With less than five weeks before Bangladesh’s 13th national election, the country’s domestic politics has reached its nadir since 2024 July Uprising. Since the emergence of ‘new Bangladesh’, the law-and-order situation has taken a toll with no signs of improvements at any time. Bangladesh’s interim government, instead of amplifying security measures and acknowledging its administrative loopholes, maintained a persistent attitude of nonchalance. Geopolitically, under the interim government, the country’s neighborhood dynamics underwent an unsettling change with Dhaka tilting towards Pakistan while rupturing its relations with India, once a closest neighbor. New manifestations of violence—political, ethnic, communal, gender—are raking up simultaneously with the Islamists on a rise in the country. These factions, typically Bangladesh’s predominant pro-Pakistan voices, are now weaponizing violence against minorities as a bait to sustain the India-Bangladesh diplomatic cool.

The July Uprising and the political aftermath in Bangladesh noted anti-Awami League forces making its anti-India sentiments loud and clear—alleging India behind Bangladesh’s controversial elections in the past that enabled Sheikh Hasina’s prolonged stay in power. The July ‘warriors’, a section that later established the National Citizens Party and in electoral alliance with Jamaat-e-Islami, blames New Delhi for making Awami League its own ‘slave’ and establishing hegemony over Bangladesh, a political narrative carried on by the interim government as well. In fact, its geopolitical hedging is believed to be interim government’s deliberate anti-League posturing that blends well with the present political atmosphere and gives interim government the legitimacy it seeks. In other words, by narrowing India-Bangladesh ties through Awami League prism, the present anti-India sentiments not only became somewhat mainstream but also became a great gimmick for political parties now competing to secure electoral mandate in the February election. The interim government, too, has made good use of prevailing anti-India sentiment via statements of shifting blame for every major domestic unrest within the country, bypassing accountability and accusing New Delhi of harbouring activities in its soil that seeks to destabilize Bangladesh, a claim that India has categorically

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