‘New phase’: India eyes Bangladesh thaw with BNP before elections
Al Jazeera
In advance of elections in Bangladesh, India and the BNP are trying to reset historically strained ties. Will it work?
New Delhi, India – Dressed in black for the occasion, India’s Foreign Minister S Jaishankar met Tarique Rahman, son of the deceased former Bangladeshi Prime Minister Khaleda Zia, with sombre expressions on their faces.
Khaleda had passed away the previous day, on December 30, and Jaishankar was among a large group of regional leaders who had gathered in Dhaka, the capital of Bangladesh, for her funeral.
Jaishankar handed Rahman, who has taken over the leadership of Khaleda’s Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), a letter from Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Then, in a post on X alongside photos of their meeting, Jaishankar wrote words that demonstrate a dramatic break with New Delhi’s past relationship with the BNP: “Conveyed deepest condolences on behalf of the Government and people of India. Expressed confidence that Begum Khaleda Zia’s vision and values will guide the development of our partnership.”
For decades, India had been – at times, publicly, on other occasions, privately – opposed to Khaleda’s “vision and values”.
Where for millions of her supporters in Bangladesh, she represented a heroic struggle against military rule in the 1980s that first brought her to power in 1991, India viewed her with suspicion and distrust. For decades, the BNP had an alliance with Jamaat-e-Islami, Bangladesh’s largest Islamist group that advocates for stronger ties with Pakistan, India’s arch-enemy. Meanwhile, India treated Khaleda’s rival, Sheikh Hasina, and her avowedly secular Awami League party as its natural partners.
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