Animosity towards India is a defining element of the ethos of the Muhammad Yunus-led interim government of Bangladesh.

Hiranmay Karlekar

MONDAY’S talks in Dhaka between India’s Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri and his Bangladeshi counterpart Mohammad Jashim Uddin had, as their background, the squally passage buffeting ties between the two countries since Sheikh Hasina’s ouster as Bangladesh’s Prime Minister on August 5.

Going by reports, the talks may not have been a slugfest, but they left unresolved all contentious issues between Delhi and Dhaka, particularly that of the persecution of minorities in Bangladesh.

While Misri flagged India’s concern over it, Jashim Uddin said the reports were false and exaggerated and, in any case, it was Bangladesh’s internal affair and India had no business to interfere.

Mutual expressions of goodwill and a resolve to carry the ties forward, doubtless, followed. Nevertheless, expectations of India-Bangladesh relations soaring amicably hereafter, are a chimera. Animosity towards India is a defining element of the interim government’s ethos. Consider two incidents. In Agartala, Tripura, on December 2, supporters of the Hindu Sangharsh Samiti, protesting against the arrest of the Sommilito Sanatan Jagaran Jot’s spokesperson, Chinmoy Krishna Das, and atrocities on minorities in Bangladesh, attacked the premises of Bangladesh’s Assistant High Commission, damaging property and burning Bangladesh’s flag.

On that day itself, India suspended three police officers for failing to fend off the demonstrators and arrested seven of the latter. It has since bolstered security around the mission. Besides announcing the deployment of additional security details at Bangladesh’s High Commission in New Delhi and other diplomatic missions in the country, India’s Ministry of External Affairs deeply regretted the incident. It affirmed that “diplomatic and consular properties should not be targeted under any circumstances.”

Notwithstanding all this, Bangladesh’s foreign ministry, in a strongly-worded statement issued on December 2 itself, reminded India that it was the host country’s responsibility to “protect diplomatic missions from any form of intrusion or damage.” It called upon India “to take immediate action” to thoroughly investigate the incident and “prevent any further acts of violence against the diplomatic missions of Bangladesh in India, including the safety and security of the diplomats and the non-diplomatic members of staff and members of their families.” The statement further affirmed that the “accounts received” had “conclusively attested’ that the protesters were allowed to enter the premises in “a pre-planned manner.”

Among other steps, it summoned the Indian High Commissioner to Bangladesn, Pranay Verma, to its foreign office and served him with a formal protest, suspended all visa and consular services at the Agartala Assistant High Commission, and recalled its acting Deputy High Commissioner in Kolkata and the Assistant High Commissioner in Tripura, for consultations.

Bangladesh has reason to protest against what happened in Agartala and Kolkata. In the latter, demonstrators protesting against Chinmoy Krishna Das’ arrest, set Bangladesh’s national flag and Muhammad Yunus’ effigy aflame on November 28, 2024. Dhaka’s response, however, suggested an attempt to dramatise the incidents and stoke anti-India sentiments at home.

The second incident mentioned above occurred on August 5, 2024, when, in the aftermath of Sheikh Hasina’s exit, a violent mob in Dhaka attacked and vandalised the Indira Gandhi Cultural Centre (IGCC) — the hub of India’s cultural activity in Bangladesh — setting some sections of it on fire.

With the security personnel fleeing, the mob ransacked the premises from the evening of August 5 to August 6, looting books — the library had 21,000 of them — computers and even stationery. With mobs ruling the streets, the High Commission gathered all its officials, staff and their families within its premises and contacted Bangladesh’s army for protection. The latter sent troops, but made it clear that it would not fire on any mob. This meant that the army would have just watched had a mob attacked the High Commission and the people inside it.

Pranay Verma raised the issue of the vandalisation of the IGCC with Chief Adviser Muhammad Yunus at his meeting with the latter on August 22, but no arrest has been made till now.

An intense anti-India feeling was also manifest in the pronouncements of the leaders of the Anti-Discrimination Student Movement (ADSM), when they blamed India for the floods that devastated parts of eastern Bangladesh in August. The ADSM attributed the deluge to India opening the sluice gates of the Dumbur Dam on the Gumti river flowing into Bangladesh without warning to the latter’s authorities. Thus, no time was given to them to deal with the consequences. As such, the ADSM led processions and rallies, condemning this country.

According to a report in The Daily Star (August 22, 2024), Mohammad Nahid Islam, an adviser holding multiple portfolios, including Information and Broadcasting, told journalists in Dhaka, “India has shown inhumanity and non-cooperation by opening the dam without prior warning.”

He added, “We will urge, and hope that India will refrain from this kind of policy against the people of Bangladesh soon.” He had also said, “Students and people of Bangladesh are angry with this policy of India” and that the people of Bangladesh were struggling for their share of the water for a long time, implying that India had been denying it to them.

Nahid Islam’s outburst was most unfortunate because, being an adviser, his pronouncements bore the stamp of the government’s authority. Moreover, he was wrong. India subsequently showed that the floods were caused by unprecedented heavy rainfall in the contiguous areas of India and eastern Bangladesh.

Also, there are advisers who are pathologically anti-India. Home Adviser, Lt-Gen Jahangir Alam Chowdhury’s (Retd), antagonism towards this country was evident when he was Director-General of Bangladesh Rifles (now Border Guards Bangladesh).

During a visit to India for talks with the then Director-General of the Border Security Force (BSF), Ajay Raj Sharma, he had, on September 28, 2004, mockingly dismissed the detailed information India had provided about the location of training camps of north-east India’s secessionist rebel groups in Bangladesh and said, with reference to illegal Bangladeshi infiltrators, “Why should people come from Bangladesh to India? Your economic situation is not better than Bangladesh’s.”

The Adviser, Religious Affairs, AFM Khalid Hossain, is a Nayeb-e-Ameer of the Hefazat-e-Islam Bangladesh, which is bitterly hostile to India. Thirteen persons were killed and scores injured when its supporters had clashed with members of the security forces and the Awami League’s activists in its violent protests against Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Dhaka on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of Bangladesh’s independence on March 26, 2021.