Have India, China, Pakistan Become The Major Players In The Bangladesh Coup?

Bangladesh’s Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has resigned and fled the country following a week of deadly demonstrations. Her resignation has come after 300 people died in weeks of protest which the authorities had sought to crush.

The country has suffered many years of military rule in the 1970s and 1980s following the war that secured its independence from Pakistan in 1971.

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There are several key players in the incident that has led to political drama in Bangladesh.

The protest led by students in the country toppled the Bangladeshi government. It had drawn hundreds of thousands of students demonstrating against a controversial quota system that allocated the government jobs.

The protest eventually turned deadly which later was escalated into a campaign to seek the ouster of Hasina, who won a fourth straight term in January in an election boycotted by the opposition.

Here are some major key players which have led to the Bangladesh coup.

As per the News 18 report, Pakistan’s intelligence agency ISI has used students to create tension in Bangladesh as it wants to establish an anti-India government by dislodging Sheikh Hasina. As per the sources, the ISI sleeper cells were working full-time in Dhaka to dislodge Hasina.

“They said ISI feels the Awami League government is backed by India and must be removed to “create ripples in this part of the neighbourhood”, the report stated.

Sheikh Hasina’s departure after a 17-year tenure means that India has lost its trusted partner in the region as Bangladesh never shied away from calling India “its true friend”. Since Narendra Modi came into power in 2014, he has met at least 10 times with the Bangladeshi leader which symbolises the deepening relationship between the two countries.

The two sides had inked a raft of agreements to further broad-base relations, including in areas of the digital domain, maritime sphere and railway connectivity.

However, with the shift in the political scenario, things are not going to be as smooth as it seems.

In the past, when opposition parties led by BNP-Jamaat or the Army have ruled the country, India has had an unpleasant experience with anti-India terror outfits operating across the India-Bangladesh border.

At the same time, Bangladesh and US bilateral relations are under strain. No one from the Biden administration has met with Hasina when she visited Washington last month for discussions with the World Bank and International Monetary Fund. Apart from that Blinken’s wielding of the visa-sanction stick is aimed at members of Hasina’s government.

The US when continued to reward Pakistan by prioritising short-term geopolitical considerations, and the Biden administration has been criticizing democratic backsliding in Bangladesh.

While speaking of China, Bangladesh had kept India as a political friend while China was a friend for “attaining development”. However, this distinction has been difficult to uphold as geopolitical tensions rise and economic interests intertwine with domestic politics resulting in difficult strategic choices for Bangladesh.

However, the relationship with China, which Sheikh Hasina had tried to achieve was not successful. The last visit to Beijing was suddenly cut short indicating that the desired objective was not achieved from the visit.

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As per the Economic Times report, Hasina too was upset over China not fulfilling its promise of financial support. State-run Chinese media also did not give adequate coverage to Hasina’s visit which was rare as any visiting leader tends to get prominent exposure in official media.

Army has also served as a major player, not just in the current scenario, it has a history of staging coups and counter coups. Part of this shift has been attributed to Hasina. Her father, Bangladesh’s first leader, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, as well as much of her family, was killed in a deadly military coup in 1975.

To clear protesters last months, the army was deployed on the streets during the crackdown. And there has been report of discomfort in the ranks over it. They have also issued a statement calling on the “military not to rescue those who have created this current situation”.

This concern was visible when the army chief, General. Waker-uz-Zaman gathered senior officers for a meeting on Sunday.

Analysts have already stated that if Hasina’s power becomes untenable, the army would be unlikely to opt for a takeover.