Exit Khaleda, Enter Tarique! |
A prominent figure in Bangladesh’s politics for more than forty years, BegumKhaleda Zia demise impact, political implications in Bangladesh, BNP sympathy wave, Tarique Rahman return to Dhaka, Bangladesh general elections February 2026, BNP clean sweep prediction, Awami League marginalisation, Jamaat electoral prospects, post-Khaleda Zia political scenario,rose from an ordinary housewife’s life to become the country’s first woman Prime Minister and one of the most influential leaders in South Asia’s post-independence history.
Her political career was moulded by military rule, mass movements, electoral politics and prolonged legal and political standoffs. Only a matriculate, while in her college years, she married then Pakistan Army officer Ziaur Rahman in 1960. During the Liberation War in 1971, she initially went into hiding.
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On July 2, in 1971, Pakistani forces had detained Khaleda Zia and her two sons from a house in Dhaka and imprisoned them at the Dhaka Cantonment. She remained in captivity till December 15, just before Bangladesh became independent.
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Following Ziaur Rahman’s assassination in 1981, on the exhortation of senior BNP leaders and activists, she assumed a leadership role in the party. With no prior political experience, she accepted the challenge and soon emerged as a key figure in opposition politics.
She led the........