Dr. Shamsul Arefin Shakti is a Bangladeshi anti-LGBTQ+ leader, anti-democratic and anti-feminist Islamist writer, physician, and Islamic speaker. He is widely known for sustained campaigns against LGBTQ+ rights and transgender inclusion, which he advances through books, serialized essays on his website, public lectures, and frequent posts on Facebook. He has been active with the anti-LGBTQ+ and extremist network Intifada Bangladesh in a front-line leadership capacity. In line with his stated convictions, he espouses the ideology of the banned organization Hizb ut-Tahrir and has displayed the group’s flag on his Facebook profile. Beyond activism, he presents himself as a medical professional and public intellectual who writes on religion, society, gender, and politics.
Born on 1 May 1989 in Bogura, Shakti completed his SSC and HSC at Jhenaidah Cadet College. He went on to study MBBS (Bachelor of Medicine & Surgery) at Shaheed Suhrawardy Medical College in Dhaka. He is pursuing an MD (Physiology) at Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University (BSMMU) and is also studying for a Master’s degree in Islamic History and Culture at the Asian University of Bangladesh. This blend of medical training and Islamic studies underpins both his vocational profile and the theological–medical framework he brings to questions of gender and sexuality.
Professionally, Shakti has served as a Lecturer (Physiology) at Magura Medical College in Magura, an Instructor at Aslaf Academy, and a Medical Officer at the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare. Alongside these roles, he writes and publishes prolifically on his website, shamsularefin.com, where he maintains a running series of polemical essays that argue against LGBTQ+ rights and transgender recognition in law, education, and public life. His public speaking—delivered as sermons, lectures, and panel talks—echoes the same themes and has been circulated widely online.
Shakti’s signature body of work centers on anti-LGBTQ+ writing. He is the co-author of the book “অভিশপ্ত রঙধনু (Abhishepto Rangdhanu / Cursed Rainbow)”, which he positions squarely against LGBTQ+ advocacy. On his website he publishes an “Anti-LGBTQ+ Series,” where he frames homosexuality and contemporary gender discourse as religiously impermissible, socially corrosive, and medically harmful. Beyond long-form essays, he regularly posts short commentaries and calls to action on Facebook—an audience he has grown to 235,000+ followers—amplifying his arguments and mobilizing like-minded networks. He also disseminates his views through a steady stream of anti-LGBTQ+ speeches on YouTube, packaged as religious or moral lectures for the general public.
Within Islamist organizing, Shakti is positioned in the front ranks of Intifada Bangladesh, where his speeches and writings have been used to animate anti-LGBTQ+ narratives and to oppose what he portrays as Westernized “gender ideology,” feminism, and democratic–secular politics. His public posture fuses doctrinal claims with a culture-war repertoire, presenting himself as a physician–preacher who invokes anatomy, pathology, and scripture to reject LGBTQ+ inclusion, women’s equality under feminism, and liberal democracy. That fusion—medical credentialing and religious oratory—has made him a visible, polarizing figure at the intersection of faith, politics, and public health discourse in Bangladesh.
References (links you provided)
Website (series hub): https://shamsularefin.com/
Anti-LGBTQ+ Series:
Anti-LGBTQ+ speeches (YouTube):
Book: https://www.rokomari.com/book/200104/ovishopto-rongdhonu
Facebook profile: https://web.facebook.com/shamsul.shakti/
