Located inside Dhaka’s historic cantonment was Aynaghor, ‘the house of mirrors’. This was Sheikh Hasina’s gulag, Guantanamo or Auschwitz, the stoic writhing of its inmates lost to a vibrant city’s commotion in the reinforced walls of the edifice.
Hasina’s final escape was from the Kurmitola air base, adjacent to Aynaghor. The clamour for liberation shriller than the howling engines of the C-130 awaiting her, as millions of ordinary citizens led by students shattered Hasina’s own Aynaghor and her father’s legacy amidst the din and smoke of freedom. I shall attempt to answer the core reasons that led to her ouster.
The Bengalis are a proud people. They rise to inevitably script history. The resentment to the oligarchical structure of the state had long continued to fester despite the country recording steady economic growth. The foundations of this growth have literally been on the blood of its people.
Bangladesh has maintained an abysmal record on health, safety and environmental standards at its vast manufacturing units for readymade garments (RMG) cater to global fashion brands. Weak labour laws, poor wages, child labour and outrage over repeated factory fires prompted leading global retail brands to sign international pacts to improve factory standards.
The Covid pandemic pushed the majority into further poverty since the country’s reliance on the RMG sector collided with weak external demand in its traditional Western markets. This led to a cost-of-living crisis, protests for better wages and employment.
Hasina responded by asking the workers to accept pay rises they already received or “return to their villages.” All this while her party and henchmen continued to enrich themselves beyond measure. A vile example is that of her former household servant, Jehangir Alam, who according to her own confession earned $34 million during her time in office. It would take the average Bengali 13,000 years to earn that amount!
With two fifths of young people without regular employment, the factors above and the reimposition of reservation for 30 per cent of government jobs for descendants of veterans of the war of liberation in the 1970s crystallised into the present upheaval for the brutal one-party authoritarian regime.
For further context, such was the dominance of the ruling party that all spheres of public life including academia, courts, media, civil service, security apparatus, corporations and banks were controlled by this tiny clique. Awami League’s student wing, Chattra League, gained notoriety for wanton spilling of blood without accountability, leaking papers including those for the Bangladesh Civil Service, allotment of dormitories, submission on campus and forging documents in doling out jobs to loyalists.
Two external reasons deserve greater attention. Hasina’s longevity in power was an essential component for the Bangladesh project of India and its premier intelligence agency, the Research and Analysis Wing (R&AW). It was vital for the internal strategy of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party that sought to extend its power across India’s ‘seven sisters’ – the country’s northeastern states. The BJP largely succeed in that endeavour by making forays and establishing governments – many firsts – in all states except Sikkim and Mizoram.
The roll out of the CAA (Citizenship Amendment Act), National Register for Citizens (NRC) would have run aground without a pliant Dhaka. India’s Home Minister, Amit Shah, had called Bengali Muslim immigrants like “termites” who he would “throw in the Bay of Bengal.”
Bangladesh allowed for India to award itself the operational rights of the Mongla Port, exert influence over Indo Pacific, counter China’s maritime sway and establish itself as a reliable partner for the littorals. The regime in Bangladesh preferred India over China on the Teesta River management system project and became a viable alternative to the Siliguri corridor by granting access to building a rail corridor linking India to its Northeastern states through that country.
The proviso of a waiver on inspection of the cargo and security of the corridor being India’s responsibility would have meant Indian armed forces on Bangladeshi soil and an arms build-up near China’s borders. For one of R&AW’s largest missions and outsized control of the country, the fall of Dhaka is one of its greatest strategic failures. Events in Bangladesh and the civil war in Myanmar would severely inhibit India’s strategic, economic plans by an already defunct SAARC (South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation) and now BIMSTECH (Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multisectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation).
Hasina has run against the interests of the United States as sanctions have been applied to Bangladesh’s Rapid Action Battalion and many of her functionaries due to strong Chinese commercial, infrastructure and military investments in that country. Its reliance on India for its own strategic ends has dissipated in Bangladesh as anti-India sentiments take root there.
The insurgents’ encirclement of the Sittwe Port, India’s largest port investment in Myanmar, has rendered it inoperable. It was hoped that the port would mark a strategic presence corresponding to the twin Chinese operated Kyaukphyu in Myanmar. This may have also been a factor.
By appearing to be on the side of the Bengali people, the United States is in a better position to hedge its bets in Bangladesh. With the strategic contest likely to escalate in that country, Washington has appeared to follow an independent path exclusive of its partner of choice in the region for the moment.
Muhammad Nasir Chaudhry contributes on contemporary issues. He is based in Islamabad
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