Shamima Choudhury
It is interesting that the head of the Bangladesh Interim government Dr. M. Yunus, a Nobel Laureate is now appears to be supporting India against whom he and his extremist students groups have launched a jehad, an all out crusade against India and anything of India. They are boycotting visiting India, they are boycotting the Indian products, and as a show of unity, they burned down a few Indian merchandise publicly at rallies. One of Dr. Yunus chief media advisers Pinaki Bhattacherjee, stationed in France, started an all out crusade against India for many months. He is being echoed by Dr. Yunus’s two Cabinet members, Mahfuz Alam and Asif Mahmud Shabuj and his Press Secretary Shafiqul Alam that anything Indian must be boycotted.
Map of New Bangladesh: it includes 10 states of India
His Cabinet Adviser Mahfuz Alam whom Dr. Yunus fondly introduced at the UN as the “meticulous designer of the August Uprising” drew a new map of Bangladesh that includes 10 states of India, a greater Bangladesh and reportedly drones and missiles were mobilized to the Bangladesh-India borders. Not only that, it created so much euphoria that many ex-army officers claimed that they could capture Kolkata, West Bengal’s capital in four hours. More importantly, the employers of Dr. Yunus as the Chief Advisor, namely the student leaders of the anti-discrimination movement of July-August, 2024 namely M/S Nahid Islam, Sarjis Alam, and Hasnath Abdullah (he wants to become the nation’s Army Chief by replacing the current one) are deadly opposed to India. They squarely blame India for anything wrong or evil in Bangladesh. The government media reported that the proposed 142-story iconic high-rise building that was proposed to be built by an American medical business man, Dr. Kaliprodip Chowdhury was also denied to do it as India opposed it. During the BNP rule in 1991-96 and 2001-06, Dr. Chowdhury tried to build a modern hospital in Dhaka but his proposal was not accepted. Afterwards, he built a 750-bed hospital in West Bengal of India. Possibly in both the cases his proposals were not accepted as he refused to pay bribes to the government officials. He is an American businessman and since he is a successful ‘brown businessman’, the US government monitors all his investment very closely. By giving bribes to Bangladesh officials he does not like to endanger his multi-billion dollar business in the USA. However, the Yunus media promoters are portraying that his high rise building proposal in Dhaka was rejected as the Indian government opposed it.
India bashing is the talk of the town
Everyday the Bangladesh media is full of India bashing. And its young leaders are deadly against keeping any relationship with India. They wanted the government to stop importing essential items like rice, wheat, sugar, edible oil, onion, potato, energy, etc from India and instead to import these items from Pakistan, Turkey, China and Brazil even at a higher price. Nowadays, it is reported in the media that the Pakistani ships are bringing food items plus weapons to Bangladesh without any inspection at the ports. Dr. Yunus’ Adviser for flood and environmental issues, Ms. Rizwana Hasan, a Cabinet member often blames India for floods in Bangladesh and she led a rally and a long march on the Teestha river barrage project. To reduce dependence on India for water sharing and also to teach India a good lesson, they have been proposing to build the Teestha barrage project . The ever active media office of Dr. Yunus gave hope to the nation that the Chinese government would be sending a Chinese aircraft to take Dr. Yunus to Beijing to finalize the Teestha barrage project during his visit. It is reported that the Chinese government would finance it and also build it. Earlier, India showed interest in undertaking a joint feasibility study on the project.
Bangladesh media projecting depression in India due to strain relationship
During the past government of Sheikh Hasina, as the relationship between Bangladesh and India was friendly not hostile, few hundred thousand Bangladeshis used to visit India routinely either as tourists, or for medical treatment or for shopping. Medical treatment is not only better but also much cheaper in India vis-a-vis Bangladesh or Thailand. No wonder the year before last year, nearly 28,00,000 (28 lakh) Bangladeshis visited India. Now the Yunus government in spite of the language barrier has made arrangements with the Chinese government to send Bangladeshis to China for their medical treatment. Here at home, the Bangladesh government media projecting a sharp economic depression in the West Bengal retail business and closure of many medical facilities in India due to the dearth of medical patients from Bangladesh.
SAARC Vs. BIMSTEC: BIMSTEC an Indian Initiative
Since the regional organization the SAARC: the South Asia Association of Regional Cooperation, an organization of 8 countries of South Asia is virtually dead due to rivalries between Pakistan and India, Dr. Yunus on his becoming the Chief Advisor undertook special initiatives to revive it. He met Pakistan’s Prime Minister a couple of times and emphasized strengthening the SAARC.
To avoid Pakistan, at the initiative of India BIMSTEC, a regional organization for economic cooperation consisting of Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Myanmar, Nepal, Sri Lanka, and Thailand was formed and its Secretariat is in Bangladesh. The current Director General of it is an Indian diplomat. Dr. Yunus would be attending its Summit in Thailand this week.
While the Yunus government and its supporters and employers are deadly against India and all Indian initiatives, but surprisingly, Dr. Yunus is attending it.
The critics argue that whenever he gets an invitation to attend any international or multilateral meetings, he always loves to join them as it is his hobby. The others argue, it might give him an opportunity for Photo Ops to have a picture with the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. India being the largest democracy always on principle encourages democratic governments rather than military or civil military-technocratic governments. Since the Yunus government is neither a constitutional government nor does it have the people’s mandate, it is reluctant to negotiate issues with a non-democratic temporary government like that of Dr. Yunus. India is not alone. In fact, most of the countries are reluctant to invest in Bangladesh as the current Yunus government is unstable and shaky. Moreover, under the patronage of the Yunus government the jehadis and religious extremists are trying to take over the country, establish an Islamic Caliphate, and they already created total lawlessness and anarchy in the country. Yunus government released all the jehadis and terrorists from jails and they under the banner of banned terrorist organization the “Hijbut Tahir” recently organized public demonstrations in the main thoroughfares of Bangladesh. Under the Draconian media control and under the government’s the “Operation Devil Hunt” no one is allowed to criticize the government nor can publish any negative story on the Yunus government. Many journalists are in jails. However, the investors know it and therefore, they are shifting their investments abroad.
Dr. Yunus China trip failed
Dr. Yunus went to China with lots of hope, unfortunately, except assurances, China did not commit anything substantial to him. He reiterated what the Sheikh Hasina government stated in the past that Bangladesh believes in the One-China policy and it demanded to reduce interest rates on credits. Although there is nothing new, his media wing stated that China granted them tariff-free facilities, agreed to import mangoes from Bangladesh, and agreed to provide a $2.1 billion credit facility. They agreed to provide tariff-free facilities to 98% exportables of Bangladesh including RMG in 2020, they agreed to buy mangoes a year before last year. When Chinese President Xi Jinping visited Bangladesh in 2016, they signed nearly $23 billion worth of credit in the government sector and another $13 billion worth in the private sector totalling $36 billion in 2016. Unfortunately, so far Bangladesh actually received around $5 billion only as the Hasina government was very prudent in accepting foreign loans and credits.
Is it possible that since the Chinese government showed a cold shoulder, Dr. Yunus felt an urgency to improve its relationship with India and therefore, in spite of so much opposition by his supporters and employers, he is determined to attend the BIMSTEC summit this week?