In Bangladesh, scars never stay closed for long. The death sentence handed down to former prime minister Sheikhy Hasina —tried in absentia and currently exiled in India— has shaken Dhaka and reignited streets that never fully cooled after the 2024 protests. A divided nation looks at the ruling through competing lenses: justice for some, political retaliation for others.
The International Crimes Tribunal in Dhaka ruled that Hasina was responsible, by command and by inaction, for the July 2024 repression that left 1,400 people dead and forced her out after 15 years of iron-fisted rule. Interim leader and Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus hailed the decision as “historic”. Hasina dismissed it as “partial and politically driven”. Predictable, but revealing.
Internationally, all eyes now turn to India. Bangladesh has requested Hasina’s extradition, but it is unlikely that Narendra Modi will hand over such a politically charged figure. His silence —strategic and heavy— suggests Delhi has no appetite for inflaming a fragile border.
The case is not just a trial; it is the reckoning of a country burdened with long-standing social and symbolic fractures. The 2024 protests began with a bureaucratic dispute over veteran-family job quotas but escalated into a nationwide revolt. And the lessons, it seems, remain unlearned.
Hasina was not the only one condemned. Former interior minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal also received a death sentence, while ex–police chief Abdullah Al-Mamun was given five years. Massive security deployments took over Dhaka as crowds attempted to storm the house-museum of Hasina’s father, Bangladesh’s founding president Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.
Yunus urged calm, aware that he governs a political minefield. The UN, while acknowledging the symbolic importance of the verdict, reiterated its opposition to the death penalty. The diplomatic balancing act continues.
Bangladesh now enters a volatile chapter: a transitional government, an exiled former leader sentenced to death, India as an unwilling referee, and a public torn between celebration, suspicion and fear. The verdict has been delivered; managing what comes next will be the true test.
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