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Journalism of Courage
📌 A three-term Awami League MP’s home in Dhaka and his ancestral estate were ransacked on the evening of August 5, 2024, the day Sheikh Hasina was forced to flee. His farm, office buildings, and shrimp factory were looted and burnt. There is “no chance of rebuilding anything,” he says.
📌 Another MP, a senior Cabinet Minister for 11 years, has been named in 37 murder cases; implicated in an estimated 100. In hiding, he’s heard that “bundles of legal notices” are delivered daily at his addresses.
📌 A senior office-bearer of the Awami League recalls how his home, the homes of his parents and brothers were set ablaze. Mobs targeted his construction company and his brokerage firm.
Yet, amid the all-pervasive despair in the ranks of Awami League leaders, there is also an unmistakable sense of hope — and purpose.
“We want to go back to Bangladesh and work for the people again.” This is their chorus, five months after the ouster of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, when The Indian Express met and spoke with several of her erstwhile Cabinet colleagues and Members of Parliament.
Speaking on the condition that their locations remain undisclosed, these leaders admit that after 15 years in power, during which there were some lapses in governance and politics, today they are a “disintegrated, scattered” political front.
They show video clips of the damage done to their properties and images of physical assault on their workers. They estimate that a third of the party leadership is in jail; a third is underground outside the country; and most of the rest are in hiding in Bangladesh.
Given this dragnet and a crackdown on their assets that includes freezing of bank accounts, how does the Awami League hope to resurrect?
An important voice from the underground is that of 78-year-old Mohammel Haque, the senior-most Minister of Sheikh Hasina’s last Cabinet (holding the portfolio of Minister of Liberation War Affairs).
“Thousands of Awami League workers have been forced out of their homes, they are in hiding, moving from place to place with no money even for food… still, the morale of the rank and file is high and we look to India to mobilise international opinion in the party’s favor,” he said.
He said that there is a thought among senior leaders that “we should all go back on March 26 which is Bangladesh’s Independence Day”.
Several younger party leaders, whom The Indian Express met, said that Awami League leaders should — and would — return to face the mounting pile of cases only once there was a semblance of the rule of law being restored.
According to Nahim Razzaq, a 44-year-old Awami League MP since 2012, almost all bail petitions of Awami League leaders were being rejected.
He said the situation was “dire” and that the Awami League leadership was “helpless” while they remain in hiding.
Said Razzaq: “As of now, we don’t have any judicial rights, no bail is being granted and we know if we return and demand elections, we will all be arrested and put in overflowing jails… the Awami League is ready to sit on the table and talk about elections but there is no environment for it. At present, it is not possible for us to be on the ground and to participate in politics.”
Echoing many others, Razzaq said that “robust discussions” were on between Awami League leaders on how the party could be galvanized.
This was being done mostly through WhatsApp groups of 30-40 MPs and former Cabinet Ministers. One of them is former MP and party Joint Secretary, A F M Bahauddin Nasim.
Nasim described how even while being underground, he was in touch with workers in almost all the 70-odd political districts of Bangladesh.
“I receive 200-300 calls from workers every day, even while technically I am in hiding. That way the Awami League leaders are in touch with the workers and the workers are in touch with the people. And, yes, once the rule of law is re-established, we will be ready to face the law of the land,” he said.
Several leaders claimed that even in her period of exile in India, Sheikh Hasina was “regularly” connected with party leaders via WhatsApp.
She was listed as “Apa (older sister)” on some groups and as Pankaj Nath, former MP who fought the 2024 election as an independent, said, the former Prime Minster was most frequently in touch with the leadership which has remained in Bangladesh and gets the most accurate feedback from them.
“Yes, I am also in touch with her…She addresses and joins many WhatsApp groups. What is important for us is that she is increasingly optimistic about the future of the Awami League.”
Another former MP, Shifuzzaman Shikor concurred that today, even the grassroots worker of the Awami League was confident that Sheikh Hasina could be contacted. He told The Indian Express, “Even while in exile she remains a mother figure for the workers. And we are all in touch with the workers in our districts and are there to take care of their families. The tragedy is that we are a party of leaders and freedom fighters who have either themselves witnessed the 1971 freedom struggle or their fathers have done so. But today we are all being treated like war criminals. The interim Government wants to press the reset button and erase the past history of Bangladesh. Even the history books are being rewritten.”
It is former senior Cabinet Ministers like Mohammel Haque and Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal (see interview) who speak most candidly about all that is still going “terribly wrong” in the five months since the interim Government headed by Muhammad Yunus has been at the helm.
Haque told The Indian Express that no attempt has been made to recover the thousands of small arms which were looted from the police stations in August 2024. He alleged: “We suspect more arms are coming into Bangladesh via the sea route. Just like Pakistan has become a failed state, there are all-out attempts to turn Bangladesh into a failed state too.”
And as the former Home Minister put it, “The Awami League has been in the opposition for many years before August 2024. But the party has never faced a situation like this.”
Speaking to The Indian Express on telephone, another three-term MP and Joint Secretary of the Awami League, Mahbubul Alam Hanif, estimated that there may still be over 3 lakh of their party workers who were in hiding in Bangladesh and scores of leaders in hiding in foreign countries.
He questioned what he called the “unfairness” of all the blame for the unrest and killings being placed at the door of the Awami League alone. Said Hanif: “The killings and violence have continued in Bangladesh even after Sheikh Hasina fled from the country. So who is responsible for all this? If she is being made an accused, so should Chief advisor Mohammad Yunus. If she is ready to face trial so should he.’’
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