Home minister Salahuddin Ahmed on Monday dismissed the recent Transparency International Bangladesh report on the country’s law and order situation, saying it was based on newspaper clippings rather than independent investigations and did not reflect official crime statistics.

‘The TIB does not conduct investigations or verify every incident before making statements and it is not a government agency. For the actual picture, one should rely on crime statistics maintained by the police and the Ministry of Home Affairs,’ he said.

Salahuddin made the remarks while he was talking to reporters at the secretariat in the capital Dhaka.

The home minister said that the TIB’s assessment should not be considered the definitive picture of law and order in the country.

Meanwhile, the Bangladesh Police on Monday issued a statement on media reports published under the headline ‘605 murders in 100 days’ in various outlets across the country.

The police claimed that the reports did not fully reflect the true picture of killings, as they lacked causal analysis, population-adjusted rates and historical statistical context.

It said that most of the killings were not political in nature but rather the result of personal and social conflicts.

The police, in the statement, said that the issue came to their attention after several media outlets published reports citing Transparency International Bangladesh’s report.

The police said that a total of 605 murder cases were recorded in the country in March and April.

Among these cases, 336 were linked to previous enmity, 146 to family disputes and 69 to property or financial conflicts.

In addition, 19 incidents resulted from sudden assaults, nine from dominance-related conflicts, five from love affairs or extramarital relationships and six from attacks by muggers.

A further 15 murders resulted from clashes, robbery, kidnapping and other causes, the police said, adding that only three cases were politically motivated.

The statement said that political killings accounted for only 0.5 per cent of the total 605 cases.

The current figures cannot be considered an unusual increase compared with past trends, the police said.

On population-based rates, the police said that in a country of about 180 million people, the murder rate over two months stood at 0.34 per 1,00,000 people.

They claimed that this level was not considered high by international standards.

The statement also emphasised that crime assessment should not rely solely on total numbers but must also consider causes, historical trends and population-adjusted rates.

The TIB on Sunday released an observation-based research report stating that 605 murders had taken place across the country during the first 100 days of the current government, led by the Bangladesh Nationalist Party.