A group of people attacked and vandalised four shrines and set them on fire at Homna upazila in Cumilla on Thursday over a social media post containing allegedly derogatory remarks on Prophet Muhammad.
The incident occurred at about 9:00am at Asadpur village of Asadpur union under the upazila, police said.
According to police, a youth made a controversial post on Prophet Muhammad from a Facebook account under the name 鈥楤emja Mohsin鈥� at 10:52am on Wednesday.
Later, a group of local people gathered in front of聽 the Homna police station, demanding exemplary punishment of the youth.
The army and police intervened to calm the crowd, and the youth was later arrested the same day.
Meanwhile, Bangladesh Islami Juba Sainik Homna upazila branch鈥檚 organisational secretary Shariful Islam filed a case against the youth.
Despite the arrest, mob used loudspeakers to gather people and then attacked Kafil Uddin Shah and Hawali Shah shrines, vandalised them and set fire to those, and the mob also damaged Kalai Shah and Abdu Shah shrines on Thursday.
Homna police station officer-in-charge Muhammad Rafiqul Islam said that the youth was arrested on charges of posting derogatory posts on Facebook and he was sent to court on Thursday.
Despite taking legal action against the youth, the agitated mob attacked and set fire to the shrines, he said.
Homna upazila nirbahi officer Kshemalika Chakma said that public anger had been simmering since Wednesday due to the post, leading to Thursday鈥檚 attacks.
Cumilla district superintendent of police Nazir Ahmed Khan said that police quickly arrested the accused after he posted an 鈥榦bjectionable post鈥� on Facebook.
鈥楾hose who took law into their own hands by attacking, vandalising and setting the shrines on fire have been identified. They will also be brought to book,鈥� he said.
He said that additional law enforcers, including police personnel, had been deployed in the area to tackle any untoward incidents.
