Young people can play a special role against disinformation: Khasru

Social Welfare State Minister Ashraf Ali Khan Khasru today said young people can play a special role against disinformation.

“Fake news and misinformation are a severe deterrence to the progress of any nation, and it can act as a major threat to society if not dealt with now. So we need to take some immediate action and obviously young people can play a special role against digital disinformation” he added.

Khasru was speaking as the chief guest at a national workshop on combating digital disinformation at the CIRDAP auditorium in the capital on Wednesday morning.

The Minister said that during the COVID period a revolutionary progress has been made in the communication sector. ‘We do a lot of important work via online even when we are abroad. Bangladesh did not stop for a second in the pandemic period.” he added.

“Many people are involved in spreading disinformation on social media. In most cases, disinformation spread about religious issues. Everyone must work together to prevent disinformation.” minister added.

Journalists, professionals, teachers, lawyers, development workers and trained 20 youths from Jashore and Mymensingh participated in the workshop organized by the Institute for Environment and Development (IED).

Dhaka University professor Dr. Shantanu Majumder presented the keynote at the beginning of the program. Later trained TCS members took part in the open discussion.

Sania Akter, Assistant Professor of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman University of Science and Technology; Jibonanondo Jayanto, lawyer and activist; Gita Adhikary, socio economic specialist of Oxfam in Bangladesh; Md Zakaria, Senior Program Manager of The Asia Foundation, Nazmul Ahsan from Action Aid also spoke on the workshop, among others.

IED Executive Director Numan Ahmed Khan presided over the workshop.