Tag: Begum Hasina

Bangladeshi prism

There is considerable discord across the border over whether Hasina has also agreed to supply natural gas to Tripura.

October 11, 2019

Nothing to observe

Thousands of troops have been deployed across the country, which will once again bear witness to an election under the awesome shadow of the soldier’s gun, recalling the experience of January 2014.

December 27, 2018

Roiled before polls

The cruel irony being that rival candidates of the Awami League and the Bangladesh Nationalist Party, who were out on the streets to cheer their respective parties, were attacked by the mobs.

December 14, 2018

The Begum’s gambit

With the national elections in Bangladesh scheduled to be held on 23 December, the supposedly secular Begum Hasina appears to have adjusted gears by playing to the Islamist gallery in the twilight phase of her current tenure as Prime Minister. There can be no questioning the decision of a Muslim country’s head of government to …

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November 10, 2018

Guarded optimism

Two critical signals were emitted from Bangladesh on Monday, at once very different and confusing. Exactly two months ahead of the general election, Prime Minister Begum Hasina has agreed to hold talks with the Opposition alliance called the Jatiyo Oikya Front. While this may be deemed as a certain forward movement in the country’s murky …

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October 31, 2018

Dissent stifled

The discourse over dissent in a democracy has been rudely jolted in Bangladesh barely two months before the general election.

October 23, 2018

Ignoble diplomacy

The president of the country’s ruling party has articulated an opinion that is ill-advised even at the mildest estimation. Both India and Bangladesh are acutely aware that illegal migrants ~ specifically the post-March 1971 generation ~ have posed a festering sore in bilateral relations since the late 1970s, when the “quiet influx” ~ this newspaper’s …

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October 1, 2018

Powered diplomacy

In the immediate aftermath of the BIMSTEC summit in Kathmandu, there has been a degree of critical forward movement in India-Bangladesh relations. The choppy waters of the Teesta may not flow towards the eastern neighbour quite yet; a discussion on the most contentious issue is beyond the scope of a video-conference. Nor for that matter …

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September 13, 2018

Disjointed Dhaka

Never since the upheaval at Shahbag Square (February 2013) has Bangladesh witnessed so virulent an expression of student power, and for more than a week. Dhaka has been thrown out of joint by school students in the main; the younger generation has been shrilling for stringent road safety rules and action against reckless bus drivers …

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August 8, 2018

Hasina comes calling

Considering the build-up on either side of the fence, neither India nor Bangladesh might have anticipated the non-event if ever there was one at the bilateral level ~ the meeting between Begum Hasina and Mamata Banerjee in Kolkata last Saturday. True, foreign policy is beyond the remit of any Chief Minister; but the suggestion for …

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May 30, 2018

Liberation and Jobs

Bangladesh for the past few days has been roiled by a spirited movement against quotas in government jobs. Most particularly, Dhaka has been thrown out of joint by an agitation that has been ignited by an issue that is terribly emotive for the Awami League in an election year ~ 56 per cent of the …

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April 13, 2018

Hasina’s tut-tutting

The bilateral grandstanding on Ekushe ~ 21 February is International Mother Language Day ~ was somewhat neutralised this year with Begum Hasina harping on the diplomatic irritants vis-a-vis India. Though the Bangladesh Prime Minister was suitably diplomatic to avoid specifics, unmistakable was the tut-tutting over Dhaka’s dealings with Delhi in course of the interaction with …

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February 25, 2018

Comeuppance in Dhaka

The sentence for the brutal and barbaric mutiny in the Bangladesh Rifles in 2009 has been as severe as it could be. The fact that this paramilitary force was in the immediate aftermath renamed as Bangladesh Border Guards may not be wholly unrelated to the horrendous revolt against the induction of military personnel into a …

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November 30, 2017

CJ vs Hasina

A grave crisis in the structure of democratic governance has erupted in Bangladesh a year before the general elections. That appears to be the major parallel with Pakistan, where the judiciary has disqualified the Prime Minister. It has ignited the raging controversy between the judiciary and the executive, with the Bangladesh Chief Justice SK Sinha, …

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August 26, 2017