Bangladesh foreign minister's India visit enables a reset in relations

Bangladesh Foreign Minister Khalilur Rahman, along with the new Prime Minister’s advisor on foreign affairs, Humayun Kabir, visited New Delhi in what will hopefully reset relations between the new government in Dhaka, led by the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), and its Indian counterpart. This is not Mr Rahman’s first visit abroad as foreign minister. Last month, he went to Saudi Arabia for meetings of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation. There he held multiple bilateral meetings, including with Pakistan. Reports also indicate that his meeting in India included a demand from Bangladesh for the extradition of its former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, who is currently in exile in India.

 

Nevertheless, New Delhi must persevere in rebuilding this important relationship. It has already made mistakes in the past; it should have begun rebuilding ties with the BNP well before it was forced to by events and the elections in Bangladesh. It is not aided in this process by the contentious atmosphere surrounding the campaigning for the Assembly elections in Assam and West Bengal, where supposed “infiltration” is a major political issue. There have also been various street protests as well as fundamentalist activities in Bangladesh, targeting supposed “pro-Indian” interests and work, including newspapers. This difficult political atmosphere is something that diplomacy cannot ignore but instead must strive to surmount.

 

There is a practical agenda for cooperation on which both sides must act. Connectivity infrastructure, trade facilitation, and energy policy are all areas that can be effectively depoliticised. And those promise solutions on which both sides can claim victory. Such tangible deliverables might create goodwill and not require either government to confront the harder political questions immediately. While it cannot be denied that Beijing’s increasing strategic footprint in Bangladesh is naturally a matter of concern for India, and it will add urgency to this engagement, India should certainly avoid the temptation of treating Bangladesh as a pawn in its strategic competition with China. Nor for that matter should Bangladesh be assumed as being in thrall to Pakistan even if it is making a point of improving ties with that nation. Instead, it should focus its attention on maintaining sustained, high-level engagement, which would signal that India takes Bangladesh seriously as a neighbour with its own legitimate interests and political evolution.

 

The BNP leadership, on its part, must work harder to signal that it intends to govern inclusively and will rein in the anti-minority and anti-Indian elements in its political coalition. It must recognise that if it finds it hard to forgive and forget, so too does New Delhi: The party’s last tenure in government has left a long bitter aftertaste in India. But that was decades ago, and much has changed since then. Both countries have grown economically, and face similar challenges on issues such as energy security. There is much that they can do to collaborate. What is most important is for the Indian leadership to impress upon the new Bangladeshi establishment that it does not seek to oust or manipulate it, but rather to find a new form of coexistence and collaboration. Neighbourly relationships cannot be repaired by a single visit, but this will at least be a good beginning. It must be followed up with continuous engagement at various levels of government.