We are befuddled by the continued escalation in tensions between the interim government of Bangladesh and its counterpart in Delhi led by the BJP, and the abject inability of the actors involved to find an off ramp. If things continue like this, at some point it will be incumbent upon us to question their intentions - do our political leaders, on both sides of the boundary, truly intend to find and settle on a new equilibrium for the bilateral relationship? Or are they just too invested in the politics of cheap point-scoring that preaches hatred for thy neighbour, to ever let go?
With the West Bengal state assembly, quite possibly the biggest prize that still eludes India's ruling party, up for grabs again next year, there is almost a sense of inevitability around increasingly vitriolic and unhinged statements regarding Bangladesh and Bangladeshis coming from BJP leaders - both in the state, as well as from their national machinery. For a long time, it was as if we just had to deal with it like some unfortunate quirk of the electoral cycle - nevermind that it wasn't even ours. Or that most of these statements even from seasoned politicians like Amit Shah, Indian home minister, routinely resort to the most puerile characterisations and wild exaggerations, for example of the issue of illegal migration, or 'infiltration', as they like to call it - all the better to lend the entire issue a more sinister shade than at all necessary.
"Anti-Indianism" on the other hand, has always been an established strand of politics in Bangladesh, in the tradition of a smaller country trying to resist the regional hegemony enjoyed by a large neighbour. Mainstream Islamist politics has always been a vehicle for it - in the last decade or so, the repressive rule of the ousted Awami League regime and the Hindutva wave sweeping through India have combined to make anti-India posturing a mainstay of this brand of politics, which exploded onto the national stage through the July Uprising of 2024. The subsequent university elections, five in all now with Jagannath University this week, have confirmed a generational shift in the political spectrum prevailing in Bangladesh. Islamists of varying shades have visibly held great sway over the workings of the interim government, under which the relationship has been in freefall.
Meanwhile, thousands of would-be medical visitors to India remain in a state of limbo in Bangladesh, their visa applications kept on hold, while businesses in Agartala and Kolkata are being forced to close at rates not seen in decades, unable to sustain their trade in the face of the shrinking footfall from this side of the border. To be sure, the sufferers on both sides are ordinary citizens.
It is of course undeniable that some recalibration of the relationship, in light of the Uprising, is to be expected. Some of the subservience that slipped into Bangladesh's stance towards its much larger neighbour, and all the things it affected, must be addressed effectively. At the same time, we cannot deny that "Geography is destiny", and you cannot choose your neighbours; you must live with them, as best you can. Finding comfort or political expediency in antagonism may win you some cheers in the playground, or even some votes, but it cannot be the stuff of statecraft. The sooner our politicians come around to realising this, on both sides of the border, the better for both our peoples.
