Awami League Leader Kamal Hossain Looks Back on Bangladesh in the Year Gone By
It's been almost a year since Bangladesh's Awami League government was ousted from power, and Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina flew out of Dhaka to take refuge in India. An interim government was appointed days later. There were great expectations when Muhammad Yunus took charge as its chief advisor. However, the rise of Muslim fundamentalist forces, deteriorating law and order, and widespread mob violence have roiled Bangladesh over the past year. Yunus has promised elections in February 2026, but the Awami League (AL), whose political activities were recently banned, seems unlikely to be allowed to contest the elections.
In an interview with The Diplomat's Snigdhendu Bhattacharya, SM Kamal Hossain, a central organizing secretary of the AL and a member of the parliament that was dissolved after the AL government's ouster on August 5, 2024, shares his view of the events leading to the government's collapse and developments in Bangladesh over the past year. Speaking from an undisclosed location, he told Bhattacharya that a U.S. 'conspiracy' led to the toppling of the Hasina government – a claim commonly made by Awami League leaders, but strongly rejected by protest leaders and U.S. officials. Instead, student leaders say their protest movement only escalated to the point of demanding Hasina's ouster due to public outrage over the heavy-handed security response by her AL government.
Hossain admitted that there were instances of 'terror, intimidation, corruption and other malpractices' during AL rule. However, 'our government's rule has been comparatively better than the rest,' he claimed, adding, 'There is no rule of law now.'
How do you look back at the past year?
The July 2024 protests were nothing but a conspiracy between fascists and terrorists. With the help of a foreign power, they trampled the constitution and unconstitutionally and illegally overthrew the secular government that embodied the spirit of the 1971 Liberation War.
In May 2024, Hasina had said that she has been fighting at home and outside; at home, the communal forces — terror groups and the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP)-Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) combine, and abroad, a foreign power that was never happy with the very creation of Bangladesh, never liked the rise of Bangladesh, and wanted to use Bangladesh's soil for influencing the sub-continent. They hatched a conspiracy. Bangladesh has been turned into a terror hub since then.
Are you calling it a U.S.-hatched conspiracy?
Yes.
The United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) report on the July violence said the AL government's 'brutal systematic repression' led to about 1,400 deaths. What do you think of so many deaths in just three weeks?
Two of Bangladesh's leading media houses, The Daily Star and Prothom Alo, put the death toll between July 16 and August 4 at 329 and between August 5 and 8 at 328. A total of 657 deaths were reported. The U.N.'s preliminary report gave a similar figure, speaking of about 650 deaths. However, after Chief Advisor Yunus spoke of 1,500 deaths, the UNHRC, too, came up with this figure of 1,400.
Does the figure of 657 make the tragedy any lighter?
No. Every death is a death after all. Hasina never wanted a mother to lose her child. Who is responsible for these deaths? Hasina has called for an independent probe by the United Nations. The Yunus government's first home affairs advisor, Brigadier (Retd.) Shakhawat Hussain, had pointed out that 7.62 mm rifles (a firearm only security forces are supposed to use) were in the hands of civilians. So, the deaths need to be seriously investigated.
Besides, of the 328 killings between August 5 and 8, as many as 122 victims were directly associated with our party. We want justice for all the killings.
Regarding the killings between July 16 and August 4, couldn't the Hasina government and the AL have been more restrained and dealt with the situation more sensitively?
We showed tolerance and patience. It was only to avoid a confrontation that our party postponed a rally that had been planned on August 1. We had also called for a massive gathering in Dhaka on August 3. We planned to mobilize a million people at the rally. But we shelved the plan, only to avoid confrontation. Had we gone ahead with the Dhaka gathering, we could have avoided the mob-led toppling of the government. They wouldn't have succeeded in removing us from power.
Do you think your government fell because of a softened approach?
Had we stood firm organizationally, had we gone ahead with the August 3 rally, they (protesters) would not have reached anywhere close to the prime minister's residence.
So, why did you back out of the August 3 program?
Hasina had likely received inputs from some quarters that the rally could lead to bloodshed. She wanted to avoid bloodshed. We wanted a peaceful solution.
One of the biggest allegations against your party is that it handed Bangladesh over to India.
Let me give you one example. The current Finance Advisor (de facto minister) has told the media that India's cancellation of transshipment facilities has led to cost escalation to the tune of Tk 2,000 crore ($164 million). India is our friend. We have blood relations with India. In 1971, the Indian Army fought shoulder to shoulder with Bangladesh's Mukti Bahini (liberation army). The Indian Army shed blood for Bangladesh's cause. West Bengal (the eastern Indian state that borders Bangladesh) gave shelter to 10 million people from Bangladesh. India's then-prime minister, Indira Gandhi, and all of India's opposition parties stood by Bangladesh. India is our political and economic friend.
The misinformation campaign branding us as India's agents has existed for a long time. When 'Bangabandhu' Sheikh Mujibur Rahman placed his famous Six-point Demand (in 1966 when Bangladesh was still East Pakistan), it was dubbed an Indian conspiracy. After Independence, they dubbed the India-Bangladesh Treaty of 1972 as akin to accepting India's slavery. But they never cancelled it even after capturing power through Mujib's murder (in 1975). They ran the country for 28 years thereafter. As for the Yunus government, it has not canceled any agreement with India either.
During the AL's rule, organizations like Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch issued repeated statements denouncing violations of human rights, including in cases of forced disappearance, death in allegedly staged encounters, and mass arrests of opposition party leaders and workers. Why were these organizations prompted to issue repeated statements? Why did human rights violations become such an important issue during your party's rule?
That's because the media was free during our rule. Today, the media has no freedom to publish all that is happening. During our time, television talk shows that sharply criticized the government were more numerous. Now, the media has been paralyzed. Press accreditation of 168 journalists has been cancelled. Eight journalists have been killed, nearly a hundred have been injured, and nearly a thousand journalists have lost their jobs. Journalists have been sacked for questioning a government advisor who holds ministerial status.
I wouldn't say that our rule did not see terror, intimidation, corruption and other malpractices; but our government's rule has been comparatively better than the rest. There is no rule of law now. One (student leader-turned-advisor) entered the airport carrying a magazine of a firearm! Had this occurred in our time, the person would have landed in jail. Now, it's just mob terror all around. Only a few days ago, BNP workers publicly disrobed a Hindu woman. Today, Bangladesh stands as disrobed as that Hindu woman.
Even during AL rule, journalists like Tasneem Khalil and Zulkarnain Saer were forced to work from outside the country. Why?
If someone tries to create unrest in the country using false information, the government has to act.
The election schedule has been announced, but AL leaders are either in hiding or in jail. What's your plan?
Only time can tell. We believe the people of Bangladesh will give a befitting reply to the conspirators who handed the country over to fascist and terrorist-led mob rule. They will respond on the streets. It may appear that we are in disarray, terrorized, and our leaders are living in hiding. But as much as 52 percent of the country is living in fear, surveys have shown. We have lost power to a conspiracy, but AL leaders and workers are united. We will take the fight to the streets.
Shouldn't the AL apologize to the people of Bangladesh? Has the issue come up in party discussions?
Apology is a non-issue. We feel that Hasina tried to take the country in the best direction for 15 years. Some of the activities of workers like us have triggered controversies. It is up to her to decide how to deal with these issues when she addresses the people of the country. Mistakes can't be ruled out. None is beyond mistakes. But first, we have to figure out what our mistakes were. We are discussing it, but we can't make them public now. All we can say now is that we are victims of a conspiracy and the conspiracy has hurt our trust.
Even if there had been irregularities, corruption and terrorization during our rule, why has the new Bangladesh not been freed from discrimination? Why are AL workers, why are the people who carry the spirit of the Liberation War, being targeted by mobs? Why are the minorities being subjected to atrocities? Their fight against us was for a better Bangladesh, right?
There appears to be little chance for your party to take part in the coming election. How would you fight back?
People have realized that they have been duped. That's why they (opponents) don't want AL to be in the electoral field. If they don't, we'll cross the bridge as it comes.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Diplomat
6 hours ago
- The Diplomat
The Clearing: Documenting Mother Nature in Cambodia
Andy Ball is a British documentary cinematographer and director with more than five years of experience in Cambodia, where he has focused on character-driven and investigative videos about human rights and environmental issues in Southeast Asia. His latest work is 'The Clearing,' which premiered one year after Cambodia jailed five activists from the award-winning environmentalist group Mother Nature for plotting against the government, after they had sounded the alarm about river pollution and land reclamation projects. Ball spoke with The Diplomat's Luke Hunt about The Clearing, which follows Chandaravuth, the group's most outspoken member, and his colleagues in the months leading up to their incarceration as they continued on a collision course with Cambodia's rulers. The Mother Nature environmentalists refused to buckle under pressure, and the severity of their sentences – up to eight years behind bars – shocked many people in Cambodia. Environmental activists, NGOs, and human rights groups have urged the government to release them, noting the Phnom Penh Appeal Court has indefinitely postponed the activists' appeal of the conviction. 'These activists should never have been imprisoned. These young men and women pose no threat to the Cambodian state,' the rights group Licadho said in a statement earlier this month. Ball's work has been published and broadcasted by Mongabay, BBC, CBS, New York Times, South China Morning Post, and Insider.
The Diplomat
2 days ago
- The Diplomat
Reviewing Thailand and Cambodia's July 2025 Border Skirmish
What led to the flare-up of the long-running dispute between the two Southeast Asian neighbors? The Diplomat's Asia Geopolitics podcast host Ankit Panda (@nktpnd) is joined by Sebastian Strangio to discuss the recent fighting between Thailand and Cambodia. Click the play button above to listen. If you're an iOS or Mac user, you can also subscribe to The Diplomat's Asia Geopolitics podcast on iTunes here; if you use Windows or Android, you can subscribe on Google Play here, or on Spotify here. If you like the podcast and have suggestions for content, please leave a review and rating on iTunes and TuneIn. You can contact the host, Ankit Panda, here.
The Diplomat
2 days ago
- The Diplomat
Flying Coffins and Broken Systems: The F-7 Disaster in Bangladesh
The tragic crash into a school was not an aberration, but the result of entrenched issues in the Bangladesh Armed Forces. On July 21, an FT-7BGI trainer from the Bangladesh Air Force crashed through the roof of a school in Uttara, Dhaka, killing its pilot and 30 other people, most of them children. It was the deadliest aviation disaster the capital has ever seen, and yet it was utterly predictable. The Bangladesh Air Force (BAF) has been plagued by crashes for decades. Since the early 1990s, at least 27 crashes have claimed military and civilian lives, including seven involving the Chinese-made fighters like the F-7. Each time, officials mumble the same line: 'technical failure,' as if bad luck, not bad governance, keeps sending jets into homes, fields, and now classrooms. Those excuses are a shield for a deeper rot. Even the 'newer' F-7 models bought under the now-fugitive former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in 2013 are derivatives of a 1960s Soviet design and notorious for their poor safety record. Privately, BAF personnel concede the obvious: these jets are obsolete, dangerous, and costly to keep in the air. Publicly, senior officials shift the blame to urban density, pilot error, or technical malfunctions. What they never confront is the corrupt procurement system and cynical budgeting that keep these flying coffins in service. Bangladesh's defense budget has ostensibly ballooned by 123 percent since 2009. Yet recent cuts leave just $9 billion earmarked for actual procurement. That number looks tiny set against the colossal sums quietly diverted elsewhere. The budgeting system is engineered less to build capability than to buy loyalty. Parliamentary scrutiny is almost nonexistent. 'National security' is the magic phrase used to turn off the lights and lock the ledger. Transparency International rates Bangladesh as a 'very high' risk for defense corruption. On the ground, that means padded maintenance contracts, ghost repairs, and 'service' budgets used as personal ATMs. Over 55 years after independence, the armed forces have grown richer but not stronger. During the past decade and a half, money has flowed into cantonments and military-run colleges. Outdated platforms – tanks, jets, and vehicles – are snapped up from friendly regimes willing to grease palms. The result is a patronage-heavy bureaucratic-military complex that prioritizes consumption over combat readiness. The famous Al Jazeera documentary 'All the Prime Minister's Men' pulled the curtain back on this system: former Army Chief Gen. Aziz Ahmed allegedly shielded fugitive brothers and ran procurement through fronts. Hasina's security adviser, Maj. Gen. Tarique Ahmed Siddique purportedly turned elite units into personal enforcement squads while steering deals worth thousands of crores. Ex-Air Force Chief Air Marshal Sheikh Abdul Hannan is accused of embezzling roughly 300 million takas ($2.45 million) – nearly a quarter of the service's budget – by bulldozing usable buildings for profit, and laundering funds abroad. These are not random bad apples. This is the orchard. A vicious cycle sustains the same issues that caused the latest fatal crash. Old aircraft break down and require frequent maintenance. Maintenance contracts generate steady streams of cash, ideal for siphoning by senior officials. Bangladesh still flies roughly 40 F-7s long retired elsewhere. Procurement of truly modern aircraft remains sluggish, politicized, and graft-ridden, because a new jet with a warranty doesn't leak money like a 40-year-old airframe. When the state does try to buy big, corruption nests at the top. A 1999 MiG-29 deal – dogged by allegations of bribery involving Hasina – and a naval frigate purchase worth over $100 million in the 1990s are reminders that strategic acquisitions have often doubled as elite enrichment schemes. The Directorate General of Defense Procurement reportedly funnels inflated contracts to military-owned conglomerates like Sena Kalyan Sangstha and the Army Welfare Trust. What began as welfare institutions now sprawl across banking, insurance, real estate, and manufacturing – perfect shells for over-billing and under-delivering. Whistleblowers are not just ignored; they are punished. A Bangladeshi general was recently dismissed after exposing graft in procurement. The culture of impunity devours anyone who threatens the racket. Another quieter allegation haunts the country's strategic credibility: Hasina kept the arsenal mediocre so as not to upset New Delhi and keep the bilateral relations manageable. If true, it means the state is literally trading away the safety of its pilots – and its schoolchildren – to avoid bruising a neighbor's ego. Inside the services, that logic has bred a corrosive ethos. Officers chase land deals, business stakes, and perks; professionalism is an afterthought. In the Air Force, that means pilots strapping into relics held together by bribes and prayers. The price of this degeneracy is often paid by the young: the pilot with everything to prove, the child sitting in a classroom beneath a doomed flight path. Bangladesh does not need another commission of inquiry or another promise to 'review procedures.' It needs a to open the budgetary black box. Start with full parliamentary oversight of defense spending, line-item transparency, and independent external audits for every maintenance contract. Ban single-source procurement, publish tender results, and criminalize undisclosed conflicts of interest. Break the monopoly of military-owned conglomerates over defense deals. Protect whistleblowers with ironclad legal shields – and prosecute the predators, not the messengers. Most of all, the interim government – and whatever elected authority follows – must purge the armed forces of the mafioso hangovers from the Hasina era and build a genuinely professional, nonpartisan military. That means modern hardware bought for performance, not payoffs; it means safety and training prioritized over stipends and shopping malls. None of this is easy, but all of it is necessary. Without real accountability, the next 'technical failure' is foreordained: it just lacks a date and GPS coordinates. Officials will trot out the same limp statements, promise the same 'thorough investigations,' and hope the public moves on. Bangladesh can no longer afford to repeat that cycle.
