Dhaka-Delhi Relations Fall Into An Abyss

The thorny question of extraditing Sheikh Hasina from India to face a death sentence in Bangladesh and Dhaka’s growing military ties with Islamabad, could lead to a military faceoff between India and Bangladesh.

Bangladesh’s National Security Adviser Khalilur Rahman will be in India on Wednesday to participate in the Colombo Security Conclave (CSC) at the invitation of the Indian National Security Adviser Ajit Doval. The CSC brings together NSAs and senior security officials of India, Bangladesh, the Maldives, Mauritius, and Sri Lanka to tackle a range of security challenges in the region.

It is not yet certain whether the sensitive issue of the extradition of former Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina from India will be discussed when Rahman meets Doval. But the Bangladesh government is certainly wanting to raise the issue as its International Crimes Tribunal (ICT) had on Monday sentenced Hasina to death for crimes including murder. Hasina has been in India under Indian protection since her overthrow by a violent agitation in August 2024.

Fleeing Bangladesh by air, she was received on arrival in India by none other than the Indian NSA, Ajit Doval.

By all accounts, Bangladesh is unlikely to get a favourable response from India because New Delhi has many issues to consider. Successive Indian governments and Sheikh Hasina’s family have had a close relationship from the days of the Bangladesh liberation struggle till Hasina’s ouster in July -August 2024. They have helped each other in multiple ways for more than two decades.

In the developing context in Bangladesh, India needs to use Hasina, a tried and tested ally, to reclaim its political base in Bangladesh.

While the caretaker government has banned the activities of Hasina’s Awami League, India has called for “free, fair, credible, and inclusive” elections with the participation of the Awami League.

On Tuesday, Bangladesh’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs cited an extradition agreement with India and said it was an “obligatory responsibility” for New Delhi to ensure Hasina’s return to Bangladesh to enable Dhaka to carry out the death sentence

“ It would be a highly unfriendly act and a disregard for justice for India to continue to provide Hasina refuge,” the Ministry said.

But political analysts in India point out that an exception exists in the extradition treaty in cases in which the offence is of a political character. India thinks that Hasina’s case is one of political vindictiveness on the part of the present rulers of Bangladesh, said Sanjay Bhardwaj, a professor of South Asian studies at the Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi.

Moreover, in New Delhi’s view, Bangladesh is today ruled by “anti-India forces”.

Against such a backdrop, “handing over Hasina would be like throwing an old friend under the bus or to the wolves” as senior journalist Subir Bhowmik put it.

The Catholic Bishops Conference of Bangladesh has said that Hasina’s trial was “one sided” as she was not given proper legal representation.

On the death sentence, the Indian Ministry of External Affairs made a careful but clear statement saying that “India remains committed to the best interests of the people of Bangladesh, including in terms of peace, democracy, inclusion and stability in that country”.

Note the mention of “democracy” and “inclusion” which indicates that New Delhi wants Bangladesh to enable the Awami League (now banned) to take part in the February 2026 parliamentary elections.

Since the current Bangladesh government is committed to destroying the Awami League, and having sentenced Hasina to death, India -Bangladesh relations will be tense for the foreseeable future.

However, if the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) comes to power through the elections and expresses a wish to restore normal political life with no political party being declared untouchable, Hasina would herself want to go back. Earlier, she had come out of exile and entered Bangladesh politics to jointly fight a military ruler. While unelected governments tend to be rigid, elected governments are more accommodative.

Bangladesh and India share a 4,000 km border and India is Bangladesh’s second biggest trading partner after China. In fact, trade between India and Bangladesh has increased in recent months despite the tensions. Therefore, there is ground for a rapprochement.

Michael Kugelman, a US-based South Asia analyst, has said that Hasina’s political legacy and the future of her Awami League cannot be written off completely, for after all, the Awami League had spearheaded the Bangladesh liberation movement.

But what worries India more than the extradition of Hasina, is the growing Dhaka-Islamabad military nexus. The present regime in Dhaka is impressed by Pakistan’s evolving military professionalism, its operational credibility, and its proven ability to withstand Indian hostility.

Further, India’s hardline policies towards its neighbours, instead of consolidating its influence, have created space for Pakistan and China to re-enter Bangladesh’s strategic imagination. .

In her paper on the Bangladesh-Pakistan defence realignment, New Delhi-based scholar Sohini Bose says that on January 14, a Bangladeshi military delegation led by the Principal Staff Officer of the Bangladesh Armed Forces Division, Lt.Gen. S.M. Kamrul Hasan, met Gen. Asim Munir, Pakistan’s Chief of Army Chief, and Gen. Sahir Shamshad Mirza, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee at Rawalpindi. Gen. Hasan also met Air Chief Marshal Zaheer Ahmed Baber Sidhu. They discussed regional security dynamics, the scope for joint military exercises, training programmes, and defence trade.

Later in the month, a military delegation led by Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) Director General, Maj. Gen. Shahid Amir Afsar, visited Dhaka to meet their Bangladeshi counterparts. In February, Bangladeshi warship BNS Samudra Joy participated in a naval exercise, Aman-25, hosted by Islamabad in the Arabian Sea. Addressing the Aman Dialogue 2025, the Bangladesh Navy Chief, Admiral Mohammad Hasan, said - "Land divides but sea unites."

Dhaka has shown interest in acquiring JF-17 Thunder fighter jets from Pakistan to upgrade its military assets under its “Forces Goal 2030”. Jointly developed by Beijing and Islamabad, JF-17 jets symbolise a potential trilateral defence partnership between China, Pakistan and Bangladesh.

Bangladesh has reportedly invited Chinese investment to develop an airbase at Lalmonirhat, near India’s strategically sensitive Siliguri Corridor, popularly known as the Chicken Neck. The narrow piece of land connects the politically fragile Northeast to the rest of India.

Such a move would place China and Pakistan closer to India’s borders along the Northeast, West Bengal, and in the strategically significant Bay of Bengal, Sohini Bose points out.

Maj. Gen. (Retd) ALM Fazlur Rahman, a former Bangladesh Army officer and a close aide of Yunus, had said, “If India attacks Pakistan, Bangladesh should occupy the seven states of Northeastern India... I think it is necessary to start discussions with China on a joint military arrangement in this regard."

While the interim government has distanced itself from this remark, Rahman's position as chairman of the National Independent Commission investigating the 2009 Bangladesh Rifles revolt underscores the need for careful consideration of the statements made by individuals in prominent public roles, Bose recommends.

Chief Advisor Muhammad Yunus had said in March, that India's northeastern states were "landlocked" and that they could use Bangladesh as a “gateway to the ocean”. While Dhaka maintained that Yunus' remark was in the context of providing regional connectivity, Indians interpreted it as a sinister suggestion meant to divide the North East from the rest of India.

Pakistan’s Defence Minister, Khawaja Muhammad Asif, was invited as the chief guest at an event marking Bangladesh’s 54th National Day celebrations hosted by the Bangladesh High Commissioner in Islamabad, where he expressed a desire to enhance bilateral cooperation between the two countries, Bose recalls.

On its part, India's military has reinforced the eastern frontier by establishing three fully operational garrisons at strategic points around the Chicken Neck. And the Indian Air Force staged one of its largest-ever air shows in the northeastern state of Assam on November 9. This came ahead of seven days of large-scale air force exercises across northeast India that would run until November 20.

Retired Indian Lt. Gen. Utpal Bhattacharya told the German agency DW, "Sometimes these are routine exercises, sometimes strategic signalling. But intentions can change overnight. Today's friend can become tomorrow's adversary if trust erodes."

While war-like moves are taking place on both sides, political circles in India hope that a government with a people’s mandate will emerge after the February 2026 parliamentary elections in Bangladesh with which New Delhi could have result-oriented talks on sensitive issues.

Meanwhile, the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) fired the first shot in the escalating India- Bangladesh conflict when on Tuesday it cancelled a white ball womens' series to be played next year in Kolkata and Cuttack, PTI reported.The Bangladesh Cricket Board however said that it was still waiting for a communication from BCCI.

Cover Photograph: File picture of Bangladesh National Security Advisor Dr. Khalilur Rahman, with India’s NSA Ajit Doval at a BIMSTEC meeting in Bangkok oin April this year.