The All Tripura Hotel and Restaurant Owners’ Association on Monday said that its members will not serve guests from Bangladesh to protest the alleged insult to the Indian flag in the neighbouring country, PTI reported.

The association describes itself as a unified platform for hotel and restaurant owners across the state.

Saikat Bandyopadhyay, the general secretary of the association, said that the decision on the ban was taken at an emergency meeting of its members.

“We are a secular country and have respect for all religions,” PTI quoted Bandyopadhyay as saying. “Our national flag has been desecrated and minorities are facing oppression by a section of fundamentalists in Bangladesh. Earlier too such incidents used to take place but now it has crossed the limit.”

The announcement came days after images were widely shared on social media purportedly showing the Indian flag being stepped on by students at the entrance of the Bangladesh University of Engineering in Dhaka.

On Friday, a Kolkata hospital also said that it would not provide medical treatment to Bangladeshi patients because of alleged insults to the Indian flag “in various places” in the neighbouring country.

Following the collapse of the Sheikh Hasina-led Awami League government in August, several parts of Bangladesh reported incidents of violence against religious minorities.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi had in August urged Muhammad Yunus, the head of Bangladesh’s interim government, to ensure the safety of Hindus and other minorities. Yunus had claimed at the time that reports of attacks on religious minorities in Bangladesh had been exaggerated.

On Monday, Bandyopadhyay said that the prevailing situation in Bangladesh was worrisome. “We serve the people who are coming to Tripura for various purposes,” he said, according to PTI. “We condemn the treatment meted out to minorities in Bangladesh.”

Earlier on Monday, protestors from a group named the Hindu Sangharsh Samiti forced their way into the Assistant High Commission of Bangladesh in Tripura’s Agartala, pulled down the Bangladeshi national flag and damaged items.

The group was protesting the arrest of Hindu leader Chinmoy Krishna Das in the Bangladeshi city of Chittagong on November 25. The Hindu leader was arrested on sedition charges after he allegedly insulted Bangladesh’s national flag during a rally in Chittagong on October 25.

Das is the spokesperson of the Sammilito Sanatani Jagaron Jote, an organisation that advocates for the rights of Hindus and other minorities in Bangladesh. He was formerly associated with the International Society for Krishna Consciousness, or ISKCON.

India on November 26 said it was deeply concerned about Das having been arrested and denied bail. It said that the arrest came after “multiple attacks on Hindus and other minorities by extremist elements in Bangladesh”.

However, the Bangladesh government said that the events surrounding Das’ arrest had been misconstrued. It said that all citizens of Bangladesh were free to practice their religion, and that protecting minorities was the government’s duty.