Bangladesh’s democracy journey – are there friends in India?

What do Indian intellectuals think about the environment of hate and enmity against Bangladesh prevailing in India in the wake of the recent political upheaval in Bangladesh? The perception here in Bangladesh is that few reputable Indian scholars or public intellectuals in India, or even in West Bengal – the Indian state that shares a common language and cultural heritage with Bangladesh – have tried to speak objectively on the subject. A rare exception is Kabir Suman, a popular singer and former parliament member from Jadavpur. He took a public position against the recent anti-Bangladesh narrative and Islamophobia in India.

Leaders of Bangladesh Hindu Buddhist Christian Kalyan Front demanded stopping propaganda by the Indian media and some religious groups against Bangladesh, at a press conference on December 4th 2024 . Chairman of the front, Bijan Kanti Sarker, urged that relations be built between peoples of the two countries on the basis of humanity, not religion.

Six months ago, before the political change, Bangladesh was regarded in India as the closest and the most trusted ally. What happened? Have aspirations as a society in India shifted? It is no longer a secular society. A fundamental change has happened in the national psyche. A correspondent in India of a Bengali daily recently wrote: “Once the question one would ask in India was: Are you, or are you not, a secularist? Today the question is: Do you believe in Hindutva or not?” Hindu nationalism is the dominant national narrative. 

Mainstream political parties including the Congress, Trinamul Congress and Communist Party of India, Marxist (CPIM), or even the Naxalites are influenced by the Hindu nationalist narrative. This is more than about winning elections; it is emblematic of a social change. Political parties across the spectrum pick up the narrative uncritically, which is projected in public media. This is then magnified in social media.

Muhammad Yunus, soon after he took office on August 8th 2024, called Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and noted the mis-reporting in Indian media about the situation in Bangladesh. He asked that Indian journalists visit Bangladesh and apprise themselves of the situation. There have been few takers. There was no initiative from the big media houses or the intellectuals to visit either as a team or individually. But the negative commentaries and analyses continued unabated. 

Could it be that the rise of Hindu nationalist ideology created a mindset that placed the overwhelmingly Muslim majority Bangladesh in the category of an adversary? The ruling parties in Bangladesh, in the past, tried to play the religion card and formed entente with religious parties for political expediency. Unlike in India, the religion-based parties have never commanded strong national support among the electorate. 

India saw the Awami League leader, Sheikh Hasina, as a dependable friend. She had been sheltered by India for years when her father, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, was assassinated in 1975, and military rule was established in Bangladesh. The perception in Bangladesh is that Hasina overlooked Bangladesh’s national interest in being an Indian vassal in exchange for India’s unwavering support in keeping her in power.

India banked on the individual Sheikh Hasina, bypassing the need to cultivate an enduring state-to-state and people-to-people relationship.  Having put all the eggs in one basket, the unexpected turn of events in August was a shock to India that was found difficult to absorb.  

The Indian media accounts have failed to highlight the damage done by the past Bangladesh regime to the economy, public institutions, the banking system and the rule of law. All three parliamentary elections in 2014, 2018 and 2024, in which Awami League claimed landslide victories, were heavily rigged, denying citizens their right to vote. The scale of corruption, nepotism, money laundering, and syphoning funds abroad is mind-boggling. While a narrative of economic growth and development was presented by the fallen regime, often with fabricated data, unabashed oligarchy and kleptocracy had actually brought the country to the brink of a failed state. 

One might ask how minorities, such as Muslims, Christians and others, are coping with the Hindutva Raj in India. I need not repeat here the public debates and frequent media reports in India about violence, repression, politicians’ hate speech, and law enforcers’ harassment of minorities, especially in states ruled by the BJP. The citizenship registration laws, excluding refugee status only to Muslims, laws to restrict religious conversions and inter-faith marriages, bans on hijab in school, etc., are examples of xenophobia against minorities, often specifically targeting the Muslim minority. The irony and contradiction when Bangladesh is condemned uncritically do not seem to have registered with Indian scholars or media.

Bangladesh is not a paragon of communal harmony. Bangladesh, Pakistan and India live with the burden of the post-colonial dispensation of religion-based partition of the subcontinent. The rich and the powerful in the mainstream of society in all three countries exploit in different ways the disadvantaged groups, who are the poor, the Dalits, and the indigenous and religious minorities, despite the protection they are supposed to be offered by the state.  Bangladesh is no exception. However, observers estimate that sporadic incidents of harm to people and properties of the Hindu community have been more frequent at various points during the past 15 and a half years under the Awami League rule than in recent months.  

The students’ protests, following various earlier agitations since 2017, began on July 1st 2024, demanding reform of a quota system used to bolster the bureaucracy with Awami League faithfuls. A combination of hubris, ineptitude and accumulated popular grievances over the years escalated the student protest into a mass uprising. Instead of negotiating with the students, Hasina unleashed the student-wings of her party on the protesters. Police, paramilitary and military forces used lethal weapons on them, causing the death of over a thousand and maiming about two thousand people in less than two weeks. 

At this point, students, joined now by citizens across the board, raised the ante, demanding the fall of the “fascist” regime and the “repair of the broken state”.  Hasina was left with no choice but to flee. This sequence of events is not in dispute. Hasina and the Awami League’s brutality and corruption are on record already, with more damning evidence coming out as more thorough investigations are conducted. 

If the Indian state is unwilling to do so, at least Indian intellectuals and media should not turn a blind eye to these truths in favour of the Awami League’s continued propaganda, which is deranged and completely removed from reality. Bangladesh looks for friends in India in her journey to democracy, which will not be smooth. This journey is in the interest of both countries and the region.●  

Manzoor Ahmed is professor emeritus at BRAC University Institute of Educational Development, and adviser to Campaign for Popular Education (CAMPE).