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Viral footage of Bangladesh student leader Nahid Islam kissing Jamaat-e-Islami chief is doctored

By Oishani Bhattacharya on 19th March 2025

An image featuring Bangladeshi student leader Muhammad Nahid Islam, the convenor of the National Citizen Party (NCP), and Jamaat-e-Islami supremo Shafiqur Rahman, where the two appear to be in a position of kissing, is viral on social media.

Nahid Islam was one of the prominent leaders in the student protests in Bangladesh, which led to the ouster of former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina. He also served as the information adviser to the interim government before resigning to join NCP — a political party formed by the student groups. While Shafiqur Rahman is the current chief of the Islamic political party in Bangladesh.

Exiled Bangladeshi writer Taslima Nasreen, who often uses her social media accounts to criticize the Bangladeshi government and Islamic religious practices in general, posted the above-mentioned viral image on Facebook on March 12 with a caption in Bengali that says, "The ameer is homosexual, there is nothing wrong with that. He is kissing an adult man in the mouth, it is a beautiful scene. But when he grabs children and kisses them in the mouth, that is nothing but sexual harassment. That is a crime." The post has been liked by more than 13,000 users and shared over 400 times. (Archive)

Another user, Salman Sheikh, posted a 16-second clip on Facebook on March 12 showing Nahid Islam and the ameer together. In the video, Shafiqur Rahman is seen pulling out a chair for Nahid. The two exchange smiles and, by the end of the clip, share a kiss. The caption of the post said: "Subahallah, now the video is also out. So much emotion and love... aha... but I feel so good... the children of the living devil and the seeds left by Pakistan😜😜" (Archive)

Several other users shared the same image claiming that it depicted a real incident. Below are a few instances.

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Fact Check

To verify this claim, we ran a relevant keyword search and we came across several reports by Bangladeshi media outlets where they have fact-checked the image. We found a report by the newspaper The Daily Ittefaq from March 13 which was titled: "The kissing scene of the ameer of Jamaat and Nahid Islam has been created using AI". According to the report, the footage is from an Iftar gathering organized by the National Citizen Party.

The news outlet has re-published a fact-check report by a Bangladeshi fact-checking organisation called 'Fact Watch'. As per Fact Watch, the image is manipulated. The report also included a video from the Iftar party where Rahman and Islam had met and from where the visuals were pulled.

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We found a video by Jaago TV linked to the Fact Watch report showed an uncut version of the exchange between Nahid Islam and Shafiqur Rahman at the Iftar table. It began from the same moment as the viral clip attached in the claim section of our report. One can see Rahman is insisting Islam take his seat, while initially, Islam hesitates, he is then seen moving to the next chair, and that is where the exchange ends.

We could also ascertain that the viral image or video was created from this larger video, as one can see that the people in the background are the same in both the visuals.

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Additionally, we conducted a Bengali keyword search on Facebook and came across another post from March 11 where a video showed Nahid Islam and Shafiqur Rahman from the same event sitting next to each other in a round table. The caption of the post said, "SubhanAllah, MashaAllah — there couldn't be a more beautiful sight than this. On 11/03/25, Jamaat's ameer Shafiqur Rahman, Salauddin Ahmed, Nahid Islam, and Shahiduddin Chowdhury Annie shared an iftar together."

We noticed another detail in the clip. The embroidery pattern on Nahid's kurta sleeves, which is visible in the original clip, is missing in the viral clip. This reaffirms the fact the footage is manipulated.

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Therefore, it is clear that the viral footage showing Jamaat-e-Islami chief and Nahid Islam kissing is doctored and is likely generated by using artificial intelligence. Videos from the event make it clear that no such thing happened at the said Iftar gathering.