Bangladesh on the brink: How unrest, radical violence and state paralysis are pushing the country toward internal conflict

Repeated lynchings, communal attacks, and police inaction are intensifying concerns over Bangladesh’s internal security and social cohesion

Thirumalairajan Sadagopan

December 25, 2025

Bangladesh’s slow slide: fear, silence, and a country coming apart

The Global Bengali Hindu Platform has written to UN Secretary-General António Guterres, sounding an urgent alarm over what it describes as the rapidly deteriorating security situation for Hindu minorities in Bangladesh. In its letter, the platform points to a string of brutal incidents that underscore the growing climate of fear, including the killing of Dipu Chandra Das, a Hindu worker who was beaten to death by a jihadi mob at a garment factory in Mymensingh on December 18, 2025, over alleged religious remarks. After his death, the mob reportedly dragged his body onto a highway, set it on fire, and blocked traffic, while video footage circulating online clearly shows the attackers’ faces—yet no arrests have been made so far.

The platform argues that Bangladesh is failing to protect its vulnerable citizens and urges the United Nations to consider deploying a peacekeeping mission under established international principles such as the Protection of Civilians mandate and the Responsibility to Protect doctrine. Such a step, it says, would not only help prevent further bloodshed but also reaffirm the UN’s commitment to safeguarding minorities when national authorities fall short.

In Bangladesh today, fear is no longer sudden or shocking. It has become familiar. It lingers in neighbourhoods after dark, in shuttered shops, in the silence that follows a protest turning violent. What the country is experiencing does not look like the start of a civil war in the dramatic sense — there are no frontlines or declarations — but it has the unmistakable feel of a nation quietly coming undone.

Bangladesh has witnessed a sharp escalation of unrest and communal violence in recent weeks amid political instability that has followed the death of student leader Sharif Osman Hadi, who was shot on December 12 and later died from his injuries. His death triggered widespread protests across Dhaka and other cities, which quickly turned violent with clashes between demonstrators, authorities, attacks on media offices and anti-India slogans spreading in the streets [1].

Major incidents reflecting deep tensions

As the broader unrest continued:

Lynching of Dipu Chandra Das (December 2025): A Hindu youth was beaten and his body set on fire by a mob in Mymensingh after blasphemy allegations, prompting arrests and sparking protests in India and diplomatic tension.
Reuters
Threatening attacks on homes: In Chattogram, a Hindu family’s house was deliberately burned and a threatening handwritten note was found nearby warning against “anti-Islamic activities,” further alarming local minorities. (based on previous source provided earlier)

These events occurred as political violence surged and protests over the death of activist Sharif Osman Hadi intensified, with gun attacks on leaders contributing to instability [5].

While Bangladesh’s leaders and civil society voices call for restraint and justice, many observers believe that without meaningful political dialogue, security sector reform and protections for minorities, the risk of deeper societal fractures will persist.

The violence against minorities is not isolated to recent days. Reports from civil society groups indicate that violence against Hindus and other minorities predates the current unrest, with thousands of incidents recorded over extended periods and dozens of deaths linked to communal attacks. According to a report from the Bangladesh Hindu Buddhist Christian Unity Council, 45 people from religious and ethnic minorities were killed in over 1,000 episodes of communal violence in just one year — including arson, threats and physical assaults [4].

In mid-2024, Bangladesh saw large-scale demonstrations and unrest that expanded beyond political issues. On August 4, 2024, protests that began as part of the Monsoon/July uprising evolved into broader conflict after the ouster of then prime minister Sheikh Hasina’s government, during which students and opposition supporters clashed with authorities. Human Rights Watch described this period as a Monsoon Revolution that exposed deep political fissures and challenges in security-sector reform [2].

As part of this upheaval, widespread violence was reported across the country — including large numbers of alleged communal attacks targeting religious minorities. A minority rights group, the Bangladesh Hindu Buddhist Christian Unity Council, reported 2,442 incidents of communal violence over about 330 days from August 2024 to mid-2025, including murders, vandalism of places of worship, arson, property destruction, and assaults on women and children [3].

The combination of political instability, street violence, attacks on media and minority communities, and eroding confidence in state institutions — coupled with rising anti-establishment sentiments — creates a volatile environment. Critics warn that if unchecked, these forces could deepen social fragmentation and push the country toward more sustained internal conflict.

At the same time, politics has turned raw and personal. Leaders are attacked, not debated. Mobs decide guilt before courts can act. Everyone has a version of the truth, and no one believes the institutions meant to arbitrate it. When faith in the police, the courts and the government weakens, people stop waiting for justice — they look for protection elsewhere.

This is how countries drift toward internal conflict. Not with a single explosion, but through exhaustion. Through anger that hardens. Through silence that replaces outrage. Through the quiet understanding that the rules no longer protect everyone equally.

Bangladesh is not yet in a civil war. But it is standing on a ledge where violence is becoming acceptable, where identity is starting to matter more than citizenship, and where power is slipping from institutions into the hands of those willing to threaten and burn.

History shows that once a society reaches this stage, pulling it back is far harder than stopping it earlier. The question now is not whether Bangladesh has problems — it clearly does — but whether it can still choose restraint, accountability and protection for all its people before fear becomes the only authority left.