Old Rangpur drug bust shared as arrest of BNP-Jamaat leader in Cumilla
A photo spread on Facebook claiming that detectives detained a man with yaba tablets in Alkara of Chauddagram upazila in Cumilla. Some posts call the detained man a BNP leader; others call him a Jamaat leader. Dismislab’s fact-check finds that the man in the photo was arrested on August 25, 2023 in Rangpur by the Metropolitan Detective Branch of police with a drug named tapentadol, a substance more dangerous than yaba.
On December 6, a personal Facebook profile shared a photo with the caption, “Jamaat leader from Alkara of Chauddagram upazila detained by DB police with yaba.” The “Dhaka Voice 24” logo appears at the top of the image. Several profiles (1, 2, 3, 4, 5) shared the photo with the same claim.
The next day, another Facebook ID spread the same photo but with a different caption: “BNP leader from Alkara of Chauddagram upazila detained by DB police with yaba.”
In both photos, two detectives stand on each side of a man. On the table in front, many tablet-like items lie inside packets.
A reverse image search led Dismislab to a photo posted on August 25, 2023 from a Facebook profile named Md. Belayet Hossain Babu. According to the post, DB police in Rangpur recovered a drug stronger than yaba. Rangpur Metropolitan DB police arrested a drug trader named Badsha Alam with tapentadol tablets. Rangpur district DB police arrested another trader named Nasir Hossain. The circulated photo matches that post exactly.
For further verification, Dismislab conducted searches using relevant keywords and found multiple reports published by news outlets (1, 2) and online platforms (1, 2). A report by Somoy TV states that on August 25, 2023, detectives in Rangpur arrested drug trader Badsha Alam with tapentadol.
DB’s Deputy Commissioner of Intelligence, Kazi Muttaki Ibnu Minan, shared this information at a press conference at the DB office on the afternoon of August 25. He said officers, acting on a tip-off, recovered 500 pieces of tapentadol from the cowshed of Badsha Alam’s house in Chilmon Purbo Para of Haragach in Rangpur town.
However, no news report mentions any political identity of the arrested man.
Meaning, the photo circulated as a recent arrest in Alkara of Chauddagram actually shows a two-year-old arrest in Rangpur.
Notably, according to a report by Prothom Alo, the government declared tapentadol, originally a prescription-only pain-relief medicine, as a narcotic substance. On July 8, 2020, the Department of Narcotics Control included tapentadol in the “Category B narcotics list” under the Narcotics Control Act and published a gazette to this effect.
