New Delhi, India

Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) has demanded the cancellation of agreements signed with India over the past 15 years under deposed Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's government. A key BNP official has described the diplomatic agreements signed between the two countries as "secret" and "unjust". 

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"I urge the interim govt to revoke all secret and unjust deals signed by Sheikh Hasina with India by compromising Bangladesh's independence and sovereignty," BNP joint secretary Ruhul Kabir Rizvi said Saturday (Aug 24).

The comment is in contrast to that of interim foreign affairs adviser Md Touhid Hossain, who had recently said that the current Muhammad Yunus administration was not abandoning any agreement with any country as commitments were made by Bangladesh. 

BNP's Rizvi asked why New Delhi ignored the "oppression" Sheikh Hasina inflicted on the people of Bangladesh.

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Led by a one-time Hasina ally-turned arch-rival Khaleda Zia — a former prime minister herself — the Bangladesh Nationalist Party boycotted the January 2024 elections that brought Hasina back to power for an unprecedented fifth term in power. 

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In the days since Hasina's ouster, the BNP has put forth a balanced stance and has refrained from an overtly anti-India outlook in the public statements given since. Amir Khasru Mahmud Chowdhury, a Zia aide, told the Times of India that anti-Hasina political entities in Bangladesh must not be perceived as anti-India in New Delhi. 

But the BNP was seen behind the purported 'India Out' campaign under which a section of the Bangladeshi populace refused to sell India-made products during weeks after the January elections that reinstated Sheikh Hasina to power. 

Zia, 79, was under house arrest for the last five years but was swiftly released days before Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus-led interim government replaced Sheikh Hasina in Dhaka's corridors of power. The chairperson of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) has returned as a free person following a presidential pardon earlier this month.

Zia was lodged in the Old Dhaka Central Jail on February 8, 2018, after a special court sentenced her to five years in prison in the Zia Orphanage Trust corruption case.

On October 30, 2018, the High Court raised her punishment to 10 years. Later, she was convicted in the Zia Charitable Trust corruption case.