Expert analysis and commentary on issues affecting Bangladesh and the region from Inqilab Delta Forum's research team.
Indian media portrays Bangladesh's economic challenges as proof of post-revolution failure. The data tells a different story: today's difficulties are rooted in policies and mismanagement under the Hasina regime.
India's Northeast — the 'Seven Sisters' with 40 million people — is connected to the Indian mainland by only a 22 km strip of land. Dhaka holds the key to solving India's geographic nightmare, but Bangladesh has never leveraged this advantage. The post-August 2024 era demands strategic recalibration.
When Bangladeshi citizens need EU visas, many must travel to New Delhi — a symbolic indignity that reflects broader EU-Bangladesh relationship failures. As LDC graduation approaches, Bangladesh must demand treatment as an independent nation, not an India appendage.
Major global powers have historically viewed Bangladesh not as an independent actor but through an 'India lens' — treating Dhaka as a subset of Delhi policy. This prism distorts how Washington, Tokyo, Moscow, and Brussels engage with a nation of 170 million, but post-August 2024 dynamics are forcing a recalibration.
A comprehensive timeline and analysis of the unprecedented collapse in India-Bangladesh relations, from the Hadi assassination to visa suspensions.
Moscow 'generally defers to Delhi on matters concerning its neighbors' — a pattern so pronounced that no Soviet/Russian foreign minister visited Bangladesh until 2023, 52 years after independence. The Rooppur nuclear plant exemplifies this triangulated relationship.
Japan has invested billions in Bangladesh infrastructure — but Tokyo's strategic framework explicitly conceptualizes these investments as serving India connectivity. The question for Dhaka: can Japanese investment be reframed as bilateral partnership rather than triangulated development?
The 2025 shift in US policy from treating Bangladesh as a subset of India policy to engaging Dhaka on its own terms represents a potential paradigm shift — but whether it survives the next administration remains uncertain.
Analysis of why India's economic vulnerabilities, multi-front strategic constraints, and geopolitical risks make a full-scale military invasion of Bangladesh strategically suicidal—and how Dhaka can strengthen this deterrence against major aggression.
Defense alignment with Pakistan requires confronting Bangladesh's foundational trauma honestly—and weighing historical grievance against current strategic necessity.