Not only did former Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and a big chunk of her party’s leadership find refuge in India, they seem to be taking inspiration from the country’s oldest political party, the Congress. If being pro-India made Hasina deeply unpopular in her country, among other grouses against her, taking inspiration from Indian politics will hardly endear her to Bangladeshis now.
With the next round of national elections in Bangladesh due in February 2026, Hasina’s party—the Awami League—is in serious thoughts about who would succeed the deposed prime minister as the face of the party.
All political activities of the Awami League are banned under the Anti-Terrorism Act until the trial of its leaders is completed in the International Crimes Tribunal (ICT). However, it has not stopped the party from thinking of a Rahul-Priyanka Gandhi model to take over the reins from Hasina.
While opinion is divided in India about the efficacy of the Rahul-Priyanka model in the Congress, this is not a formula that would work for the Awami League—especially after the July Revolution of 2024 that toppled Hasina.
What Hasina wants
On 8 September, the BBC Bangla put out a report stating that Hasina has been mulling a family-centric leadership model for her party, like the Congress, which has both Rahul and Priyanka Gandhi in Parliament. Citing political sources close to Hasina, the report said that Hasina’s son Sajeeb Wazed Joy, 54, who is currently in the United States, has become the Awami League’s de facto spokesperson. He speaks on Bangladesh politics and the party’s take on various issues in the international media.
On her part, Hasina’s daughter Saima Wazed Putul, 52, the former South East Asian regional director of the World Health Organisation, has been reportedly handling major internal responsibilities of the party, drafting speeches, planning political programmes, and representing her mother in various diplomatic meetings. Hasina’s nephew, Radwan Mujib Siddiq Bobby, is also expected to play a supporting role to her children.
The BBC Bangla report, which has created a sensation in Bangladesh, said that significant shifts are taking place in the party’s central leadership as well. One of the most prominent faces in the Awami League before the fall of the Hasina government on 5 August 2024, Obaidul Quader, remains the general secretary of the party. However, he has reportedly not met the former prime minister since her escape to India.
The report also said Hasina’s new coterie consists of former Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal, former MP and current joint secretary Bahauddin Nasim, as well as former Minister of Textiles and Jute Jahangir Kabir Nanak. The report said there is a temporary office that has been set up in Kolkata from where the Awami League leaders run the party’s affairs. For consultations with Hasina, they fly down to Delhi.
According to the BBC report, it is widely believed in Awami League circles that the Hasina family’s generational ties with the Gandhi family have influenced the former Bangladesh prime minister to pass on the baton of her party to her children, like Gandhis in India. Hasina has also reportedly admired Rahul Gandhi’s ‘Bharat Jodo Yatra’ and its effect on Indian politics. The report added that Hasina has also shown keen interest in Rahul and Priyanka’s political journey and made up her mind to apply the same formula for her party.
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Reading the room wrong
One of the main charges against Sheikh Hasina that got Bangladesh’s youth on the streets against her government was large-scale corruption, the beneficiaries of which were allegedly her family members and the top leadership of her party. Though the July Revolution of 2024 began over the issue of quotas in government jobs, it soon became a rallying cry against the Hasina dispensation and what it stood for—dynastic rule that did not take into account the aspirations of the country’s youth.
On 17 September, the Bangladesh press reported that five witnesses had testified in three separate corruption cases against Hasina, her son Joy, daughter Putul, and others over an alleged land scam. An argument can be made that some of these cases are perhaps politically motivated against the deposed prime minister and her family by the current interim government under Muhammad Yunus. But what cannot be ignored is the public anger against the Hasina family.
Soon after the fall of the Hasina government, mobs had not only desecrated and pulled down statues of her father, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, but also demolished Dhanmondi 32, the house in which he was assassinated on 15 August 1975, and which served as his memorial. Such was the anger against the Hasina family that attackers had also wanted to snuff out her father from the nation’s collective memory, even though he was the then father of the nation. How prudent then is Hasina’s reported decision to pass on the Awami League baton to her children?
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Another wrong move
Bangladeshi Hindu rights activist Rupan Guha told ThePrint that the country needs a return to the values of the 1971 liberation war, when people had risen over narrow religiosity and had united through common language and culture. “Both Joy and Putul are educated, highly qualified, and secular at heart. They are good choices to lead Bangladesh, currently in the throes of communalism and lawlessness, to a saner tomorrow,” Guha added.
However, according to Bangladeshi academic Sharin Shajahan Naomi, a postdoctoral fellow at India’s KREA University, Joy and Putul’s lack of on-ground political experience could rule the narrative against the brother-sister duo. “They can be two of many stakeholders of Awami League, but Bangladeshi youth now want leaders who have worked at the grassroots, walked the dusty roads and interacted with the masses, not someone who comes with the baggage of the past,” Naomi said.
Saqlain Rizve, Bangladesh correspondent of The Diplomat, said that the Rahul-Priyanka model cannot be applied to Joy and Putul, as a mass uprising never toppled the Congress government. “Hasina was ousted for corruption, enforced disappearances and finally mass killings. Her children cannot escape that legacy. How will people accept?” Rizve added.
If elections are indeed held in February 2026, there is little chance that the Awami League will be able to participate in them, given the current political climate in Bangladesh. Which means Hasina’s party will remain out of power for some more time. The party leadership should utilise this time to go back to the drawing board and come up with a new political model that would appeal to Bangladesh’s youth. Falling back on dynastic politics that the youth revolted against is unlikely to make the cut.
Deep Halder is an author and journalist. He tweets @deepscribble. Views are personal.
(Edited by Saptak Datta)