The run-up to the Bangladesh elections on February 12 was anything but peaceful, adding weight to Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) Chairman and PM-designate Tarique Rahman's sweeping win in the polls.
Mainly pitted against the Jamaat-e-Islami, the BNP emerged victorious in 212 of the 297 announced seats and is poised to take over the reins from the interim government led by Chief Adviser Muhammad Yunus, as per a Daily Star report. These polls are widely seen as the first in the country since the ouster of former PM Sheikh Hasina due to student-led protests in 2024.
The Rahman-led BNP is now holding talks with its allies to determine the composition of the new government.
It now inherits the fragmented Bangladesh that has followed in the wake of the student-led protests in 2024.
This served as a precedent for the violence targeting religious minorities across the country over the past few months, which only intensified with the death of Sharif Osman Hadi.
The murder of the head of the radical party Inquilab Mancha, which was at the forefront of the anti-Hasina revolution in 2024, only intensified the violence in the country, further opening it up to international scrutiny.
Notably, the BNP is no stranger to such violence, because crimes against the Awami League and religious minorities broke out after a coalition led by the party last took power in 2001.
With Tarique Rahman 2.0, the 60-year-old, who has kept unity and peace at the very forefront of his efforts to return to power after a self-imposed exile of nearly two decades, will have to use insights from that period to carefully rebuild the country from the inside out.
“Vengeance will not bring [anything] back ... Rather, if we can control it, if we can keep everyone united, keep the country united, that might get us something good,” he told TIME in an interview.
With the issue of Sheikh Hasina's extradition from India set to become a thorn in the side of the incoming government—due to public sentiments against the former PM, arising from fresh wounds that still sting—it will have to tread carefully to prise apart the anger against her and the anger against India.
This comes a day after Sheikh Hasina attacked the 2026 Bangladesh elections in an X post from the Awami League, calling the polls a 'well-planned farce'.
— THE WEEK (@TheWeekLive) February 13, 2026
(sheikh hasina extradition letter, bangladesh elections 2026, bnp tarique rahman)https://t.co/y6rScNmsD5
Apart from taking on the mammoth task of rebuilding trust in public institutions such as the military, courts, civil service, and security services, Tarique Rahman 2.0's handling of the probe and the optics around the probe into the death of Hadi is another key area where it can expect scrutiny from an entire nation.
For now, the road to recovery is steep, as the Tarique Rahman-led government will have to demonstrate political will, administrative discipline and transparency to counter the Jamaat-e-Islami and the National Citizens Party that will be monitoring it from the Opposition side, waiting to pounce on the slightest laxity or error that could push the country into unrest again.
