Women at security risk amid mob violence and online attacks

Last year, BM Fahmida Alam contested for the post of secretary for liberation war and democratic movements from the ‘Aparajeyo 71- Oddommo 24’ panel in the Dhaka University Central Students’ Union (DUCSU) election.

During the campaign, she was subjected to online attacks. She received threats of ‘gang rape’ and faced abusive remarks such as being labelled “Shahbagi”, “foul-smelling”, and “someone who does not bathe”.

A report published by Dismislab on 17 October last year said that among five high-profile female candidates in the DUCSU election, Fahmida Alam faced the highest level of online hate and harassment.

Speaking to Prothom Alo on 3 January, Fahmida Alam said extremist and reactionary groups use sexually abusive comments online to demoralise outspoken women. During the election, the level of hate and harassment from ideologically opposed groups was so intense that her family became concerned about her safety. Many people even advised her to quit politics.

In 2025, not just politically active women but also cultural activists, female athletes, entrepreneurs and students were not spared from online violence.

Earlier last year, on 4 February, 23-year-old women’s football team member Matsushima Sumaiya said on her verified Facebook page that she had received rape and death threats.

Violence against women and children was also alarming in real life, beyond the virtual sphere. After the interim government published the recommendations of the Women’s Affairs Reform Commission, a group objected to some of the proposals and launched attacks and abusive comments targeting the chair and members of the commission.

Towards the end of the year, a teacher at Rajshahi University made derogatory remarks about Begum Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain, a pioneer of women’s awakening in Bengal.

In addition there was also an increase in incidents of rape and sexual abuse inside homes and sexual harassment on buses.

According to police headquarters data, in the first 11 months of 2025, cases filed over violence against women and children rose by 18 per cent compared with the whole of 2024. Looking at the past four years, last year recorded the highest number of cases within an 11-month period.

Dismislab conducted research on online attacks against female candidates of DUCSU election, examining the nature of attacks on five women candidates.

The candidates were: Umama Fatema, vice-president candidate of the Swatantra Shikkharthi Oikko panel; Sheikh Tasnim Afroze Imi, vice-president candidate of the left-leaning Protirodh Porshod panel; Fatima Tasnim Juma, candidate for the post of secretary for liberation war and democratic movements from the Islami Chhatra Shibir-backed Oikkoboddho Shikkharthi Jote panel; BM Fahmida Alam from the leftist Aparajeyo 71-Oddommo 24 alliance; and Hema Chakma, member candidate of the Protirodh Porshod panel.

The report found that 22 per cent (110) of the 500 collected posts contained hateful and harassing content. Of the 13,674 comments under these posts, 24 per cent were hateful or abusive.

Fahmida Alam and Tasnim Afroze Imi faced the highest levels of harassment, 39 per cent of comments on Fahmida’s posts and 38 per cent on Imi’s posts were hateful. Of them, Fatima Tasnim Juma faced the lowest level of hateful comments, at 4 per cent.

On 1 March last year, two women were assaulted by a ‘mob’ in Mohammadpur area of Dhaka, over smoking in public. One of them was a student of Jahangirnagar University. After police took them into custody for protection, a mob gathered at the police station as well.

A witness to the incident, Riddha Anindya Ganguly, a former student of archaeology at Jahangirnagar University and current assistant general secretary of the Student Union, told Prothom Alo on 4 January that the main accused had recently been granted bail.

He said the incident showed that an extremist group did not share the ideals that inspired the July mass uprising. “By forming mobs, they seek to attack free-minded women,” he said.

Four days after the Mohammadpur incident, on 5 March, a man named Mostafa Asif Arnab, an assistant binder at Dhaka University’s central library, was accused of harassing a female student over wearing an orna (scarf). The university authorities suspended him temporarily.

After his arrest, a group became active in his support and against the victim. The following day, after he was released on bail, he was welcomed with flower garlands and a turban.

Seema Akhter, a postgraduate student of the music department at Dhaka University and a member of the Bangladesh Chhatra Federation’s Dhaka University unit, who accompanied the victim to the police station, said that the mob has now turned into a source of fear. Women are being harassed by being labelled “Shahbagi”, “feminist” and “secular”.

In May last year, a 24-year-old man named Nehal Ahmed publicly beat two young women with a belt at Munshiganj launch terminal. After the video went viral on social media, police detained him on 10 May. Contacted on 3 January this year, Nehal told Prothom Alo that he had surrendered to police and later secured bail from the High Court.

When asked why he had beaten them, Nehal claimed, “Some rowdy youths were calling the two girls ‘immoral’ and trying to drag them off the launch. Out of fear of the mob, I beat the girls only to save them.”

Towards the end of the year, on 12 November, a female dancer in Mymensingh was assaulted, her hair was cut and her face was blackened following a dispute. In that incident, the police arrested only one person after she filed a case with the Kotwali police station. When contacted over phone to ask about the incident, the victim dancer did not respond.

At the start of the year, on 29 January, a group of people vandalised the tin fencing around the field at Tilakpur High School in Akkelpur upazila of Joypurhat, objecting to a women’s friendly football match.

Eventually, the organisers were forced to cancel the match. Later, on 5 February, the upazila administration brought a women’s team from Dhaka and organised another match at the same field. Just a day later, on 6 February, a match between the women’s team of Joypurhat and Rajshahi was cancelled amid threats of protest marches in Taraganj upazila of Rangpur.

The report titled ‘Bangladesh’s Human Rights Situation 2025: Observations by Ain o Salish Kendra (ASK)’ highlights women becoming victims of mob violence. The report documents at least three cases in which women were subjected to mob beatings.

It states that women are currently living in an environment of widespread insecurity. The spread of hate speech against women and attempts to police their clothing or behaviour in the name of ‘moral policing’ are becoming increasingly severe.

Last year, two incidents involving violence against women and children, one in the plains and the other in the hills, drew widespread attention. On 5 March, after being raped, a child in Magura was strangled, pushing her towards death. A rape case was filed naming her sister’s father-in-law as the accused. The child died on 13 March.

The eight-year-old later became known as the ‘Magura child’. Following the incident, significant amendments were introduced to rape trials, and the Women and Children Repression Prevention Ordinance, 2025, was promulgated.

In September, allegations of the rape of an adolescent girl from an indigenous community in Guimara upazila of Khagrachhari sparked tension across the area. Three hill people were killed by gunfire from law enforcement agencies. Earlier, in May, a 29-year-old woman from an indigenous community was raped and murdered in Thanchi upazila of Khagrachhari while, her eyes were gouged out.

On 27 October, a young woman was subjected to lewd remarks and assault by a bus conductor on a bus in Mohammadpur area of the capital. She has said that she has still not been able to recover from the trauma.

In another incident, on the night of 26 June in Muradnagar upazila of Cumilla district, a woman was allegedly raped after attackers broke into her home. She was beaten, stripped, and a video of the assault was recorded and circulated on social media.

According to police headquarters data, from January to November 2025, covering 11 months, as case data for December has not yet been published, a total of 20,691 cases were filed over violence against women and children. In the previous year, the number stood at 17,571.

Ain o Salish Kendra (ASK)’s report states that between January and December last year, the media reported 560 incidents of domestic violence and 749 cases of rape. Half of the victims were under the age of 18, meaning they were children. Throughout the year, as many as 1,023 children were subjected to various forms of abuse.

The extent to which violence against women has heightened women’s sense of insecurity has been highlighted in a research report titled ‘Women’s Manifesto’, published last November by the Department of Women and Gender Studies at the University of Dhaka.

More than 66 per cent of the women who took part in the study identified violence in public transport, the digital space and within the family as serious problems.

The research was conducted by Professor Tania Haque, Professor Syed Md Shaikh Imtiaz and Associate Professor Ishrat Jahan Khan of the department.

Professor Syed Md Shaikh Imtiaz told Prothom Alo that mob culture and attacks on women have increased since the July mass uprising. If women live in fear, he said, progress in education, the economy and social development cannot be achieved.

The survey also found that women want measures to be taken to build gender sensitivity among men, which would make addressing the problem easier, added the professor.