Dhaka, March 27 (DPA) Clashes broke out between two groups of Hindu worshippers over the control of a river site in eastern Bangladesh where thousands of pilgrims gathered Tuesday to take a ritual dip.
Local officials said the violence left at least 100 people injured, about 20 of them seriously, in the frontier district of Brahmanbaria, nearly 290 km east of the capital Dhaka.
The rival groups used spears and sticks in the clash that lasted four hours, witnesses said.
Police and paramilitary border guards fired rubber bullets after failing to quell the fighting with teargas.
Police arrested 30 persons on the banks of the Titas river.
The Hindu devotees were taking the bath at the crack of dawn, as a part of their religious rituals.
Bangladesh is a predominantly Muslim country with Hindu, Buddhist and Christian minorities.