Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina on Sunday said she wanted to assure Bangladesh’s predominantly Hindu community and the world community that her government strongly supports secularism and that any attempt to disrupt communal harmony will be dealt with immediately.

In an interview with ANI a day before her visit to India, Hasina said that extremism was not limited to her country, as many countries including India were witnessing it.

She said one of the reasons for the growing extremism is social media, which has become “very bad these days”.

Sheikh Hasina said, “As long as we are in power, we always give importance to it and I always tell them (minorities) that you are our citizens. You also have a responsibility towards the country.”

“We take action when minorities are attacked. It happens sometimes. It is a very undesirable situation but it does not happen only in Bangladesh. Even in India, sometimes minorities suffer,” she added.

There have been reports of attacks and hostilities against the Hindu minority in Bangladesh. Some reports mention attacks on Durga Puja pandals or places of worship.

When asked about the incidents of attack on the Hindu community, Sheikh Hasina said, “You know Bangladesh is a secular country and we have many religions here. And religious harmony is very high here. So, when one or two things happen… especially my party…people in my party, they are much aware and so is my government. We take immediate action.”

When Hasina was asked to comment on the role of bloggers and extremist communities on social media, she said it is not desirable that people should write something to hurt each other.

She said that her government had tried to prevent any such activity.

The Prime Minister said, “Extremism is now everywhere. Even if you look in India or other countries, you can find it in many countries around the world. It’s become very… very bad these days because of social media. Some write occasionally. It also reacts instantly, but we have tried our best to control it. We never support it.”

“Every person has a right to practice his religion properly and one should not say anything that hurts another religion,” she added.