The Tamesis
March 2, 2026
Dhaka – Bangladesh’s 13th national parliamentary elections are taking place in a “digitally saturated” environment where community misinformation and AI-generated deception are used to manipulate voters’ perceptions, activist rights group said in a report released yesterday.
Activate Rights is a non-profit initiative to protect digital rights in Bangladesh.
The study, titled “Beliefs, Fears and Lies: Mapping Community Misinformation and Hate in Bangladesh’s 2026 Elections,” analyzed data from December 11, 2025, to February 16, 2026, and concluded that coordinated narrative manipulation was a structural feature of the February 12 elections.
The report found a troubling increase in the use of generative AI targeting female candidates in public opinion polls. “Although female candidates made up only 4% of the contestants and seven were ultimately elected, they suffered disproportionate online abuse,” the report said.
Dhaka-9 candidate Tasnim Jara and Brahmanbaria-2 candidate Rumeen Farhana, who won the seats, were both victims of explicit images generated by artificial intelligence.
Artificial intelligence has also been used to spread misinformation. The report found that AI-generated minority characters claimed they were in danger or claimed that if people did not vote for Jamaat, they would be sent to India.
The report noted that in addition to community misinformation, election-time rhetoric from hardline Islamic accounts on social media also sought to legitimize democratic participation by claiming that democracy and voting were fundamentally incompatible with Islam and therefore religiously prohibited.
The report also revealed that the Awami League was excluded from the election after a ban on its political activities, triggering a coordinated boycott on social media using the hashtag #NoBoatNoVote. But it goes beyond symbolic resistance and toward explicit obstruction. For example, one post directly encouraged supporters to boycott the vote, and lyrics in a TikTok video promoted physical attacks on the ballot box.
Electoral rhetoric also includes systemic hate speech directed at political parties and candidates. Jamaat-e-Islami and its allies have been labeled “extremists” and spread derogatory content after their social media accounts were reportedly hacked. BNP figures have been widely dubbed “blackmailers”, with posts claiming “70%” are criminals.
Another tactic is to circulate selectively edited video clips of politicians.
These non-deepfake excerpts remove context, resulting in subtitles accusing the speaker of blasphemy or anti-Islamic sentiments. Comments frequently use labels such as “atheist,” “heretic,” or “apostate,” demonstrating how contextual distortions can quickly produce hate-driven engagement.
The report highlights important cross-border dynamics, noting that many narratives originating from India portray Bangladesh as a hotbed of extremism and systematic minority persecution.
These narratives often use recycled or miscontextualized footage – such as reframing a food stall dispute in Chittagong as an attack on Muslim girls who did not wear hijab, which was later revealed to have nothing to do with religion and hijab.
Not only on Facebook, the Indian X account also claimed that “Islamists” forcibly cut the hair of students wearing Western clothes. The clip actually depicts a symbolic protest in Mymensing against a specific individual’s haircut, without any religious or extremist motives.
