Senior leaders of Sheikh Hasina’s political party have urged India to continue sheltering the exiled former Bangladesh prime minister who was sentenced to death in absentia by a war crimes court.
The Awami League members, who are also in exile, asked India to intervene in their fight against Bangladesh’s interim government led by Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus, according to reports.
Hasina was sentenced to death on Monday by Bangladesh’s International Crimes Tribunal at the end of a months-long trial that found her guilty of ordering a deadly crackdown on a student-led uprising last year. Hasina, who fled to neighbouring India in August 2024 at the height of the uprising against her government, issued a statement dismissing the court as a "rigged tribunal".
The interim government described it as a "historic verdict", but called for calm and warned that it would deal with any disorder.
Awami League members told The Indian Express they will return home only if there is political inclusion. Earlier this year, Bangladesh’s election commission suspended the registration of Hasina’s party, effectively blocking the Awami League from contesting the upcoming polls. Her supporters threatened unrest if the Awami League, once the country's largest, remains banned from elections in February.
The move came days after Mr Yunus banned all activities of the former ruling party, citing national security threats and the war crimes investigation into hundreds of deaths during the agitation that toppled Ms Hasina last year.
“India has to help us in our fight against the interim government which created the ITC (International Crimes Tribunal) and which gave such an illegal verdict of death penalty for our Prime Minister in absentia. It is a totally one-sided verdict, where no opportunity for defence was given,” former textiles and jute minister, Jahangir Kabir Nanok, said.
Four-time MP Nahim Razzaq told the outlet that the verdict against Hasina has “suddenly motivated” them. The International Crimes Tribunal also gave the death penalty to her home minister Asaduzzaman Khan.
Mr Razzaq said: “We know going back to Bangladesh is a challenge, but if the ban on the party is lifted and we are granted bail in the cases against us, the cadre and the leadership are raring to go.”
Hasina has rejected all allegations, insisting that she and Khan “acted in good faith and were trying to minimise the loss of life”.
“We lost control of the situation, but to characterise what happened as a premeditated assault on citizens is simply to misread the facts,” she said in a statement.
On Tuesday, the Awami League declared a nationwide shutdown to protest the verdict.
Meanwhile, another senior member of the Awami League, Jahangir Kabir Nanok, said that Mr Yunus “has to resign”.
He said: “The senior leaders of the Awami League are clear about the fact that we will not participate in polls under him.”
Parties across Bangladesh’s political spectrum have pressed India to honour Dhaka’s request to hand over Hasina. The BNP accused New Delhi of sheltering “a fugitive criminal”, while Jamaat-e-Islami urged India to behave like “a good neighbour”. The National Citizen Party welcomed the verdict as “appropriate justice”.
Asif Nazrul, the interim government’s legal adviser, said Dhaka would follow up with another formal request to India.
“If India continues to shelter this mass murderer,” he said, “then India must understand that it is an act of hostility.”
New Delhi had earlier confirmed receiving a diplomatic note requesting Hasina’s extradition, but it had offered no substantive reply before Monday’s verdict.
