Protests erupt in Bangladesh after Osman Hadi's death, Awami League office torched
From Indian point of view - was helping Bangladesh/East Pakistan get its freedom in 1971 and the manner it was left 'independent' a strategic blunder ??
A Parliamentary panel led by Shashi Tharoor has recommended that the government of India must strictly monitor to keep any foreign powers from setting up military foothold in Bangladesh and offer Dhaka a comparative advantage in development, connectivity and port access.
"While the challenge in 1971 was existential, a humanitarian and a birth of a new nation, the latter was of a graver, a generational discontinuity, a shift of political order, and a potential strategic realignment away from India," says a report by the Parliamentary Standing Committee headed by Congress lawmaker Shashi Tharoor.
Protesters also gathered at the residence of India’s Deputy High Commissioner in Chattogram after news broke of the death of Sharif Osman bin Hadi and threw stones at the premises. Stones were hurled at the residence of India’s Deputy High Commissioner too.
(32-year-old Hadi was a senior leader of the student protest group Inqilab Mancha and an outspoken critic of Sheikh Hasina and also India )
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Foreign interference especially by the US deep state has been a matter of concern for both Dhaka and New Delhi. Bangladesh's security forces have also been accused of serious abuses.
In 2021, the US sanctioned its Rapid Action Battalion - a notorious police unit accused of carrying out numerous extra-judicial killings - citing human rights violations.
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The demonstrators assembled outside the Khulshi premises around 11 pm on Thursday, shouting slogans over Hadi’s killing and raising chants against the Awami League and India.
Chanting slogans and waving placards, protesters accused authorities of failing to protect Osman Hadi, the convener of political platform Inquilab Mancha and a radical leader known for his fierce anti-India and anti–Sheikh Hasina rhetoric.
Massive protests broke out across Bangladesh’s capital Dhaka, with thousands gathering at Shahbag following the death of radical leader Sharif Osman Hadi, a polarising figure known for his strong anti-India rhetoric.
Chanting slogans and waving placards, protesters accused authorities of failing to protect Hadi, the convener of the political platform Inquilab Mancha and a key organiser of the July uprising. The demonstrations soon escalated, with a group vandalising the office of Daily Prothom Alo, the country’s largest newspaper, amid heightened outrage.
Local media reports that several people are stranded inside the building that houses the offices of Prothom Alo & Daily Star. Protesters first vandalised these offices and then set them ablaze.
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| Sheikh Hasina in 1990s - Getty Image/BBC |
(She was first elected to power in 1996. She earned credit for signing a water-sharing deal with India and a peace deal with tribal insurgents in the south-east of the country.
But at the same time, her government was criticised for numerous allegedly corrupt business deals.)
According to the Associated Press, soldiers and paramilitary border guards were deployed outside the two buildings but did not take action to disperse the protesters. Security officials tried to persuade them to leave peacefully as firefighters arrived outside The Daily Star building.
Some protesters raised overtly anti-India and anti-Awami League slogans, including “Demolish Indian aggression!” and “Catch and slaughter those who belong to the League (Awami League)”.
Bangladesh’s foreign office earlier confirmed that Hadi had died while undergoing treatment at a hospital in Singapore. He had been in critical condition since December 12, when he was shot in the head by unidentified assailants while campaigning in Dhaka’s Bijoynagar area. He was later airlifted to Singapore for advanced medical care but did not survive.
The interim government has appealed for calm, urging citizens not to take the law into their own hands.
A day of national mourning has been announced on Friday, with special prayers to be held at mosques across the country.
Sharif Osman Hadi came to prominence during the July Uprising and the campaign seeking a constitutional ban on the Awami League. Casting himself as a hardline opponent of pro-India politics, he also targeted the BNP, warning that a return to old-style politics would quickly collapse.
Bangladesh's longest-serving prime minister Sheikh Hasina Wazed began her political career as a pro-democracy icon, but fled mass protests against her rule in August 2024 after 15 years in power. Since then, Hasina has been in self-imposed exile in India, where she flew after being deposed by the student-led uprising which spiralled into nationwide unrest.
On 17 November, a special tribunal in Dhaka sentenced her to death after convicting her of crimes against humanity.
"It was found Hasina had ordered a deadly crackdown on protesters between 15 July and 5 August 2024. She denied all charges against her. Up to 1,400 people were killed during the weeks of protests leading up to her ousting, most by gunfire from security forces, UN human rights investigators said," - says BBC.
Parliamentary panel led by Tharoor in its latest report says -- "If India fails to recalibrate at this moment, it risks losing strategic space in Dhaka not to war, but to irrelevance".
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India did some strategic mistakes. We did not look at other leades in Bangladesh and thought Hasina would continue for infinity. - Vidyarthi Kumar -- Bhopal
ReplyDeleteIt's a make or break for NCP and Yunus. Even for foreign players. If elections take place; BNP may do better than anyone else. Thus, India bashing is a good tool as of now. But to erase identity or ideology - you need to be in power -- aligned with the quasi political dispensation; and that means limitations. - Shankar Prasad, Pune
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