A video of protesting students shared with false claims to show a “Joy Bangla” march
On August 8, a video spread on social media with the claim that different Dhaka city areas were filled with chants of “Joy Bangla” at 11:00 p.m. However, Dismislab’s factcheck found that the video is at least one month old, and is from a procession protesting the clash between students of Bangladesh Agricultural University (BAU) in Mymensingh and outsiders.
The video was posted from a Facebook profile with the caption, “Tonight’s Dhaka.” Inside the video, the text reads, “Dhaka’s various points filled with Joy Bangla chants at 11:00 p.m.”
In the 23-second video, a procession is seen moving forward with colorful lights visible on the front and one side of the procession. Although the “Joy Bangla” slogan is not heard in the video, slogans like “If anything happens to Sheikh Hasina, every house will burn” and “We are all Mujib’s soldiers, we fear no bullets or bombs” are heard. By the time of writing this report, the video had been viewed about 100,000 times and shared nearly 800 times.
The same video was shared with the same claim from multiple Facebook groups (1, 2, 3) and a profile.
Through keyframe search, Dismislab found a photo, originally used in a news report published on August 31 this year, that matched the video. The report stated, “At Bangladesh Agricultural University (BAU), Mymensingh, miscreants attacked protestors using local weapons demanding a combined degree. Several students were injured. The incident took place around 7:45 p.m. on Sunday (August 31). Miscreants carrying local weapons attacked students who were staying near the Shilpacharya Zainul Abedin Auditorium. Several crude bomb explosions were also heard. At least 10 people, including journalists, were injured in the attack.”
Dismislab also conducted a reverse image search using some keyframes from the video, only to find that the same video was posted on August 31 on a page named “It’s Mymensingh.” Its caption read, “Tense situation at Bangladesh Agricultural University. What a state of affairs, the current situation at Bangladesh Agricultural University, Mymensingh.” The same video was also posted on September 1 from multiple Facebook profiles (1, 2) and pages (1, 2), each post identifying the location as Bangladesh Agricultural University in Mymensingh.
None of these videos contained the slogans such as “Joy Bangla,” “If anything happens to Sheikh Hasina,” or “We are all Mujib’s soldiers”.
Multiple reports (1, 2, 3, 4) on the BAU incident were found in various media outlets. The daily Prothom Alo published the report on September 1 headlined, “Teachers confined, after attack on students, Agricultural University closed indefinitely.” The report said, “Following the attack on protesting students after confining the vice-chancellor and more than two hundred teachers demanding a combined degree, Bangladesh Agricultural University (BAU), Mymensingh, has been declared closed indefinitely. At the same time, students were instructed to vacate the halls by 9:00 a.m. Monday (September 1).”
For context, the BAU academic council held a meeting at 11:00 a.m. on August 31 in the wake of a movement by students of the Faculty of Animal Husbandry and Veterinary Science at Bangladesh Agricultural University demanding a ‘combined degree’ (BSc in Veterinary and Animal Husbandry). i The meeting, held at Shilpacharya Zainul Abedin Auditorium, decided to launch a combined degree program, alongside the separate degrees on Animal Husbandry and Veterinary. However, the protesting students rejected the decision to run three degrees. So when the decision of three degrees was announced, the protestors locked the auditorium, demanding “one degree for one profession (combined degree).” As a result, the vice-chancellor, Professor A.K. Fazlul Haque Bhuiyan, and about 200 other teachers were trapped inside.
According to the Prothom Alo report, Mymensingh Deputy Commissioner Mufidul Alam and Additional Deputy Commissioner (Education) Syed Shahnewaz Morshed Apu were holding discussions with the protesting students later that night. At that time, a group of people armed with sticks attacked the students. They attacked the protestors and unlocked the auditorium, releasing the teachers.
So the video claiming to show a march with “Joy Bangla” slogans in Dhaka is actually an old video from an incident at Bangladesh Agricultural University in Mymensingh.
