On a visit to Kolkata, India, in February 1972, Mujib visited the refugee camps that were still hosting several million Bangladeshi Hindus and appealed to them to return to Bangladesh and to help to rebuild the country.

Despite the public commitment of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and his government to re-establish secularism and the rights of non-Muslim religious groups, two significant aspects of his rule remain controversial as related to the conditions of Hindus in Bangladesh. The first was his refusal to return the premises of the Ramna Kali Mandir, historically the most important temple in Dhaka, to the religious body that owned the property. This centuries-old Hindu temple was demolished by the Pakistan Army during the Bangladesh Liberation War, and around one hundred devotees were murdered. Under the provisions of the Enemy Property Act, it was determined that ownership of the property could not be established as there were no surviving members to claim inherited rights, and the land was handed over to the Dhaka Club.

Secondly, state-authorized confiscation of Hindu-owned property under the provisions of the Enemy Property Act was rampant during Mujib's rule, and as per the research conducted by Abul Barkat of Dhaka University, the Awami League party of Sheikh Mujib was the largest beneficiary of Hindu property transfer in the past 35 years of Bangladeshi independence. This was enabled considerably because of the particular turmoil and displacement suffered by Bangladeshi Hindus, who bore the disproportionate brunt of the Pakistan Army's genocide, as well documented by international publications such as Time magazine and the New York Times, and by the declassified Hamoodur Rahman Commission report. This caused much bitterness among Bangladeshi Hindus, particularly given the public stance of the regime's commitment to secularism and communal harmony.

Zia and Ershad regimes (1975–1990)

President Ziaur Rahman abandoned the constitutional provision for secularism and began to introduce Islamic symbolism across all spheres of national life (such as official seals and the constitutional preamble). Zia brought back the multi-party system, thus allowing organizations such as Jamaat-e-Islami Bangladesh (an offshoot of the Islamist Jamaat-e-Islami in Pakistan) to regroup and contest elections. In 1988, President Hussein Mohammed Ershad declared Islam to be the State Religion of Bangladesh. Although the move was protested by students and left-leaning political parties and minority groups, to this date neither the regimes of the BNP nor Awami League have challenged this change, and it remains in place.

In 1990, the Ershad regime was widely blamed for negligence (and some human rights analyses allege active participation) in the anti-Hindu riots following the Babri Mosque incident in India, the largest communal disturbances since Bangladesh's independence, as a means of diverting attention from the rapidly increasing opposition to his rule. Many Hindu temples, Hindu neighbourhoods and shops were attacked and damaged including, for the first time since 1971, the Dhakeshwari temple. The atrocities were brought to the West's attention by many Bangladeshis, including Taslima Nasrin and her book Lajja, which, translated into English, means "shame".

Return to democracy (1991–2008)

Immediately after the Bangladesh Nationalist Party and its Islamic fundamentalist allies came to power in the October 2001 elections, ruling coalition activists attacked Hindus on a large scale in retribution for their perceived support of the opposition Awami League. Hundreds were killed, many were raped, and thousands fled to India. The events were widely seen as a repercussion against the razing of the Babri Mosque in India.

Prominent political leaders frequently fall back on "Hindu bashing" in an attempt to appeal to extremist sentiment and to stir up communal passions. In one of the most notorious utterances of a mainstream Bangladeshi figure, the immediate past Prime Minister Khaleda Zia, while the leader of the opposition in 1996, declared that the country was at risk of hearing "uludhhwani" (a Hindu custom involving women's ululation) from mosques, replacing the azan (Muslim call to prayer) (e.g., see Agence-France Press report of 18 November 1996, "Bangladesh opposition leader accused of hurting religious sentiment").

After the election of 2001, when a right-wing coalition including two Islamist parties (Jamaat-e-Islami Bangladesh and Islami Oikya Jote) led by the pro-Islamic right-wing Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) came to power, many minority Hindus and liberal secularist Muslims were attacked by a section of the governing regime. Thousands of Bangladeshi Hindus were believed to have fled to neighbouring India to escape the violence unleashed by activists sympathetic to the new government. Many Bangladeshi Muslims played an active role in documenting atrocities against Hindus during this period.

The new government also clamped down on attempts by the media to document alleged atrocities against non-Muslim minorities following the election. Severe pressure was put on newspapers and other media outside of government control through threats of violence and other intimidation. Most prominently, the Muslim journalist and human rights activist Shahriyar Kabir was arrested on charges of treason on his return from India, where he had been interviewing Hindu refugees from Bangladesh; this was by the Bangladesh High Court, and he was subsequently freed.

The fundamentalists and right-wing parties such as the BNP and Jatiya Party often portray Hindus as being sympathetic to India, and transferring economic resources to India, contributing to a widespread perception that Bangladeshi Hindus are disloyal to the state. Also, the right-wing parties claim that Hindus are backing the Awami League. As widely documented in international media, Bangladesh authorities have had to increase security to enable Bangladeshi Hindus to worship freely following widespread attacks on places of worship and devotees.

In October 2006, the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom published a report titled 'Policy Focus on Bangladesh,' which said that since its last election, 'Bangladesh has experienced growing violence by religious extremists, intensifying concerns expressed by the country's religious minorities'. The report further stated that Hindus are particularly vulnerable in a period of rising violence and extremism, whether motivated by religious, political or criminal factors, or some combination. The report noted that Hindus had multiple disadvantages against them in Bangladesh, such as perceptions of dual loyalty concerning India and religious beliefs that are not tolerated by the politically dominant Islamic Fundamentalists of the BNP. Violence against Hindus has taken place "in order to encourage them to flee in order to seize their property". The previous reports of the Hindu American Foundation were acknowledged and confirmed by this non-partisan report.

On 2 November 2006, USCIRF criticized Bangladesh for violence against minority Hindus. It also urged the Bush administration to get Dhaka to ensure the protection of religious freedom and minority rights before Bangladesh's next national elections in January 2007.

Sheikh Hasina era (2008–2024)

In 2013, the International Crimes Tribunal indicted several Jamaat members for war crimes against Hindus during the 1971 Bangladesh atrocities. In retaliation, violence against Hindu minorities in Bangladesh was instigated by the Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami.

BJHM (Bangladesh Jatiya Hindu Mahajote) claimed in its report that in 2017, at least 107 Hindus were killed and 31 fell victim to enforced disappearance. 782 Hindus were forced to leave the country or threatened into doing so, 23 were forced to convert to other religions, and at least 25 Hindu women and children were raped, while 235 temples and statues were vandalized. 6,474 atrocities were committed against the Hindu community in total.

During the 2019 Bangladesh elections, eight houses belonging to Hindu families caught fire in Thakurgaon alone. In April 2019, two idols of Hindu goddesses, Lakshmi and Saraswati, were vandalized by unidentified miscreants at a newly constructed temple in Kazipara of Brahmanbaria. In the same month, several idols of Hindu gods in two temples in Madaripur Sadar Upazila, which were under construction, were desecrated by miscreants.

In 2021, many temples and houses of Hindus were broken and vandalized after an attack on them on Narendra Modi visit to Bangladesh by Hefazat-e-Islam and other radical groups as anti-Modi protests. Similarly, there were attacks on Hindus in 2020, after some of them supported France after the Murder of Samuel Paty. In October of the same year, there was severe communal violence in Bangladesh against the Bengali Hindus after the video of Quran desecration at the Durga Puja pandals was spread, in which more than 120 Hindu temples were vandalized and 7 Hindus were killed. It was described by The New York Times as "worst communal violence in years".

Post-revolution Bangladesh (2024–present)

Following the July Revolution that overthrew the Hasina regime in August 2024, Hindu temples, businesses and homes were attacked by mobs upset that many Hindus in the country were seen as supporting the deposed Hasina's Awami League party, something that was alleged to have upset more conservative Islamist political groups. As of 8 August 2024, a school teacher was reported dead and 45 injured, with 45 out of the country's 64 districts having at least one attack on Hindu individuals or property. Protesters protected Hindu temples and communities from extremists. In 2025, Dipu Chandra Das, a 27-year-old Hindu garment worker, was captured by several of his Muslim colleagues for allegedly making derogatory remarks about the Prophet Muhammad. The accusations drew a violent mob that beat him to death, hung his body from a tree and set it on fire.

Political representation

Because Hindus in Bangladesh are scattered across all areas (except in Narayanganj), they cannot unite politically. However, Hindus became swing voters in various elections. Historically, Hindus have usually voted en masse for Bangladesh Awami League and communist parties, as these are the only parties that have a nominal commitment to secularism. This pattern, however, shifted in 2026. Due to the ban on Awami League, a significant number of Hindus preferred voting for the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (traditional rival of the Awami League), as the latter option, Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami, is known for anti-Hindu persecution, including during the 1971 Liberation War.

Even after the decline of the Hindu population in Bangladesh from 13.5% in 1974, just after independence, Hindus were at around 11.2% of the population in 2001 according to government estimates following the census. However, Hindus accounted for only thirty-two members of the 300 member parliament following the 2001 elections through direct election; this went up to thirty-five following a by-election victory in 2004. Of the 50 seats reserved for women that are directly nominated by the Prime Minister, only four were allotted to a Hindu. The political representation is not at all satisfactory, and several Hindu advocacy groups in Bangladesh have demanded a return to a communal electorate system as existed during the Pakistan period, to enable a more equitable and proportionate representation in parliament, or a reserved quota since the persecution of Hindus has continued since 1946.

Despite their dwindling population in terms of overall percentage, Hindus still yield considerable influence because of their geographical concentration in certain regions. They form a majority of the electorate in at least two parliamentary constituencies (Khulna-1 and Gopalganj-3) and account for more than 25% in at least another thirty. For this reason, they are often the deciding factor in parliamentary elections where victory margins can be extremely narrow. It is also frequently alleged that this is a prime reason for many Hindus being prevented from voting in elections, either through intimidating actual voters or through exclusion in voter list revisions.