Hero Alom

Ashraful Alom (Bengali: আশরাফুল আলম; born 20 January 1985), better known as Hero Alom, is a Bangladeshi media personality, actor, producer, singer, model and Bangladesh Congress politician. He has been working in Bengali short film and music video. He made his debut in 2017 action film Mar Chokka. His YouTube channel has over 1.7 million subscribers.

He is best known for his absurdist music videos, which often show him dancing with random women. These videos have made him a target of online trolling and the subject of memes in Bangladesh and other South Asian countries. In 2019, a Hindi play based on Alom, directed by NSD-graduate Mahesh Ruprao Ghodeswar, was staged in Ahmedabad and Mumbai.

Early life and career
Earlier in his life, Alom used to sell Chanachur in a station. Later, Alom had been employed selling CDs and later started a satellite TV connection business. He began making music videos as a hobby. Some of his music videos went viral in 2015, and Alom became a popular target of online trolling and a popular subject of memes in Bangladesh. As of December 2018, Alom has acted in one feature film.

Personal life
Alom currently lives in Erulia, near Bogra, with his wife, Sadia Akter Sumi, and their children, Alom and Kabir.

2018
In 2018 Alom decided to contest in 2018 Bangladeshi general election and he bought his candidature form for Bogra-4 constituency buying a Jatiya Party (E) nomination paper ahead of the 11th national elections, but Jatiya Party denied him nomination. Later, he sought his candidacy as an independent candidate. On 10 December High Court instructed Bangladesh Election Commission to accept his candidature form as the latter authority denied his candidature earlier and Alom contested in the election as an independent candidate. His candidacy drew so much media attention that, in 2018, he became the 2nd Bangladeshi only behind Khaleda Zia to be in the top 10 in the category of people in 2018 google search trend in Bangladesh. Eventually he lost in the election getting only 638 votes in his name and BNP candidate Mosharraf Hossain won the seat of that constituency.

2023
He contested in the bypolls to both Bogra-6 and Bogra-4 as an independent, and lost Bogra-4 by only 834 votes.

On July 17, 2023, Alom was assaulted by political opponents near a polling center at the Banani Bidyaniketan School and College. Alom stood as an independent candidate in the ongoing Dhaka-17 elections. The incident occurred at around 3:20 p.m. while Alom was visiting the polling center. According to reports, Alom was taking photos with his fans on the playground of the school when he was approached by a group of people who told him that it was not a place to shoot TikTok videos. The group then began to physically assault Alom, dragging him out of the building after he had entered the corridor. Alom was able to escape in a car. An officer at the scene said that Alom had been accompanied by around 50-60 people, and that law enforcement personnel had ejected them from the polling center to maintain order. The officer also said that the assault on the independent candidate took place outside the polling center premises.

The officer added that the police would collect video footage of the incident and investigate. He said that those responsible for the assault would be brought to justice.

The United Nations high commission of Bangladesh showed their concerns over the actions and requested for his protection.

Charity
Alom is heavily involved in charity works and he founded "Hero Alom Foundation" which support free education for orphans and provides free ambulance, shelter and expenses for homeless people.

2019
Alom was arrested in March 2019 for allegedly assaulting his wife for dowry. Alom had earlier assaulted her when she had protested against his “second marriage”, according to Sumi. Alom came home to Erulia village on the outskirts of the town on Monday night after two months and spoke to a woman on mobile phone for three hours, his wife said. According Sumi's father Saiful Alam, he rescued Sumi from Alom’s home on Tuesday night and took her to the hospital. In the police complaint, he alleged Alom also demanded Tk 200,000 in dowry from him.

2022
He was arrested again on August 6, 2022 by Dhaka Police for exploiting and degrading old classical Bengali songs. He said, "The police picked me up at 6 am and kept me there for eight hours. They asked me why I sing Rabindra and Nazrul songs". He was mainly arrested for making a music video from Rabindranath Tagore's song changing its original tone and lyrics. In response, Dhaka's chief detective Harun-or-Rashid said Alom was arrested for wearing the police uniform in his videos without authorities permission. The chief detective added that they had also received several complaints against Alom for his take on old classical songs. "We received many complaints against him. (He) totally changed the (traditional) style (of singing)... He assured us that he won’t repeat this", he said.