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News Analysis
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, who once brought democratic hope to Bangladesh, turned increasingly autocratic and met her downfall in a crackdown on protesters.
By Mujib Mashal
Mujib Mashal studied Sheikh Hasina’s politics closely over the past year and interviewed her in her office in Dhaka, Bangladesh.
Aug. 5, 2024, 4:27 p.m. ET
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s life, as well as her politics, had been defined by an early trauma at once personal in its pain and national in its imprint.
In 1975, her father, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, Bangladesh’s charismatic founding leader, and most of their family were massacred in a military coup. Ms. Hasina, who was abroad at the time, was forced into exile in India.
Her eventual return and elevation to prime minister embodied Bangladesh’s hopes of a better, more democratic future. She was celebrated as a secular Muslim woman who tried to rein in a coup-prone military, stood up to Islamist militancy and reformed the impoverished country’s economy.
But in time, she changed. She grew more authoritarian, crushing dissent and exuding an entitlement that treated Bangladesh as her rightful inheritance. Then, on Monday, the years of repressive rule finally caught up with Ms. Hasina, and her story came full circle: She resigned under intense pressure from a vast protest movement and fled once again into exile.
Student-led protesters enraged at her deadly crackdown on their initially peaceful movement stormed her official residence and plundered nearly everything inside. They defaced her portraits and tore down statues of her father around the city, and attacked the homes and offices of her party officials.
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