Bangladesh’s army chief Gen. Waker-Uz-Zaman who has announced that an interim government will be set up, will obviously remain along with the army, as the guarantor of that government. Bangladesh has a long history of army coups and interference in civilian rule in that country and the latest move is a continuation of that trend.

The neighbouring country unfortunately witnessed a descent into chaos Monday night despite the Army take-over with rioters breaking down the statue of Sheikh Mujib, the founding father of the nation, burning and looting property and killing hundreds in reprisals. 

Protests That Ousted Hasina

The protests in India’s eastern neighbour started after a High Court ruling brought back a quota for 30 per cent of all public sector jobs for freedom fighters’ kin which had earlier been scrapped by Sheikh Hasina’s government in 2018. Unhappy students in various universities protested against the move and clashed with both the police and students' wing of the ruling Awami League.

Bangladesh had won its independence from Pakistan in 1971 after a bloody nine-month-long guerilla war which ended when Indian troops pushed inside what was then East Pakistan in a 14-day December blitzkrieg in support of the Mukti Bahini (Liberation Force) to finally liberate Dhaka on December 16.

The country’s Supreme Court in a judgement on July 21, finally scrapped the high court order and allowed reservation of only 5 per cent for veteran relatives and another 2 per cent for various disadvantaged groups in a bid to quell the violence which had erupted on the streets of Dhaka. However, by then the student protests had become a wider movement to oust the Hasina-led government. Opposition parties - Bangladesh Nationalist Party and Jamaat-i-Islami Bangladesh - came out in support of the students and their student wings joined the violent clashes on the streets of Bangladesh.

Economic Cost Of The Protests

The long disturbance has already bled Bangladesh not only in terms of human lives lost but also economically. Trade with India which is worth US $ 14 billion annually came to a virtual standstill with long lines of trucks on either side of the border waiting for the situation to normalise.

Bangladesh is one of the world’s largest garment manufacturers earning nearly US $ 46 billion from the export of ready-made garments and the disruption meant many of the orders that Bangladeshi manufacturers had undertaken could not be shipped, leading to huge supply chain disruptions all over the globe.

Sheikh Awami League government which won an election earlier this year, with no visible opposition participation, had been for some time turning unpopular with the populace who felt that their country was suffering from "a democracy deficit".

High youth unemployment rates which now stand at 15.7 per cent, a falling Taka which nosedived from TK 105 to the dollar in March this year to TK 117 now, and a slowing economy, did not help either.

Dhaka was also slipping into a debt trap. China started calling in debt repayments on its earlier loans totalling US $ 7 billion for various infrastructure projects in Bangladesh placing tremendous pressure on its foreign exchange reserves. Bangladesh's foreign exchange reserves have as a result fallen by 60 per cent between August 2021 and June 2024.

True Friend Of India

Hasina who rode to power on the crest of a huge support wave in an election conducted by a caretaker government in 2009, has proven to be a true friend to India. She put an end to safe harbours for India’s northeastern militants which the previous BNP and military regimes had allowed with support from Pakistan’s ISI.

Her government also purged Bangladesh of Islamist rebels who had returned from Afghanistan after the fall of Taliban in 2001, and let loose a reign of terror in not only Bangladesh but also neighbouring states of India.

She also agreed to an exchange of enclaves in each other’s territories and allowed India the use of ports in Bangladesh to service its northeast. A large number of road and rail connectivity projects which had been stalled by previous regimes were also given the go-ahead by Dhaka during her tenure.

Trade and economic ties between the two countries also flourished, rising seven-fold from US $ 2 billion in 2006-7 to over US $ 14 billion in 2023-24.

Policy Implications For The Neighbourhood

A chaotic Bangladesh is bad news for business and for the many projects that India has in that country including railway connectivity  between mainland India and northeast through the neighbouring country. 

Both New Delhi and other powerful nations with interest in the region, will also have to guard against Hasina’s successor government hosting Chinese interests.

Bangladesh, is already in a debt trap and a deeper financial alliance with Beijing may place it in a position similar to Sri Lanka’s, which has had to give away ports and other infrastructure which the Chinese built as part payment for accumulated arrears.

Bangladesh’s Jamaat and BNP, which were involved in the background in the student protests, are believed to have retained live contacts with Pakistan, especially its military intelligence agency ISI.

If Dhaka were to again become a part of the growing axis between Beijing and Islamabad, it would for New Delhi mean a return to the old days when it was facing insurgency and Islamist threats from its eastern neighbour’s soil.

Any descent into chaos for Bangladesh would also spell law and order problems for eastern and northeastern Indian states, especially if refugees escaping violence in Bangladesh were forced to cross the border and seek shelter in India.  

All in all, the situation in India’s neighbourhood remains fluid and South Bloc, which hosts the Ministry of External Affairs will have to burn the midnight oil and strategise to protect India’s interests in the region, even as it ensures peace all around.