Bangladesh one of the leading national newspaper ‘Daily Kalbela’ identified as the country’s top spreading misinformation from the first and last six months of 2024 and 2023, according to the analysis of Rumor Scanner.

Rumor Scanner found evidence of 20 false news campaigns from January to June by analyzing the news published on the media’s website, YouTube channel and Facebook page. Among these the top five misinformation campaigns were on religious topics, as a percentage that is about 25 percent.

Considering typological misinformation outside of category or topic, Kalbela’s most frequent errors were informational (9), which is 45 percent of total errors. In addition, five of the published news stories used wrong pictures of old or different events, which is 25 percent of the total errors. Apart from this, the rate of publishing fake news based on video is about 30 percent.

Dhaka’s Daily Kalbela newspaper is a sister concern of Biswas Group and Nazrul Islam Biswas is the owner. He is also a political figure of Bangladesh ruling party Awami League. Once upon a time Mr. Biswas lived in a small village. In 90’s he worked in border guard Bangladesh. But due to criminal activities he lost his job and later came to capital Dhaka. In 1995 he started construction business. Various reports published in Bangladesh’s media have also revealed that there are multiple allegations of corruption, terrorist activities and money laundering against Mr. Biswas.

Within twenty years Nazrul Islam Biswas becomes a billionaire from a road construction worker, according to Shomoyer Alo news, published in 2019. The news also said about illegal incoming source against Mr. Biswas.
There is also a financial connection found between Biswas group and an Indian agency. Delhi based Trade India company’s founder Chairman Mr. Bikky Khosla confirmed the information to The Rummage.

There is also an allegation found against Santosh Sharma that he is working for Indian government intelligent agency “Research and Analysis Wing” (RAW). The news based on propaganda information spread in social media by India’s ruling Hindutva party BJP activists of Bangladesh. The Editor of the newspaper Mr. Santosh Sharma was the main mastermind behind the fake news to spread religious hatred in the country, according to Daily Kalbela source.

Mr. Santosh Sharma was under the surveillance of various agencies for a long time. To defy the odds he went to meet someone special in India very secretly. Mr. Santosh told a Hindu leader about that secret in a meeting. We also have a call record where he indicated that his powers had reached unprecedented heights. Soon after that conversation, on March 17, Mr. Santosh became the General Secretary of Bangladesh Puja Udjapan Parishad. Even before he became the general secretary, the Bangladesh Hindu-Buddhist-Christian Unity Association’s Facebook page has been accused of destroying religious harmony and creating riots with various inflammatory posts. An unconfirmed source has confirmed that the ‘religiously inflammatory’ Facebook post of love trap converts was posted by Mr. Santosh plan.

You can also read: https://therummage.org/an-editors-mastermind-behind-a-fake-news/

Even after the fall of Sheikh Hasina government on August 5, several Indian media outlets have been identified for spreading disinformation on religious issues. Following the ideology of Indian media, Dhaka’s Daily Kalbela also spread religious disinformation.