Bangladeshis demand an election after revolution joy

A new beginning was marked for more than 170 million people in Bangladesh on 6 August, as the authoritarian government of prime minister Sheikh Hasina was finally toppled after weeks of bloody protests that saw hundreds killed.

- ALISHA RAHAMAN SARKAR

The protests began as a student movement against plans to reform recruitment for public sector jobs, but quickly snowballed into a popular revolution against the Awami League government. Ms Hasina fled to India on a helicopter as an angry mob marched towards the presidential palace.

Her ousting created a power vacuum in Bangladesh that was quickly filled by a new caretaker government, as Hasina critic and Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus returned to the country to be named interim leader. The 84-year-old microfinance pioneer faced an almighty task – restoring democracy to a nation scarred by violence and whose economy was floundering.

Almost five months on and the streets of Dhaka have come alive, schools and colleges have reopened, a police force which refused to work in the days immediately after Ms Hasina’s ouster has returned, and remittances from abroad – worth around 5 per cent of GDP – have stabilised.

But Bangladesh is still on edge, with growing discontent over the Yunus government’s failure to solve the economic crisis and international concern over attacks on religious minority groups. The UK government this month revised its travel guidance, cautioning that “terrorists are likely to try to carry out attacks” in Bangladesh as it advised citizens against “all but essential travel”.

For better or worse, Ms Hasina’s ouster was necessary, says Rafiqul Islam, a 19-year-old Dhaka University student who was one of the thousands who took part in demonstrations that led to her downfall. He and others braved confrontations with a police force ordered to shoot at protesters to quash the unrest.

It was the rising death toll among students, and the security forces’ eventual refusal to carry out those orders, that made it clear Ms Hasina could not continue. The Yunus administration revealed in November that about 1,500 people died in protests and as many as 3,500 may have been forcibly abducted during Ms Hasina’s rule.