A disturbing video showing a youth being thrashed by angry mobs has now been shared online, with false communal claims that it shows violence against an innocent Hindu child in West Bengal.
BOOM found that the viral video is not related to any incident in West Bengal. The video shows a teenager accused of rape being snatched from the police in Dhaka's Khilkhet and then beaten up by a mob.
Following the recent amendment of the Waqf Act in Parliament, communal violence and unrest erupted in Murshidabad, West Bengal, on April 11 and 12 during protests against the act. Three people were killed in the incident, and panicked residents from several parts of Murshidabad fled to Malda for shelter. As the ruling Trinamool Congress and the Chief Minister came under fire from opposition parties over the situation, Mamata Banerjee accused the BJP of spreading misinformation about West Bengal.
BOOM chose not to include the viral post in its report due to the video's disturbing content
The video is being shared with a Hindi caption that translates to, "Did you see how brutally an innocent 6-year-old Hindu boy was beaten to death yesterday in West Bengal? An innocent life... just because he was a Hindu? This is a blot on humanity. If we remain silent even now, history will never forgive us."
(Original Text in Hindi: क्या आपने देखा, कल पश्चिम बंगाल में एक मासूम 6 वर्षीय हिन्दू बालक को किस क्रूरता से पीट-पीट कर उसकी हत्या कर दी गई? एक मासूम जीवन... सिर्फ इसलिए कि वो हिन्दू था? यह मानवता पर कलंक है। अब भी अगर हम चुप रहे, तो इतिहास हमें कभी माफ नहीं करेगा।")
Fact Check
BOOM first ran a reverse image search on one of the keyframe from the viral video and found a longer version of the footage posted on Instagram by a Bangladeshi user on March 25, 2025. This indicates that the video is unrelated to the events happened in Murshidabad in April this year.
Additionally, BOOM found a screenshot of the viral video in a report by the Bangladeshi media outlet Somoy News, dated March 19, 2025, through another reverse image search.
The article mentions that the incident occurred on March 18 in the Khilkhet area of Dhaka, Bangladesh, where a teenager was beaten on charges of raping a child.
According to Prothom Alo, Ismail Hossain, the officer-in-charge of Khilkhet Police Station, stated that after authorities received information about the beating of the accused teenager, more than a hundred local residents attacked the police as they were transporting him to the station. The mob vandalised the police vehicle and beat the teenager again.
Khilkhet Police Station OC Ashikur Rahman and other officers were also injured in the attack. The teenager was admitted to Dhaka Medical College Hospital with serious injuries.
A video report published on Ekushey Television's YouTube channel on March 18, 2025, also shows scenes similar to the viral video.
