The initial June 2024 Bangladesh students’ protest that broke out was mainly observed as a deep-rooted resentment against the government employment reservation quotas. As the days passed, the protest seemed to be rapidly widespread, exceeding its hope with political entities, objectifying the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), which seemed to maintain abstention from the electoral process in opposition to prevailing electoral frameworks, which indirectly led to seizing the opportunity to modify the political atmosphere in the country. The BNP and its Islamist ally, Jamaat-e-Islami, carefully grabbed the protests and reframed them into a mass mobilisation to overthrow Sheikh Hasina’s government, taking advantage of the socio-political unrest.
Although the BNP has attempted several times in the past to orchestrate a large-scale rebellion against Hasina’s government, its attempts have consistently failed to garner enough support from the public to force the government to concede to its demands for electoral change. The BNP briefly thought it was in a strong position to regain political leadership after the student-led revolution succeeded in overthrowing Sheikh Hasina on August 5, 2024, and then tried to expel the Awami League from the country’s political system. It is also true to witness the consequent development that led to deep division between the BNP and the Anti-Discrimination Students Movement (ADSM) of Bangladesh, which further swayed the exercise and decision-making of the Interim Government of Mohammad Yunus. This split results in rising tension for the upcoming political dispute, causing serious consequences and leading to another stage of national destabilisation.
The widening gap between the BNP and ADSM resulted in a wide range of controversial issues. The key highlighted issues that arise are constitutional and electoral reforms, the postponement of national elections, and—above all—the attempts to reinterpret the July-August Uprising as a revolutionary event that could replace the Independence Declaration of 1971. The things that come out are most noticeable in the opposing views on the parameters of the alleged July Proclamation/Declaration, which is turning into a major source of conflict between the two groups.
The “July Proclamation” , a draft by ADSM in late December 2024, was revealed that has elicited widespread public scrutiny ever since. Attempting to reframe Bangladesh’s independence struggle as “a People’s War” instead of a “Liberation War,” the draft notably omits any mention of the Independence Declaration of March 26, 1971, which led to the country’s independence after a 10-month genocidal campaign by the Pakistan Army. This intentional revisionism sparked immediate rejection from the BNP, which criticised the student movement leadership for undermining the foundational consensus surrounding the Liberation War.
Additionally, the leadership of ADSM has strongly advocated for the repeal of what it refers to as the “Mujib-badi Constitution of 1972,” claiming that the current legal framework does not adequately reflect the true “aspirations of the Liberation War participants.” The movement demands that structural changes be made before any elections are held, and they insist on the complete demolition, or burying, of this constitution. The BNP, on the other hand, has vehemently opposed the complete repeal of the 1972 Constitution and is in favour of specific changes meant to provide strong systemic checks and balances in order to prevent future governments from becoming increasingly dictatorial. The BNP leadership also maintains that only a legally elected government after national elections can implement such broad constitutional changes, supporting its stance that the order of political change must follow procedural legitimacy rather than the revolutionary rupture that the student leaders are demanding.
The timeliness of the nation’s systematic reforms is a second area of disagreement between the BNP and ADSM. Although all sides agree that extensive institutional reforms are necessary, they are completely at odds on the best way to go about enacting them and when to do so. According to the BNP, only a properly elected government with a clear popular mandate can carry out such significant reforms, not an unelected interim government that lacks the necessary democratic and constitutional legitimacy.
The BNP, however, views the ADSM leadership’s unwavering desire that these reforms be implemented before any election process as a calculated move to postpone elections while claiming to be implementing reforms. It correctly interprets these actions as a coordinated attempt by the leadership of the student movement, supported by its power in the transitional government, to unilaterally shape the political environment in its favour. According to the BNP, this apparent aversion to electoral legitimacy exacerbates suspicions that ADSM is trying to create a political environment that will support its long-term consolidation of power because it reflects the very extra-constitutional authoritarianism of the previous administration that the student leaders had previously denounced. For instance, Tarique Rahman, the acting head of the BNP, warned that certain forces—read: student leaders—were delaying elections under the guise of reforms. We observe that some individuals are dragging out various procedures by bringing up reforms. We must determine now if this constant harping on reforms is a plot. The nation’s issues will worsen if this procedure is extended on the pretext of changes, Rahman stated.
This is closely linked to the dispute between these two groups over electoral reforms. The BNP has criticised Chief Advisor Muhammad Yunus’s public argument to lower the voting age from 18 to 17 as another desperate attempt by the interim government to postpone the elections. BNP secretary general Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir claimed that this has caused people to fear that the student leaders are using this as a tactic to waste more time and cause “further delays” in the conduct of elections because it would require the creation of new electoral rolls.
In order to regain a legitimate democratic space in such a changing political environment, the BNP must either confront ADSM’s unilateralism or form partnerships with other political players, such as the Awami League, or risk continuing to be marginalised politically, as it has been for the past ten and a half years. The leadership of the BNP is now directly responsible for navigating this perilous time with refocused pragmatism.
(The views are personal. The write is the student of Post Graduate Diploma in Journalism (English) at Indian Institute of Mass Communication, Jammu)
