Hotel owners in Assam’s Barak Valley have announced that they will not rent their hotels to any Bangladeshi nationals until attacks on Hindus and other minorities in neighboring Bangladesh stop.
The Barak Valley Hotel and Restaurant Owners Association took this decision on Friday, the country’s media outlet India Today reported.
President of the Barak Valley Hotel and Restaurant Owners Association, Babul Roy, said, “The situation of Hindus and other minorities in Bangladesh is worrying. We cannot accept this in any way. The people of Bangladesh must restore stability in the country. If the situation improves, we can reconsider our decision.”
Earlier, hoteliers in some districts of Tripura and West Bengal also took similar decisions in protest against the insulting of the Indian national flag and the persecution of minority Hindus in Bangladesh.
Earlier, a press release by the All Tripura Hotel and Restaurant Owners Association said that recently in Bangladesh, the insulting of the Indian national flag and the persecution of minority Hindus by a section of extremist people have been taking place. It used to happen before, but not like now. The current situation is very worrying. In our state, we treat citizens coming from Bangladesh as guests for various reasons. There, such behavior of a section of Bangladeshi citizens towards the minorities of that country is condemnable. In this context, the All Tripura Hotel and Restaurant Owners Association has decided to temporarily not provide any services to Bangladeshi citizens arriving in our state from December 2.
Recently, members of an organization called Hindu Sangharsh Samity attacked the Bangladesh Assistant High Commission in Agartala, Tripura. They took down the Bangladesh flag and set it on fire. Later, the Indian Ministry of External Affairs issued a statement calling the incident “sad”. Meanwhile, the Bangladesh Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement that Bangladesh is “deeply angered” by the incident.
Tensions between the two countries arose after the arrest of Sammilit Sanatani Jagran Jote leader Chinmoy Krishna Das at Dhaka airport in the middle of last month and his appearance in court the next day, followed by the death of a lawyer in violence in Chittagong. Both countries have accused each other of insulting the national flag.
Relations between the two countries have become increasingly complicated since the fall of Sheikh Hasina’s government in a mass uprising on August 5 and her departure from India. India temporarily stopped issuing visas to Bangladeshis. Since then, the number of Bangladeshi patients and tourists in the country has been decreasing.
