Bangladesh votes on 12 February 2026 in an election that is meant to end an extraordinary interregnum after the 2024 uprising and the Yunus-led caretaker government. The contest is also a referendum on what replaces Hasina era order. With the Awami League barred, politics has reorganized into a BNP led bid to reclaim the mainstream and a Jamaat-e-Islami anchored bloc that presents itself as disciplined, incorruptible, and closer to the street mood of change.
For India, the temptation is to treat this as a morality play. Hasina was Delhi’s closest partner in Dhaka for years, and the idea of her party being pushed off the ballot while she remains in India creates a combustible triangle of resentment, accusation, and nationalist posturing. That is precisely why Indian policy cannot be built on nostalgia. It must be built on outcomes. Delhi’s core interests are boring but vital. A stable border. Predictable counterterror and anti-smuggling cooperation. A Bangladesh that does not become a theatre for violent extremist mobilization. And basic safety for religious minorities who are again reporting fear and targeted violence as the vote nears.
Those interests point in one direction. India should stop treating the BNP as a permanent adversary and start treating it as the most plausible governing party in this cycle. Polling snapshots, campaign dynamics, and the organizational revival of BNP under Tarique Rahman all suggest BNP is best positioned to form the next government, even as Jamaat has become a serious competitor nationally. If Delhi keeps acting as if only one party in Bangladesh is legitimate, it will reinforce the very anti India sentiment now supercharging Jamaat’s appeal.
But hoping for a BNP victory is not the same as trying to engineer one. The strongest argument for Delhi is not ideological or historical affinity, because there is none, but risk management. In today’s Bangladesh, Jamaat’s rise is not a fringe story. It is a disciplined political project that has benefited from the collapse of Awami League narratives, the vacuum of credible governance, and a widely shared hunger for cleaner politics. Analysts inside Bangladesh have laid out multiple drivers, from welfare outreach to organizational discipline to the fading electoral salience of 1971 for younger voters, and to the perception that Jamaat is more credible than BNP in confronting India.
That last point should haunt Delhi. Anti-India sentiment is not a passing slogan. It is a political resource. It draws strength from border killings, insult of cricket players, inflammatory rhetoric from India’s own politicians, and the perception that India treated Hasina as an indispensable client rather than a partner accountable to Bangladeshi voters. Jamaat thrives when the election becomes a plebiscite on sovereignty against a neighbor. Every time Delhi appears to prefer a particular winner, it narrows the space for pragmatic Bangladeshi leaders to work with India after the vote.
A BNP led government, if it materializes, would not deliver a love story. Tarique Rahman has already signaled a foreign policy posture that sounds transactional and prideful, seeking economic partnerships with any country including India and China while rejecting alignment politics. That is exactly why Delhi should prepare to deal with BNP rather than fear it. A transactional Dhaka is still governable. A Dhaka pulled into a competitive Islamist nationalist posture, with street mobilization capacity and moral policing energies, is harder to predict and easier to destabilize.
Still, India should not romanticize BNP as a natural firewall against communal violence. Recent reporting describes a rise in attacks and fear among Hindus ahead of the election, and rights groups argue impunity is a central problem. The uncomfortable truth is that minorities have often been instrumentalized by all major Bangladeshi parties, sometimes as voting blocs, sometimes as scapegoats, sometimes as soft targets during periods of political churn. Any Indian strategy that reduces minority safety to which party wins will fail, because protection depends on state capacity, policing reforms, local accountability, and the political cost of mobilization against minorities.
That said, the difference between the main contenders is not imaginary. Jamaat’s own history, its ideological project, and the anxieties its resurgence produces are real, even if the party has sought to rebrand and even fielded symbolic minority candidates. The pre vote environment is already marked by political violence risks, and crisis monitoring groups have warned about politically motivated killings and the danger of further violence around the polls. In such an atmosphere, a party whose cadres are reputed for discipline can look attractive, but discipline can also harden into social control if checks are weak.
India therefore faces a strategic dilemma that is also a reputational trap. If it openly roots for BNP, it will validate Jamaat’s anti India narrative. If it clings to the memory of Hasina and treats the election as illegitimate, it will push the next rulers, likely BNP or a BNP led coalition, into a posture of public distance from India just to prove independence. And if it stands aloof, it risks waking up to a Dhaka where the strongest organizing energy is a coalition that feels it can win votes by being maximally adversarial to India.
So, the sensible approach is neither abandonment nor meddling. It is disciplined engagement built around three ideas.
First, depersonalize the relationship. Delhi’s Bangladesh policy cannot be a relationship with one family or one party. It must be a relationship with the Bangladeshi state and with broad social constituencies. That means sustained working ties with BNP leaders, yes, but also with reformist and student currents that will shape politics for a decade, and with civil society actors who can speak credibly on minority protection and rule of law. This is not idealism. It is insurance against future volatility.
Second, stop feeding the grievance machine. India’s public messaging should be boring, restrained, and consistent. Respect for Bangladeshi sovereignty. Support for a peaceful, credible election. Condemnation of political violence and communal attacks without turning them into propaganda. Quiet cooperation on border management and crime, paired with visible steps to reduce incidents that become symbols, will do more to weaken anti-India mobilisation than any number of speeches about shared culture.
Third, prepare a post-election compact with whoever governs, but shape it around deliverables that help ordinary Bangladeshis. Trade reliability, smoother transit and customs, targeted investments in border districts, and crisis coordination on refugees and disasters. A BNP government that wants to prove it is not India’s proxy will still welcome tangible wins it can sell domestically. If Delhi offers only security demands and old talking points, it will get old resentments in return.
There is also the Hasina problem. Her presence in India and Dhaka’s anger over perceived Indian sheltering have already become political fuel. Delhi must handle this with legal seriousness and political foresight. Treat it as a matter of law and bilateral process, not partisan loyalty. Avoid allowing her to become a megaphone that poisons India’s standing with the next Bangladeshi government before it even forms.
None of this guarantees a BNP victory, nor should India try to guarantee it. But if the question is what outcome best protects India’s strategic security while reducing the risk of Bangladesh sliding into a harder ideological confrontation, the least bad answer is a BNP led government with incentives to govern from the center and to keep Islamist leverage contained. That is a hope. The more important point is the method. India must stop behaving like Bangladesh’s politics is a binary of friends and enemies. In 2026, that habit is not just outdated. It is dangerous.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Ashok Swain is a professor of peace and conflict research at Uppsala University, Sweden.
(Cover Image Credit: Mohammad Ponir Hossain/pbs.org)
Awami LeagueBallotBangladeshBangladesh Nationalist PartyBangladesh’s Election CommissionChinaDhakaElectionIndiaMuhammad YunusNarendra ModiPoliticsSheikh HasinaTarique Rahman