Hasina, floods, visas: What’s troubling India-Bangladesh relations? | Battle Information

Final September, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi hosted his Bangladeshi counterpart Sheikh Hasina as a particular visitor on the margins of the G20 Summit in New Delhi. It was a gesture of heat in the direction of a neighbour that India seen as an particularly shut accomplice.

Now, a 12 months later, that proximity to Hasina has became a headache for India. Earlier this month, scholar protests compelled Hasina out of energy after 15 years. Hasina fled to India.

And weeks after Hasina’s overthrow, anti-India sentiment in Bangladesh stays excessive — seen in every thing from rising requires New Delhi to extradite Hasina to accusations that India is utilizing visas and water alike to focus on its neighbour.

Right here’s a breakdown of all that’s ailing relations between the 2 nations:

Opposition calls for for Hasina’s extradition

Hasina fled Bangladesh on August 5 by army helicopter and landed at a army base near New Delhi, the place she was greeted by India’s Nationwide Safety Adviser Ajit Doval. She is since believed to have been residing in and across the Indian capital.

However requires Hasina’s extradition again to Bangladesh are rising.

On Monday, the final secretary of the primary opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Celebration (BNP), Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir, instructed Indian media that Hasina have to be extradited and tried in Bangladesh. Muhammed Quader, the chairman of the Jatiya Celebration, echoed this demand on the identical day. Quader was the opposition chief of the Bangladesh parliament dissolved on August 6.

“India ought to assist Bangladesh search accountability from her as she has evidently completed nice deal of hurt to Bangladesh,” Alamgir was quoted as saying by Indian media. A slew of authorized circumstances, together with homicide probes, face Hasina.

Final week, Bangladesh’s interim authorities underneath Nobel laureate Mohammed Yunus cancelled Hasina’s diplomatic visa. With out that, it’s unclear how lengthy Hasina can legally keep in India. The Indian authorities has not commented on the difficulty.

Ali Riaz, professor and political scientist at Illinois State College, stated that folks in Bangladesh have been searching for Hasina’s extradition to carry her accountable for alleged enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings that passed off in Bangladesh throughout her 15 years of rule.

The Fast Motion Battalion (RAB) paramilitary pressure was sanctioned by the United Nations for its involvement within the killings and disappearances.

Since Hasina rose to the highest job in 2009, “over 600 disappearances” have been dedicated by safety forces, based on Human Rights Watch final 12 months.

Is India liable for the floods in Bangladesh?

Bangladesh, alongside elements of northeast India together with Tripura, Assam and Meghalaya skilled a downpour of heavy rainfall throughout the month of August.

Bangladesh’s Ministry of Catastrophe Administration and Reduction stated on August 23 that roughly 190,000 individuals have been taken to emergency reduction shelters. Of Bangladesh’s 64 districts, 11 have been hit by the flooding, the ministry stated. A couple of million individuals have been lower off from the remainder of the nation by the flooding.

On Bangladeshi our on-line world, nevertheless, rumours began circulating that the floods have been attributable to India’s deliberate opening of the Dumbur Dam, which is upstream of the Gumti River in India’s Tripura State. The Gumti River flows from India to Bangladesh. There is no such thing as a proof thus far to again this assertion.

India’s Ministry of Exterior Affairs launched a press release on August 22, saying that the flooding was from extreme rain and water from giant catchments downstream of the dam. “We stay dedicated to resolving points and mutual issues in water assets and river water administration by way of bilateral consultations and technical discussions,” stated the assertion. There are 54 transboundary rivers between India and Bangladesh.

Earlier this week, Pranay Verma, India’s excessive commissioner to Bangladesh, instructed Yunus that the water from the dam was “launched mechanically” as a result of elevated ranges.

Officers at Bangladesh’s Flood Forecasting and Warning Centre in Bangladesh have, nevertheless, instructed Al Jazeera that in contrast to prior to now, India didn’t problem a warning to its neighbour on the discharge of water. That warning, he added, might have helped stop deaths and destruction.

No matter what what induced the flooding, many Bangladeshis have been fast responsible India due to previous experiences with water sharing, stated Riaz. Bangladesh has lengthy sought entry to extra water from their shared rivers — a pact for one such settlement has been in limbo for greater than a decade, a sore level for Dhaka.

“Beforehand throughout monsoon, we’ve got seen that Bangladesh is inundated with water whereas throughout the dry season, Bangladesh by no means obtained what they needed,” stated Riaz.

What is going on in Indian visa centres in Bangladesh?

Indian visa software centres (IVACS) remained closed in Dhaka and Sathkira in southwestern Bangladesh on Tuesday.

This was a day after lots of of individuals protested in opposition to delays within the processing of their visas. India has scaled again its diplomatic presence in Dhaka amid safety issues following Hasina’s overthrow. On the protests, individuals demanded that their their passports be returned.

About 1.6 million Bangladeshis visited India in 2023 — the highest vacation spot for the nation’s residents. Tourism and medical remedy rank as the largest causes that draw Bangladeshis to India.

Why is the connection between Bangladesh and India troubled?

New Delhi and Dhaka have lengthy shared robust diplomatic and commerce relations. The Indian military performed a vital position in serving to Bangladesh achieve independence from Pakistan in 1971.

Nonetheless, in current many years, it has more and more seen Hasina and her secular Awami League celebration as higher aligned with India’s pursuits. Lots of Hasina’s critics have accused India of attempting to prop up her regime, regardless of mounting proof of undemocratic acts, together with the crushing of dissent, arrests of critics and alleged makes an attempt to govern elections.

Riaz stated that anger in opposition to India inside Bangladesh was “a mirrored image of the discontent that has been simmering for years over respectable points”.

“India’s unqualified assist for Hasina,” he stated, meant that it had supported “three fraudulent elections and egregious violations of human rights”.

He cited the instance of former Indian Overseas Secretary Sujatha Singh visiting Bangladesh earlier than the 2014 election to dissuade the Jatiya Celebration from boycotting the polls. “This gave Awami League a lifeline”. Most opposition events boycotted the election, which adopted the arrests of senior BNP leaders, together with its chief, Begum Khaleda Zia.

In the meantime, incidents, after Hasina’s overthrow, of assaults on Bangladeshi Hindus — the nation’s largest minority group —  sparked outrage in India. Modi additionally sounded an alarm internationally by discussing the difficulty with US President Joe Biden.

A whole bunch of protesters rallied in Dhaka on August 9 in opposition to violence concentrating on the nation’s Hindus, who make up 8 % of the inhabitants. The Bangladesh Hindu Buddhist Christian Unity Council — an umbrella group representing the nation’s non secular minorities — estimated that not less than 52 districts noticed communal violence since Hasina’s resignation.

Yunus, the caretaker prime minister of Bangladesh, known as Modi on August 16 to guarantee him of the security of Hindus within the nation. “Reiterated India’s assist for a democratic, secure, peaceable and progressive Bangladesh,” the Indian prime minister wrote on X.

Riaz stated that the mending of ties between the 2 nations was “India’s duty, by all means,” as a result of Hasina’s regime survived due to India’s assist.

“Bangladesh has entered a brand new chapter,” Riaz stated, referring to the tip of Hasina’s lengthy rule.

“Indians ought to recalibrate their coverage as a substitute of crying foul on their problem. Settle for the truth that Bangladesh has moved on, and transfer on, too”.