Bangladesh’s former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has stated she’s going to return to her nation in December this 12 months, virtually two and a half years after fleeing to India following violent pupil protests that culminated within the ouster of her authorities.
In a message delivered on-line to Indian and overseas journalists in New Delhi on August 5, Hasina stated her resolution to return dwelling was primarily based on her need to serve her nation and its individuals. Acknowledging the potential of imprisonment and even execution if she returned to Bangladesh, Hasina stated that such apprehensions wouldn’t deter her.
“My return, and the return of the Awami League to the democratic course of, is just not about energy. It’s about placing Bangladesh again heading in the right direction,” Hasina stated. She additionally defended her authorities’s motion in opposition to protesters who she stated had destroyed public infrastructure and vandalized monuments related to Sheikh Mujibur Rehman, who led Bangladesh’s liberation battle in 1971 and have become impartial Bangladesh’s first president.
Hasina’s media interplay drew an indignant response from the Bangladesh Nationalist Social gathering authorities, which expressed “outrage” over India permitting the press convention to be organized in Delhi. “Dhaka deeply regrets that regardless of issues conveyed a priori to the Authorities of India in regards to the probably ramifications of this occasion on the reset of our bilateral relations, this public occasion was permitted to be held,” it stated. That it happened on the very day that Bangladesh was observing the second anniversary of Hasina’s ouster was “an affront to the sovereignty of Bangladesh and a grievous insult to the martyrs of the July Revolution,” it added.
On the eve of Hasina’s on-line interplay with the media, India distanced itself from the Hasina occasion, saying it had no function in it nor had it endorsed it. The Awami League presser was hosted by the Overseas Correspondents Membership of South Asia in New Delhi.
However that didn’t persuade Bangladesh.
Hasina had deployed excessive drive to quell the protests of summer season 2024, which led to over a thousand individuals getting killed within the crackdown. She was pressured to step down on August 5, 2024.
She fled to India after the autumn of her authorities. India’s sheltering of Hasina since then has irked Bangladeshis immensely, particularly after November 2025, when a particular Bangladeshi tribunal convicted and sentenced Hasina and her Dwelling Minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal to dying for crimes in opposition to humanity. Moreover, Hasina had issued statements and given media interviews whereas in India, prompting Dhaka to repeatedly ask India to curb her political actions on Indian soil. Dhaka has additionally sought her extradition to face justice in Bangladesh. Nonetheless, India has ignored Dhaka’s requests.
Forcing Hasina again to Bangladesh is just not an possibility for India. Her return of her personal volition could assist ease the present tensions in Bangladesh-India ties.
There’s some hypothesis that India has been working behind the scenes with some European international locations to make sure Hasina’s security when she returns dwelling. That’s one thing the Indian Exterior Affairs Ministry has not commented on.
When Hasina was in energy, the Bangladesh-India relationship was heat. That modified along with her ouster, particularly when the interim authorities underneath Mohammed Yunus leaned towards China and appeared insensitive to Indian issues.
Though earlier BNP regimes have been perceived in Delhi as anti-India, this time round, when the BNP took workplace in February, it raised hopes for a reset in ties. Overseas Minister Khalilur Rehman’s go to to New Delhi in April was seen as a confidence-rebuilding train. But India stays cautious, largely due to the BNP authorities’s rising closeness to Pakistan, China, and Turkiye.
For India, steady ties with Bangladesh are a precedence provided that the 2 share a 4,100-km-long border. India seems for assist from Dhaka not just for higher connectivity with its landlocked Northeast but in addition to cope with insurgencies on this restive area.
Given these imperatives, India has made a number of overtures to Dhaka in current months. It despatched Overseas Secretary Vikram Misri and Speaker of the Parliament Om Birla to Prime Minister Tarique Rahman’s inauguration in February, despatched over 45,000 tons of diesel in April 2026 amid gasoline shortages, and appointed a brand new envoy in Dhaka to assist within the recalibration of bilateral ties. The envoy, Dinesh Trivedi, was additionally elevated to cupboard minister standing to ease his entry to the Bangladeshi prime minister.
India has additionally invited Rahman to the BRICS summit in Delhi in September, though the Bangladeshi prime minister is but to just accept the invite.
An vital concern that would form bilateral relations decisively is the Ganga Water Sharing Accord. Signed in 1996 when Hasina first turned prime minister, the treaty is legitimate for 30 years. It’s up for renewal this December. Elements like the amount of water flowing within the river at present and the affect of local weather change on each international locations should be factored in whereas renewing the treaty. A fast renewal may assist place New Delhi’s ties with Dhaka on a firmer footing.
With the Bharatiya Janata Social gathering now in energy each on the middle and in West Bengal, India and Bangladesh are higher positioned to conclude an settlement on the sharing of the waters of the Teesta River – a long-standing demand of Dhaka. Beforehand, Mamata Banerjee, chief minister of West Bengal, had opposed a pact.
The Narendra Modi authorities would do nicely to additionally observe up on suggestions made by the Parliament Committee on Exterior Affairs. In feedback made public in July, the panel had urged the federal government to leverage its comparative benefit in improvement cooperation to strengthen belief and reinforce its place as “Bangladesh’s most dependable companion,” noting with concern “the rising Chinese language footprint in Bangladesh, significantly in infrastructure improvement, port enlargement, and protection cooperation.”
A reset in relations is crucial. However first, New Delhi should restrict the harm achieved by Hasina’s on-line engagement with the media.
