India Foundation, in collaboration with India Habitat Centre, organised a Book Discussion on ‘Transformation: Emergence of Bangladesh and Evolution of India-Bangladesh Ties‘ by Shri Pinak Ranjan Chakravarty, Former Indian High Commissioner to Bangladesh & Former Secretary (Economic Relations), MEA at Gulmohar Hall, India Habitat Centre, New Delhi on 6th January 2025.
Shri Jayanta Roy Chowdhury, Editor, The Secretariat, Amb Veena Sikhri, Former Indian High Commissioner to Bangladesh, Lt Gen Syed Ata Hasnain, Chancellor, Central University of Kashmir discussed the book with the author. The session was moderated by Ms Rami Niranjan Desai, Distinguished Fellow, India Foundation.
Amb Ranjan highlighted that it is important to focus on the history of Bengal in order to understand the contemporary politics of Bangladesh. He pointed out that the Book talks about the Father of Bangladesh Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rehman’s days in Bengal and his support for Pakistan freedom and as to how he turned towards the freedom of Bangladesh from Pakistan. He mentioned that Prof Yunus gained political ambitions after winning the Noble prize. The Gramin Bank, founded by Prof Yunus joined hands with mobile service, leading to scams owing crores of money of the common people. Prof Yunus also held great hatred against Hasina who was taking action against the corruption. The political forces in Bangladesh had wanted to see Hasina out for geopolitical and domestic reasons. It must be realised that Prof Yunus is nominee of students as well as of US. Today’s government is hostile towards India but perhaps it itself is not in full control of the system and is majorly influenced by students and Islamic forces promoting irrational, emotional and unnecessary ideas. He mentioned that India’s reaction to all these events has been to wait and watch and to see how things develop. It was argued that the two main political parties – the Awami League and the BNP, that had competed for power in Bangladesh for decades, are now coming together to get back the control of the country. India has been caught off guard since Hasina was friends with India. In fight within the regime over several issues is clearly visible.
The discussants highlighted that the impact of journalists on the regime change in Bangladesh has been very significant and destructive. Bank accounts of several journalists have been blocked. Press freedom currently has been severely impacted. Many of them have been jailed without reason. It was pointed out that these days, due to fear of persecution, journalists in Bangladesh choose to flee to Kolkata, and that’ll impact India too in the long run. It was also mentioned that a major conflict is brewing in the south-eastern state which is the Arakan state under the Arakan army. The panelist highlighted that the option available before us is to either woo the incumbent Bangladesh regime or to change the existing govt. They also mentioned that Islamic groups are a threat to West and they have always been against Western brand of politics and their agendas. Until the West is attacked, it doesn’t considers the problem of the world to be its own problem.
The panelists argued that book talks about the transformation of Bangladesh as to how it was in the last century- growing from a low income state into an economically significant nation in the region. It was mentioned that India has been in support of every government that has come into power, but the leaders and people associated with the Jamaat-e-Islami created havoc in early 2000’s in North-East India when the BNP came to power and formed the government in Bangladesh. Bilateral cooperation has been, therefore severely impacted by the current situation. It was argued that Pakistan, the US and Jamaat-e-Islaam were collectively responsible for the fall of Hasina government and that the incumbent Yunus regime hasn’t been able to get stability, prosperity and democracy to Bangla that they ultimately aimed at achieving.
In the final phase of discussion, it was pointed out that 30% of Bengalis in now what constitutes Bangladesh never wanted independence and wanted to be with Pakistan. The Muslim League, the party responsible for the partition of India was, in fact, founded in Dhaka by Bengali speaking Muslims and had Indo-Pak partition had not happened, the country called Bangladesh would have never existed. Due to continuous prosecution a very thin slice of Bangali Hindus are left now in Bangladesh.
