A father and a daughter, and the political volatility of Bangladesh

The Hindu

24-07-2025

Call it providence or whatever, veteran journalist, editor, author Manash Ghosh's fortuitous introduction to politics was to go a long way in helping him understand the crests and troughs of political leaders and ideologies in Bangladesh, India's eastern neighbour. As a cub reporter, he had gone to cover the Second Asian Highway Car Rally organised by a UN body, from Tehran to Dhaka. Instead, he ended up talking to a few locals.
Years later, he wrote in his book, Bangladesh War: Report from Ground Zero, 'I got talking to three Bengali strangers. Great talkers, as most Bengalis are, they chronicled for me the events on their own — from Field Marshal Ayub Khan's downfall to General Yahya Khan's rise to power, and Sheikh Mujib's six-point autonomy movement....I asked them point blank whether they were from Sheikh Mujib's Awami League. Their immediate riposte was, 'Every Bengali today, whether Muslim, Hindu or Buddhist, in East Pakistan, is a committed follower of Sheikh Mujib and his Awami League.' That was in November 1970, barely months before the Liberation War.
The cost of arrogance
But why did the Liberation War take place? Among many reasons, was the supposed arrogance of West Pakistan's military and civil leadership. As expressed by Muntassir Mamoon who went to Pakistan some 25 years ago for his book The Vanquished Generals and the Liberation War of Bangladesh, 'The general assumption was that the people in East Pakistan, because they were Bengalis, were pro-Hindu. Rao Farman Ali, the person responsible for the murder of the intellectuals in 1971, said that the Hindus were influencing the East Pakistanis. Major General Umar, who was the Secretary of the Security Council of Pakistan in 1971, expressed the same opinion. By pro-Hindu, they actually meant pro-India.' Incidentally, Mamoon was asked, 'After the creation of Pakistan, why did Jinnah first go to Karachi instead of Dhaka? He should have first gone to Dhaka because 56 per cent of the population of Pakistan were in the East.' Probably, there lay the germ of the conflict.
Cut to August 2024 when Sheikh Mujib's elder daughter Sheikh Hasina was ousted from power and banished from the country. Hasina's ouster was a little under 50 years after Mujib, once said to have had the support of every Bangladeshi, was killed on August 15, 1975. Ghosh, widely respected as an expert on Bangladesh politics, clears the cobwebs in his new book. As he writes in the epilogue of Blunders: The Power and the Plot Behind his Killing, 'There are striking similarities between what happened preceding 15 August 1975 — when Sheikh Mujibur Rahman along with 18 of his family members was killed — and that which occurred almost 50 years later on 5 August 2024 again in Dhaka when Mujib's elder daughter Sheikh Hasina was ousted from power in a bloodless coup. While in the case of Mujib, the CIA station chief in Dacca was the specific actor, in his daughter's case, there were two actors — Peter Haas, the U.S. envoy in Dhaka, and an American Assistant Secretary of State Donald Lu — who had already earned tremendous notoriety of being a past master in covert regime change operations having toppled, in the recent past, governments in Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Nepal.'
Power games
It might appear surprising to a layman who bought into the claims of a student revolution in the country, but in Ghosh's view in the book, it was far from it. He writes, 'Hasina was anathema to Dhaka-based American diplomats who did not forgive her for rejecting out of hand their government's request to hand over the offshore St. Martin's island in the Bay of Bengal on a long lease to the Americans. The latter wanted to build a U.S. naval base for keeping an eye on Chinese and Indian naval build-up in the region. Washington wanted to have a regime led by someone who would be beholden to it and enjoyed its full trust and confidence.'
It's quite possible that students and the people of Bangladesh did not understand the politics behind Hasina's removal. But what of Mujib's blunders after he had everything going for him? The picture is cleared by Pinak Ranjan Chakravarty, former Indian High Commissioner to Bangladesh, who writes in the foreword of Ghosh's book, 'Mujib failed to punish the collaborators of Pakistan out of compassion...Mujib failed to foresee that these pro-Pakistan elements would take full advantage of his magnanimity and impede his policies for the benefit of Pakistan. One such example was the 1972 India-Bangladesh Treaty of Peace, Friendship and Cooperation. The treaty was attacked...for being an instrument of India's hegemonistic design...China and Pakistan conveyed their disapproval to Bangladesh...China had not recognised Bangladesh and this was used as an excuse to decry the treaty.' Incidentally, China recognised Bangladesh only after Mujib's assassination during the dictatorship of Gen Ziaur Rehman who was known for his anti-India stance. During the decade-long rule of Major Zia's widow, Begum Khaleda Zia, the Liberation War was dubbed an 'India-inspired controversy which robbed Muslim Bengalis of their religious rights and identity'.
Tragic twist
Indeed, Mujib was too trusting of those not worthy of his trust. He paid the ultimate price. His country suffered too. Recalls Ghosh in his thoughtfully written book, 'Mujib, or Bangabandhu, as he was popularly known, even after witnessing acts of betrayal by his supposed 'very close' confidants, like Mushtaq and Taheruddin Thakur...had sought to ignore the clear warning signals. He had been warned by Tajuddin not to be blind to the misdeeds of the venous snakes in the grass that abounded in the party.' Interestingly, in a rare departure from the spotlight on Mujib, Ghosh seeks to give Tajuddin (prime minister in exile in India) credit for much of the early success, writing, 'Bangladesh would never have been liberated had Tajuddin not been the prime minister of the interim government. His unique leadership capability to bring people of different political hues, professions and religious faiths under the liberation war fold remains unparalleled.'
In fact, Tajuddin went back to Dhaka only after getting the Bangladesh currency notes printed in Nashik Press.
It didn't prove a wise decision for him then.
From 1971 to 2025, Bangladesh has experienced political volatility. Warns Ghosh, 'Political turbulence will gather steam and instability will continue to haunt this eastern neighbour of India. Hasina's Awami League is no pushover and far from a vanquished force.'