The death sentence passed on Bangladesh’s exiled former prime minister Sheikh Hasina and the call from the country’s interim government that India should extradite her in order to carry the judicial process forward are part of a larger gameplan. The swift response from India rejecting the call outright was also in the scheme of things. Bangladesh is in no position to force India to extradite the seasoned former premier. It neither has the military might nor the diplomatic clout to press for the demand. Fact is also that India will not throw its trusted associate to the wolves, come what may. Hasina, 78, represents a movement and a family that won East Bengal’s people their hard-won freedom from the Pakistani military yoke and a nation of their own half a century ago.
Perceptions are that the exiled Bangladesh leader is safely positioned in a highly protected dwelling unit in New Delhi ever since her flight landed in the capital in August last. Bangladesh’s governance, grabbed by leaders of the student-led anti-Hasina movement and overseen by Nobel laureate Mohammed Yunus in an advisory capacity, does not have legitimacy. It is promising elections in February 2026, but the process could further drag. It’s here that Sheikh Hasina is anchoring her arguments against the death warrant. It’s here that the international community would pause before taking any firm stand in support of Bangladesh’s International Crimes Tribunal verdict. The verdict, based on rights violations on students protesting against Hasina in Dhaka and elsewhere last year, is itself seen by the exiled leader as a manipulated order. The tribunal’s labelling of the security forces’ action against the students as “a crime against humanity” looks far-fetched. Yunus and the others who run the present dispensation in Bangladesh have proven in good measure in the past over a year as to where their loyalties lie.
The present regime is building bridges with Pakistan and might be willing to dance to Rawalpindi’s tunes if only to spite India. Yunus’ attempts to court the US – and vice versa – ever since he assumed political power there, are no secret. The American political and military establishments have their interests to promote in the subcontinent and beyond. President Donald Trump is unpredictable. Yet, nothing goes to show that he can dictate terms with India in crucial matters of national interest though what happened during Operation Sindoor was an exception. The extraordinary situation at that time demanded so. It is well-known that the US sought to draw a feeder line to Myanmar too through Bangladesh’s facilities. Geopolitical interests are intertwined also in ways that China is scouting around the region and offering a helping hand to Bangladesh while the reds had already built bridges with the Myanmar military brass. It’s no small matter that the agencies investigating the Red Fort blast have also stumbled on some Bangladeshi link to the Faridabad-based terrorist outfit, which all apparently took orders from the Jaish-e-Mohammed and by extension from the Pakistani military’s notorious ISI. Sheikh Hasina was a guarantee that the ISI schemes would not work through Bangladesh against India. That scenario no longer exists.
