New Delhi, India – Bangladesh’s Prime Minister Tarique Rahman’s first journey to India has been placed on maintain, highlighting the strained ties between the 2 South Asian neighbours because the July 2024 student-led rebellion that pressured Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina to flee the nation.
Since coming to energy in February, Rahman – the son of Hasina’s archrival, the late Khaleda Zia – has aimed to enhance ties with India. However a press convention carried out by Hasina, who lives in India in exile, has riled Bangladesh.
Dhaka says that the August 5 press convention has “vitiated” the environment, including that “a propitious surroundings must be created for the go to” of Prime Minister Rahman.
For now, Rahman’s journey appears unsure, as Bangladesh’s Overseas Ministry mentioned officers from each international locations have been engaged in talks for “a number of weeks” to work out a attainable answer.
Right here is all the pieces you must know in regards to the newest diplomatic turbulence between the South Asian neighbours.
What’s up with Rahman’s India go to?
New Delhi had prolonged an invite to Rahman for a stand-alone go to to India this month, forward of subsequent month’s scheduled BRICS summit. BRICS is a grouping of main rising economies, at the moment chaired by India.
Since Rahman took workplace, there have been a number of exchanges between prime ministers and diplomats from each side. India appointed Dinesh Trivedi, a former minister and member of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Occasion (BJP), as its envoy to Dhaka in a uncommon political appointment to the important thing put up.
Final Tuesday, Trivedi appealed to Rahman’s authorities, arguing that the Indian mission is just not asking Dhaka “to neglect the previous”, in an obvious reference to Hasina’s exile in India. “Maintain the previous and kind out the variations of the previous. However transfer on. Don’t get stagnant,” he added.
At a reception hosted by the Indian Excessive Fee in Dhaka, Trivedi mentioned that Modi needed Rahman’s go to to be “memorable”.
However these plans for a go to have been already derailed after Dhaka took offence to Hasina nearly addressing a presser on the Overseas Correspondents’ Membership in New Delhi on August 5, marking two years of her ouster.
India clarified that it had nothing to do with the occasion, however to no avail.
What have each international locations mentioned?
Each capitals have been tight-lipped about Rahman’s go to. “I’ve nothing to say proper now,” mentioned India’s Overseas Ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal, responding to a query about Rahman’s go to.
Talking at an occasion on Saturday, India’s Overseas Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar mentioned India and Bangladesh’s bilateral ties should meet the “take a look at of mutual curiosity”.
“It has to work for them, it has to work for us,” he mentioned.
“There must be an inexpensive diploma of my recognising and respecting what’s their curiosity, simply as I anticipate them additionally to take action,” Jaishankar mentioned.
Rahman’s international affairs adviser, Humayun Kabir, instructed a Bangladeshi information company that there’s “no rush” in Dhaka to facilitate the prime minister’s go to to India.
Kabir added that Dhaka continues to be ascertaining what sort of relationship India desires with the newly elected authorities in Bangladesh.
“The neighbouring nation should correctly perceive the truth of Bangladesh’s July Mass Rebellion, which occurred by way of the sacrifices of greater than 1,500 individuals,” he mentioned, referring to India sitting on the request for Hasina’s extradition.
Earlier this month, New Delhi had mentioned that it was contemplating Hasina’s extradition request based mostly on the established process. Each international locations have an extradition treaty, however with an exception for political instances.
What are the factors of pressure?
Bangladesh has made Hasina’s extradition a significant difficulty. Hasina’s authorities was seen as particularly near India, and New Delhi’s backing of her authoritarian rule additionally angered Bangladeshis.
Dhaka has been looking for the extradition of Hasina, who was handed a death sentence in absentia in November 2025. Some analysts have accused New Delhi of utilizing it as a diplomatic bargaining chip.
Bangladesh has expressed its displeasure with India for internet hosting Hasina and sees Hasina’s political speeches as an interference in its inner affairs. Throughout the August 5 presser, Hasina mentioned she would return to Bangladesh.
“We’ve got requested Indian authorities to expeditiously act on our request to extradite Sheikh Hasina and different fugitive criminals,” the Bangladesh Overseas Ministry mentioned in an X put up on August 16.
“We reiterate that we are going to proceed to pursue our ‘Bangladesh First’ coverage to advertise pleasant bilateral relations with different international locations, together with our neighbours, on the premise of sovereign equality, nationwide dignity, non-interference in one another’s inner affairs and mutual profit.”
For New Delhi, Dhaka inching nearer to Pakistan after a long time of strained ties is a significant diplomatic setback. India performed a significant function within the formation of Bangladesh from Pakistan in 1971.
Shakil Ahmed, an assistant professor of presidency and politics at Dhaka’s Jahangirnagar College, famous that home politics tends to affect international coverage at instances.
“Relations between India and Bangladesh are constrained by their home politics, particularly in Dhaka,” he mentioned.
“Folks in Bangladesh need that any relation with India needs to be based mostly on self-respect and mutual pursuits,” he mentioned, including that Rahman’s authorities has been diversifying its friendships with international international locations, together with the US, China, and Pakistan.
“New Delhi noticed Bangladesh as one among India’s international coverage followers,” Ahmed mentioned, noting that that isn’t the case anymore. “Hasina gave India a clean cheque in international relations, which isn’t taking place anymore.”
India’s Hindu nationalist authorities’s push to fence the 4,096km-long (2,545-mile) border with Bangladesh has additionally strained ties. Anti-Bangladesh rhetoric by ruling occasion officers has additional antagonised Dhaka.
India has been deporting what it calls undocumented Bangladeshi immigrants throughout its borders. Dhaka has accused New Delhi of pushing individuals extrajudicially into Bangladesh with out diplomatic verification.
What’s forward for India-Bangladesh ties?
Sanjay Bhardwaj, a professor of South Asian research on the Jawaharlal Nehru College in Delhi, instructed Al Jazeera that Bangladesh’s Prime Minister Rahman is taking part in to the gallery by stalling his maiden India go to.
Hasina’s case is one among political persecution, mentioned Bhardwaj, as her personal authorities chased Rahman – who lived for the final 17 years in London, the UK, together with all of Hasina’s years in energy – with a number of prison instances.
“India has been optimistic to domesticate and have a developmental partnership with Bangladesh, with no reluctance to develop the financial participation,” he added. “However Rahman is enthusiastic about politics and never eager about the event of Bangladesh.”
Hasina’s extradition is a contentious difficulty, he mentioned, including that each capitals should transfer past this to take care of a productive bilateral relationship.
Sreeradha Datta, a professor specialising in South Asian research at India’s OP Jindal International College, mentioned that each international locations want to speak, since “there isn’t a various”.
As neighbours, “they don’t have a option to disengage”, she mentioned, including that merely the passage of time won’t restore the relations.
India is worried in regards to the Mecca defence pact, Datta instructed Al Jazeera, “However how can one have any management when there isn’t a dialogue and engagement?”
“The preliminary heat diluted in nationalistic noise on each side,” Datta mentioned, referring to preliminary interactions, together with an Indian delegation led by Jaishankar visiting Dhaka final yr for the funeral of Rahman’s mom, Khaleda Zia.
Datta argued that New Delhi wants to return to phrases with a brand new actuality that the federal government of Bangladesh might not share the identical heat because the one underneath Hasina did. “However that doesn’t matter,” she mentioned. “These are neighbours, and a relationship based mostly on targets or pursuits is what is going to take it ahead.”
