A sanitary pad brand named ‘Stay Safe’, which had set up 2 stalls during the 2025 Ekushey Book Fair in Dhaka, shut its operations following threats from radical Muslim groups.
The brand, owned by the PRAN-RFL Group, announced on Saturday (16th February) that it was withdrawing women’s health and hygiene products from the Book Fair to ‘honour religious sentiments’.
The development comes after radical Muslim groups wrote to the Bangla Academy, complaining about the public display of sanitary pads.
Kamruzzaman Kamal, the marketing director of the PRAN-RFL Group said, “A faction of people complained that the product is not something that can be shown and displayed in public and that it hurts religious sentiment of the people.”
“On receiving the letter today (16 February), and to honour people’s religious sentiment, we have decided to close the services of Stay Safe at the book fair and thereby close the operations of the booths.”
Following outrage over the incident, Bangla Academy claimed that the stalls were shut down for selling unauthorised goods. As a matter of fact, the stalls were giving away sanitary pads for free and were operational from the first day of the Book Fair.
Bangla Academy only intervened after Muslim groups claimed that sanitary pads were private in nature and cannot be ‘sold in public’. The extremists also demanded the replacement of women’s hygiene products with ‘children-centric items.’
They had even visited the two stalls and issued threats on 11th February and 13th February. Fearing recent incident of mob violence at the Book Fair, the sanitary pad brand had to give in to the demands.
