"Behaved Like Demons": Witness To Dipu Das' Murder Describes Muslim Mob

A witness to the gruesome murder of Dipu Chandra Das, a Hindu man in Bangladesh, has given chilling details to NDTV. The witness spoke with his face covered due to safety concerns in the crisis-hit country where Hindu minorities have been attacked by Muslim mobs with little visible action against the perpetrators from the Muhammad Yunus-led caretaker administration.

The witness, who worked with Dipu Das, said the father of a little girl was killed not only because he was a Hindu, but also due to jealousy over his hard work. He said some people who did not get jobs spread rumours out of spite that Dipu Das committed blasphemy.

"First, Dipu da was called to the HR office. They forced him to resign. There were outsiders along with factory workers. He was handed over to them. After that the mob took him out of the factory gate and gave him to the public," the witness said.

"The people who were waiting outside thrashed him brutally. They hit him on the face, chest. They use several sticks to thrash him brutally. He was bleeding a lot. All this happened just outside the gate of the factory.

"After some time they dragged the body for at least 1 km and hung it from a tree. They set it ablaze too. The body fell to the ground. The mob was full of Muslim people. We were there but we couldn't say a single word," the witness said.

On whether he tried to intervene, the witness told NDTV that some people tried to save him but backed out due to fear of attacks on them.

"They were behaving like demons," the witness told NDTV.

The authorities later said there is no evidence that Dipu Das committed blasphemy.

Dipu Das' death is a reminder that in today's volatile Bangladesh, Hindus must curb their ambition or pay with their lives, people at the village where Dipu Das lived said.

A local Hindu community leader who helped in translation raised concern that Dipu Das' murder has left a deep scar of fear in the community.

Yesterday, Hindus in Bangladesh's troubled capital Dhaka in an exclusive conversation with NDTV narrated the horrors they faced and concerns they have as attacks on them by radical Islamists, a majority of them encouraged by the Jamaat-e-Islami, rise.

"They said they are attacking us because we are Hindus, not because we support the Bangladesh Awami League. First of all we don't support anyone, whether Awami League or any other group," a member of the Hindu community told NDTV.

"The Islamists are lying to the outside world that they are going after Awami League supporters and it's purely political. But that's a smokescreen to run their campaign against minorities in this country," the Dhaka resident, his face hidden from the camera, told NDTV.

While officials working with Bangladesh chief adviser Muhammad Yunus claim they are protecting minorities, the ground reports say otherwise. Hindus have reported frequent attacks by Islamists across the country.