India on Saturday asked Bangladesh to live up to its responsibility to protect all minorities “without inventing excuses or making distinctions” after Hindu community leader Bhabesh Chandra Roy was killed in Dinajpur district.

“We have noted with distress the abduction and brutal killing of Shri Bhabesh Chandra Roy, a Hindu minority leader in Bangladesh,” external affairs ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said in a post on X.

“This killing follows a pattern of systematic persecution of Hindu minorities under the interim government even as the perpetrators of previous such events roam with impunity.”

Jaiswal added: “We condemn this incident and once again remind the interim government to live up to its responsibility of protecting all minorities, including Hindus, without inventing excuses or making distinctions.”

Bangladeshi newspaper The Daily Star reported that Roy was said to have been abducted from his home and beaten to death on Friday. The 58-year-old vice-president of the Biral unit of the Bangladesh Puja Udjapan Parishad was a prominent Hindu community leader of the area.

The newspaper quoted Roy’s wife as saying he had been abducted from their home early in the evening after the kidnappers had confirmed he was at home with a phone call. They sent him back unconscious in a van later in the evening.

Roy was declared dead on arrival at the Dinajpur Medical College and Hospital, after being referred there by a local hospital.

India has repeatedly flagged the subject of minority persecution in Bangladesh since Sheikh Hasina’s ouster in August, urging the interim administration to ensure their safety.

Dhaka contends that the minorities are being targeted not because of their religion but because of their political leanings. The minorities, particularly Hindus, are seen as supporters of Hasina’s party, the Awami League.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi had raised the matter with Muhammad Yunus, head of the interim government in Bangladesh, when they met on the sidelines of the Bimstec Summit in Bangkok earlier this month.

“(The) Prime Minister underlined India’s concerns related to the safety and security of minorities in Bangladesh, including Hindus, and expressed his expectation that the Government of Bangladesh would ensure their security, including by thoroughly investigating the cases of atrocities committed against them,” the external affairs ministry’s readout of the meeting had said.

Briefing the media on the visit, foreign secretary Vikram Misri had added that the Prime Minister had also made it clear that the responsibility for addressing these issues lay with the Bangladesh government.

“He expressed his hope that the government would fulfil its responsibilities with seriousness and ensure that these matters are properly investigated and addressed,” Misri had said.

The Congress condemned the killing and demanded that the government take up the matter with Dhaka, saying silence and inaction were not options when such targeted violence was being allowed to take root.

Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge said religious minorities, “especially our Hindu brothers and sisters”, are constantly being persecuted in Bangladesh.

“The brutal murder of Bhabesh Chandra Roy, a prominent leader of the Hindu community, is proof that Narendra Modi ji’s smiling meeting with the chief advisor of Bangladesh was a failure,” he said in a post in Hindi on X.