Dhaka has increasingly allowed the Hasina issue to become the lens through which the entire relationship with India is viewed. That is strategically problematic for Bangladesh because it has enormous interests with India that have nothing to do with Hasina such as trade, energy, water, border management, connectivity, transit, investment and access to India’s northeastern and wider markets. I argue that the real issue here is that Bangladesh’s new political establishment finds anti-India positioning politically useful even when its economic and geographic interests require a functional relationship with India. That unwittingly pushes India into Bangladesh’s domestic politics. If Bangladesh is mistaking its ability to inconvenience India for the ability to overpower India’s strategic interests, it may eventually discover that the supposed aces in its hand are not aces at all, but merely cards India has so far chosen to let it play.
Bangladesh’s foreign policy towards India has undergone a remarkable transformation. In barely two years, Dhaka has moved from close strategic cooperation to sharp rhetoric, revived ties with Pakistan, deepened engagement with China and begun treating its relationship with India almost as a test of national sovereignty.
Recent statements from Bangladeshi politicians and officials have been particularly revealing and even stupefying. The foreign adviser to the Prime Minister said the possibility of a visit to India was “slim” without mutual trust and a “dignified” invitation. The spokesperson of India’s foreign ministry confirmed that a formal invitation was extended to the Bangladesh Prime Minister when he assumed office in February 2026. India has extended a separate invitation to him to attend the outreach session of the 18th BRICS Summit to be held in New Delhi. The Jamaat-e-Islami chief declared that Bangladesh would no longer accept anyone’s “hegemony” and wanted relations with India based on “friendship, mutual respect and equality.”
So what has India actually done to Bangladesh that warrants such a dramatic foreign-policy reversal? Bangladesh certainly has grievances. But when genuine bilateral disputes are separated from the political rhetoric surrounding them, the case for such a fundamental strategic realignment becomes considerably less compelling.
Hasina has become the organizing principle
The central issue is Sheikh Hasina. The violence surrounding the 2024 uprising demanded accountability, and Dhaka has sought justice through established legal mechanisms. India has said that it will examine Bangladesh’s extradition request through its legal framework. But Dhaka has interpreted the Hasina question from a bilateral legal issue into a core principle of its entire India policy. Making Hasina’s extradition a precondition for a Bangladeshi prime ministerial visit to India is converting a difficult legal and political issue into a test of the relationship itself. That is strategically problematic.
Bangladesh’s interests in India have nothing to do with Shiekh Hasina
But Bangladesh’s interests in India have little to do with Sheikh Hasina. They involve trade, electricity, energy, water, border management, connectivity, transit, investment and access to India’s enormous market and the Northeast. Allowing one former leader to become the prism through which all these interests are viewed risks subordinating Bangladesh’s long-term interests to the politics of the moment.
Was Bangladesh really under India’s shadow?
Contrary to popular notion and for the record, Bangladesh was never an Indian satellite, even during the 15 year rule of Shiekh Hasina. True, Dhaka cooperated closely with New Delhi on security, connectivity and regional issues, but it simultaneously maintained extensive strategic relations with China in defence, infrastructure and trade. It cultivated Japan, Russia, the United States and the Gulf countries and pursued its own interests whenever they diverged from India’s. The relationship was therefore one of interdependence and negotiation, not subordination. Bangladesh needed India’s geography, energy, market and security cooperation. India needed Bangladesh for the security of its Northeast and connectivity. Both possessed leverage over the other. This makes the recent messaging by Bangladeshi officials about “restoring sovereignty” from India difficult to reconcile with the historical record. Ironically, Bangladesh which is now touting its policy of strategic autonomy, does not mind being an unequal and junior partner with China.
When India becomes domestic politics
The crux of the matter is that the new political establishment feels the need to distinguish itself from Hasina and demonstrate that Bangladesh is no longer India’s “special partner” and that Dhaka will not accept political influence from New Delhi. That explains why the rhetoric is disproportionate to the actual strategic dispute. India becomes useful precisely because it is powerful, geographically unavoidable and associated with Hasina. Confronting it symbolically allows the new political establishment to demonstrate independence to its own population. The danger, however, is that an identity initially constructed against India can gradually turn into a foreign policy that is defined by opposition to India. That would be a very different and potentially a self-defeating development for Bangladesh.
Bangladesh’s real grievances should certainly not be ignored. On the unresolved Teesta issue, Bangladesh believes that India has failed to deliver an equitable water-sharing arrangement. Border killings and the treatment of Bangladeshis at the border have generated anger and a perception of unequal treatment. Dhaka is unhappy about India’s control over upstream rivers and believes this gives New Delhi disproportionate leverage. There is resentment over India’s trade dominance and what Bangladesh sees as barriers to its exports. Indian political rhetoric portraying Bangladeshis as illegal immigrants has also caused unease.
These are real issues. But they are essentially bilateral in nature, not evidence of an Indian strategy to negate Bangladeshi sovereignty. Many of the issues have been negotiated for years through institutionalized mechanisms. Others will remain difficult because India’s own federal structure, particularly the role of West Bengal on water issues, complicates New Delhi’s ability to deliver what Dhaka wants. The scale of Bangladesh’s foreign-policy reversal therefore remains difficult to explain solely through these disputes.
Bangladesh overestimating its leverage
Bangladesh should certainly diversify its relationships. There is nothing irrational about deepening ties with China or reviving relations with Pakistan. Strategic autonomy requires options. But there is a fundamental difference between diversifying one’s partnerships and deliberately antagonizing one’s most geographically consequential neighbour. This is where Bangladesh appears to be increasingly blurring that distinction.
Bangladesh cannot change its geography
China and Pakistan may give Bangladesh greater bargaining power. But neither can change its geography. India surrounds Bangladesh on three sides. Its Northeast is connected to Bangladesh geographically and economically. Access through Bangladesh can make India’s Northeast more economically integrated and strategically secure. Bangladesh’s ambitions to become a regional connectivity hub linking India, Nepal, Bhutan and Southeast Asia depend heavily on cooperation with India. That is not Indian coercion, but just geography, which is often the most durable source of strategic power. Bangladesh’s real vulnerability is its dependence on interdependence. This is where Dhaka may be overestimating its leverage.
India has options
If Dhaka increasingly provides strategic space for Chinese influence, welcomes a renewed Pakistani role and allows anti-India networks to acquire greater room for manoeuvre, India will inevitably look at Bangladesh through a more competitive security lens. If the relationship becomes increasingly securitized, New Delhi can put greater emphasis on alternative routes, including the Siliguri corridor and maritime and multi-modal connectivity. It can become more cautious about expanding transit and infrastructure cooperation through Bangladesh. That would not hurt Bangladesh overnight. But it will gradually reduce the economic value of one of Bangladesh’s greatest strategic assets, which is its geography.
Bangladesh benefits substantially from cross-border electricity and energy cooperation with India. Its garment industry and wider economy benefit from access to Indian inputs and markets. India, for its part, has enormous commercial weight. A transactional approach to tariffs, standards, customs, ports and market access could alter the balance without India imposing an economic blockade. India does not have to punish Bangladesh. All it needs to do is to stop treating the relationship as exceptional.
The danger of forcing India to recalculate
For decades, New Delhi has viewed Bangladesh through the prism of neighbourhood cooperation. But if Bangladesh’s foreign policy towards India is guided by factors designed to suit its new national identity, then it will inevitably begin to sacrifice its own economic and strategic interests. Then, in its new calculations, India’s best response would be patience, reciprocity and strategic calibration, but not retaliation. If Bangladesh is mistaking its ability to inconvenience India for the ability to overpower India’s strategic interests, it may eventually discover that the supposed aces in its hand are not aces at all, but merely cards India has so far chosen to let it play.
