Following Bangladesh’s July 2024 uprising, many female student leaders joined the National Citizen Party (NCP). This new political formation emerged in February 2025 as the first student-led party in Bangladesh’s history. Tasneem Zara, Samanta Sharmin, Nusrat Tabassum, and other student activists became prominent leaders and electoral candidates. Their entry into formal politics triggered a dramatic escalation in disinformation attacks.
A recent research, “Disinformation Targeting Female Political Figures in Bangladesh”, investigates how gendered disinformation is produced, circulated, and weaponised against female leaders and student activists in Bangladesh.
It highlights the dominant patterns of gendered disinformation during a heightened political situation. It reviewed 40 distinct fact-checked reports concerning 12 female student activists, constituting 22.7% of the overall sample.
Between 2024 and 2025, at least twelve female leaders and student activists faced systematic disinformation attacks involving deepfakes, fabricated news reports, death rumours, and sexually explicit material falsely attributed to them.
Author’s Illustration
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Originally published at Dhaka Tribune on January 31, 2026.
