Photos from Bangladeshi films shared to back cooked-up ‘Love Jihad’ story

An image of a woman with what looks like burn injuries on her face is viral on social media alongside the photo of a couple. It is being claimed that the Hindu woman was attacked by her Muslim partner and that their relationship was a case of ‘Love Jihad’ — a conspiracy theory peddled by Hindutva groups which claims that Muslim men trap Hindu women into romantic/spousal relationships with the motive to convert them into Islam.

X user Bharatrastrasena (@Bharatrastrsena) shared the above-mentioned images on October 29. The photo of the couple has the man labelled as ‘Muslim’ and the woman labelled as ‘Hindu’. In the caption, the user claims that photo of the couple is from 2023 and that of the injured face from 2025. It further says, “…This Honda Sherni married Abdul Adil Khan in 2023, changed her name from Nandini Mandal to Zara Islam, and converted to Islam. Many Hindus tried to reason with her, but she wouldn’t listen. This Honda lioness was completely engrossed in Abdul’s love…” (Archive)

At the time of this report being written, the post has received over 640,000 views, close to 10,000 likes and has been reposted over 4,000 times.

Another Honda Sherni ruined in Abdul’s love, read it completely and understand it. 🤡😣

This Honda Sherni married Abdul Adil Khan in 2023, changed her name from Nandini Mandal to Zara Islam, and converted to Islam. Many Hindus tried to reason with her, but she wouldn’t listen.… pic.twitter.com/DubZcH2X7A

— Bharatrastrasena (@Bharatrastrsena) October 29, 2025

Another X user, @Hindulegalsena, also posted the viral image. The caption is in Hindi. It can be translated to,  “Even her Abdul turned out to be the same. Many people had warned her to stay away from Abdul, that he’d rob her, put her in the freezer, but she didn’t listen; she was already drowned in Abdul’s love for 2 years, Abdul satisfied his lust with her and then kicked her out of his house. Now she’s crying, asking people for help”.

Several other users posted the same set of images, claiming that the woman, who was a Hindu, was attacked by her partner, who was a Muslim named Abdul Adil Khan. Below are a few instances:

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

The phrase ‘Honda Sherni’ is a commonly used abusive term in the vocabulary of Hindutva flagbearers. A possible distortion of ‘Hindu Sherni’, it is generally used to describe women who publicly acknowledge being in interfaith relationships. 

We also noticed that some other users made a different claim about the ‘injured’ woman. X user @Marssxyz shared a video of her in which she is seen crying. The video ends with footage of a woman lighting a firecracker, the fire from which splashes on her face. Though there is no way to ascertain from the video whether they are the same person, the user claims that the burn injuries on her face were caused by an accident during Diwali.

The girl was burnt during Diwali.

Imagine these RW are spreading her image saying Muslim attacked. They don’t even care about the girl. It’s just the hate ! Hope their mothers and sisters see this pic.twitter.com/mZvIMFotAN

— Mars (@Marssxyz) October 29, 2025

Fact Check

To verify the claims and find out more about the woman, we broke down the video posted by @Marssxyz into multiple keyframes and ran a reverse image search on a few of them. This led us to a Facebook page by the name Jouty Islam where the same video had been posted. According to the bio, the page belongs to Bangladeshi actress Jouty Islam.

The caption of the post in Bengali can be translated as, “There’s an unknown story behind everything in life — a story that no one wants to know or understand”. The post also carried the following hashtags: “#foryoupagereels #joutyislam #BTS #BanglaNatok (Bengali Drama) #shooting”. The findings indicated that the video might be behind-the-scenes footage of a Bengali drama.

In the comments, the uploader has clarified that the bruises on the face is ‘part of a shooting’.

We found that the page also shared a poster for a drama on October 30, where the same woman, who is seen in the viral image and the above video, can be seen with bruises on her face. The poster is for a fictional piece named “Ami Nusrat Bolchi” (I am Nusrat). The cast has the following names — Yamin Shimul, Jouty Islam and Tinu Karim.

Actor Yamin Shimul also shared the video of the ‘bruised’ woman crying and clearly mentioned that it was a teaser for an upcoming movie.

As far as the image of the couple is concerned, we found a very similar photo on the same actress’s timeline. It is a poster for another Bangladeshi film, called “Bidhoba Bou” (Widow wife). This was shared in February.

See the comparison below:

Therefore, from the above findings, it is clear that the set of viral images of a couple and a woman with burn injuries on her face are not from any real incident or a case of “Love Jihad”. Both are related to Bangladeshi movies. One is a poster and the other is a behind-the-scene photo of actress Jouty Islam with makeup on.