Dhaka Diary 3: Yunus administration outdoes Hasina government in record time

Hasina was accused of politicising the judiciary and securing tailor-made judgments. But Bangladesh has likely seen far more, in far less time, under Yunus.

From Baridhara diplomatic zone, the taxi took the four-lane elevated tollway - deposed Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s gift to Dhaka – to reach David Bergman’s residence at Bailey Road. The Bangladeshi capital is not as vast as Delhi, but it is 2.5 times more densely populated. This, coupled with decades of low infrastructure spending since the days of army ruler H. M. Ershad (1983–90), turned the country into a logistics nightmare. Dhaka became infamous for its slow traffic.

Hasina (2009–2024) tried to address it. The most significant of her projects was the iconic Padma Bridge, which helped mitigate the North-South divide. Dhaka got a metro rail, a new airport terminal, and the elevated expressway. Most of these mega projects were completed ahead of the January 2024 election — a fast timeline by Bangladeshi standards. The expressway was partially opened; once completed, it is expected to ease connectivity with the economic nerve centre at Chittagong.

The Lost Opportunity 

David is Bangladesh’s own foreign journalist, who has taken it upon himself to be the nation’s conscience keeper. British by birth and citizenship, he is married into one of Dhaka’s most illustrious families. His father-in-law, Kamal Hossain, is a legal luminary of international repute. He was the country’s first law minister and played a key role in drafting the Constitution — the very document the Muhammad Yunus administration is now keen to replace.

Kamal exited the Awami League in the 1990s following differences with Hasina — one of many instances of her failure to accommodate dissenting voices, preferring instead to fill the space with yes-men. Kamal was instrumental in convincing the League’s archrival, the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), to contest the 2018 election. That was the only time an election was competitive during Hasina’s rule. She squandered the opportunity to gain political legitimacy by rigging the polls.

David tormented Hasina with his incisive articles, mostly focused on human rights. A student of law with a background in legal activism against corporates around the world, he highlighted the lack of legal justice in Bangladesh. Procedural loopholes in the trial of Liberation War criminals at the International Crimes Tribunal (ICT), and enforced disappearances, were his recurring themes.

His journalism came at a cost. David was denied entry into Bangladesh from 2017. In a 2023 article in Netra News, he spoke of the “blow-back” his Dhaka-based family faced while he was reporting from abroad. (Journalists in Dhaka suffered more. The Daily Star editor Mahfuz Anam faced 84 cases, including 16 sedition charges.)

However, people paid attention to his opinions. In his last article before Hasina’s fall (A disturbing legal provision makes convicting law enforcers difficult, August 1, The Daily Star), David suggested trying the July killers at the ICT. Yunus did exactly that — but it turned out to be both the beginning and the end of his promise to build a free and fair Bangladesh. 

Political Retribution

Over the last ten months, Yunus has not missed a single opportunity to accuse Hasina. He even blamed her for giving the country a head start in infrastructure-led growth. “All the mega projects the previous government took were so they could make lots of money out of that cut,” (quote unchanged) he said at a Chatham House meeting in the UK early this month.

Soon after assuming office, on August 8, the interim administration unleashed a student-led mob to chase away many Supreme Court and High Court judges, including the Chief Justice. A journalist who was present in the office of an adviser (equivalent to a cabinet minister) that day witnessed the administration bargaining hard with the army to prevent any intervention.

Hasina was accused of politicising the judiciary and securing tailor-made judgments. But Bangladesh has likely seen far more, in far less time, under Yunus. Many allies or potential allies of the Yunus administration were acquitted from previously sentenced cases — some involving terror charges. BNP and Jamaat-e-Islami were major beneficiaries. Yunus and his Grameen Bank were cleared of nearly all charges.

Meanwhile, jails were filled with Awami League activists, journalists, and others. Civil society activist Shahriyar Kabir — who was at the forefront of demanding justice for the mass rape and murder by Jamaat-e-Islami during the Liberation War — is now behind bars. According to Anam (Prothom Alo, May 4), at least 266 journalists are facing criminal charges, including murder.

Barrister Tureen Afroz, a former ICT prosecutor, was arrested in April this year for the attempted murder of a 21-year-old during the July protests. In a social media post, David described it as “political retribution.” The following month, actor Nusrat Faria was arrested on similar charges. She had played Hasina in Shyam Benegal’s 2023 film Mujib: The Making of a Nation. Faria got bail, but most others remain in jail.

Senior advocate and BNP chairperson’s adviser, Fazlur Rahman, claimed that the courts were “relatively free” during Hasina’s rule. “There was no dearth of fake cases against BNP activists then, but the higher courts were generous in granting bail. Even that much justice is now denied,” he said. Rahman, once a Mujib loyalist, was pushed out of the party by Hasina. Today, he is a fierce critic of the Yunus administration, and the League circulates his TV talk show clips on social media.

How Bad Was Hasina?

Rahman is not alone. Many in Dhaka’s civil society who once targeted Hasina are now turning against Yunus. Most do so privately, fearing retribution.

David, now back in Dhaka, is doing what he does best: holding a mirror to those in power. He criticised the ban on the Awami League, questioned indiscriminate arrests, and challenged the one-sided blame heaped on Hasina. In his May 22 article (How not to describe the Awami League, The Daily Star), he argued that, without considering the July events, the BNP government of 2001–2006 had no better record on many critical indicators — including extrajudicial killings.

So, how did Dr Yunus’s Bangladesh fare on these counts? According to The Daily Star (Custodial torture, deaths continue, February 11), between August 9 and December 31, 2024, there were 12 extrajudicial killings — double the number reported in the first half of the year.

There were no reported cases of “enforced disappearance” by law enforcers. It wasn’t needed — mobs delivered instant justice. According to a report by the Human Rights Support Society, 119 people were killed and 74 injured in the first seven months of Yunus’s rule. “Many incidents of mob violence were related to political score-settling,” The Daily Star reported.

It will be up to another government to hold this interim administration accountable. Until then, Yunus can continue to blame Hasina for everything.

(This is the concluding part of the ground situation in Bangladesh. The first and second part were published on June 9 and June 12 respectively).

Views are personal, and do not represent the stance of this publication.