Old footage of cocktail explosions at NCP program circulating with false claim
A group of people is seen running and shouting underneath a metro rail station. A video capturing this scene has been posted on social media with the claim that Awami League activists recently chased down “militancy” in Shahbagh. However, a fact-check by Dismislab found that the original video is from an incident that occurred a year ago.
The video was from July 3, 2025, when two cocktails (homemade crude bombs) exploded at the Shahbagh intersection during a “July Exhibition” organized by the National Citizen Party (NCP). No reports were found in the mainstream media indicating that Awami League activists chased anyone during that incident.
A video posted on Facebook claims in its caption, “Breaking News: Awami League activists are chasing militancy at the Shahbagh intersection” (Translated from Bangla). In this video, posted on July 4 from a personal profile named Sheikh Sultan, several people are seen running and shouting. A metro rail station is also visible in one of the scenes. At one point in the video, some individuals are also seen entering a building.
Up until the writing of this report, the video has been shared more than 400 times and has received nearly 400 comments. The same video was also seen being shared by multiple other users with the identical caption (1, 2, 3, 4). Multiple users also posted and shared the video on July 5 (1, 2).
A logo reading “Daily Ekattor” is visible in the right corner of the video. Based on this, Dismislab found a verified page named Daily Ekattor. By searching relevant keywords on the page, a video posted from that page on July 3, 2025, was found. The caption of the post reads, “2 co’ck’tail ex’plo’sions at Shahbagh intersection during NCP’s July Exhibition!” (translated from Bangla). The video attached to that post is found to be identical to the recently circulated video. However, there is no mention of the claimed “chase” by the Awami League activists in the video posted by Daily Ekattor.
To find further details, a keyword search brought forward multiple media reports to Dismislab (1, 2, 3). A report published by Daily Ittefaq on July 3, 2025, states that two cocktail explosions occurred around 8:00 PM at the capital’s Shahbagh intersection during the July Exhibition organized by the National Citizen Party. No casualties were reported in the incident. However, no news report mentioned that Awami League activists chased anyone that day.
Therefore, the video circulating with the claim that Awami League activists recently chased militants at the Shahbagh intersection is one year old. Also, no mention of any chase by any party or of any kind was found in any news report.
