Indian Council of World Affairs

 

Unidentified Speaker: A very good afternoon to everyone present here today. Before we begin, may I request you to kindly place your mobile phones on silent. Thank you. Esteemed panelists, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen, it is my privilege to welcome you all to Sapru House for today's panel discussion on Deciphering the Implications of Bangladesh and Myanmar's Election. We are honored to have with us a distinguished panel of experts, and we sincerely thank our speakers for graciously accepting our invitation.

 

Allow me to briefly outline the program for today. The session will begin with the opening remarks by the Chair, Ambassador Preet Malik, former Ambassador of India to Myanmar. The first speaker will be Dr. Sreeradha Datta, Professor, Jindal School of International Affairs, O.P. Jindal Global University, and former Director, Maulana Azad Institute of Asian Studies, Kolkata. This will be followed by Mr. Jayanta Roy Chowdhury, Editor, United News of India. The third panelist will be Ms. Rami Desai, Distinguished Fellow at the India Foundation. And the final speaker of the day will be Mr. Sabyasachi Dutta, Executive Director, Asian Confluence. The first two speakers will reflect on Bangladesh. Third and fourth speakers in the panel will discuss Myanmar. The panel discussion will conclude with a brief question-and-answer session moderated by the Chair.

 

With this, may I now request Ambassador Preet Malik to kindly deliver his opening remarks and conduct the proceedings. Over to you, sir.

 

Preet Malik: Good evening. It's a pleasure being here. I am thankful to the Indian Council of World Affairs for inviting me and an extremely distinguished panel. You learn much more from them than you will from me. I am a person rather long in the teeth and I was in Myanmar at a time when things were very different from what they are today.

 

To just give you an introduction to it. I was sent there with specific instructions that I shall keep myself away from meeting any minister in the government. This was in 1990, at a time when we were still determining whether we had a policy towards Myanmar or we didn't. I served three different prime ministers. Each one called me back several times, and at the end of it, I left without any specific instructions on policy. That has subsequently changed, and now we follow strictly the principle that those in power are the ones that we will continue to deal with. So that's just as an introduction.

 

One thing I would like to sort of emphasize is the commonality between what has happened in Myanmar's elections, which started in December last year, ended in January this year, and the elections that took place only the other day in the month of February in Bangladesh. This is that neither election was inclusive. If you recall, our prime minister has, on several instances, referred to that word in both cases, in both countries' cases. But in the case of Myanmar, the main political party which had been in power for some time, the NLD, was excluded. In fact, not only is it excluded, but dissolved. It is no longer registered as a political party in Myanmar.

 

In the case of Bangladesh, as we know, Awami League was out, banned. But in one sense, this was not a novelty in Bangladesh because the last few elections have been very clearly not inclusive either in the real sense of the term. So this is one commonality between the two countries, both of whom are extremely important neighbors of India. In the case of Myanmar, we have the additional factor that from the time of Mr. Ne Win or General Ne Win, as he liked to be known as, the military in one form or the other has ruled Myanmar.

 

So as an independent nation, the only time and only period that it was a functional democracy was from 1948 when it got independent till 1960 when Mr. Ne Win carried out his coup d'etat against the ruling dispensation. That military rule has only been firmly founded by the recent election where, for all effective purposes, the present junta leader, Senior General Min Hlaing, has, in one sense or the other, consolidated his position. I just wanted to make that point clear.

 

In the case of Bangladesh, we have now an elected government which has substituted the interim government with which India had a rather difficult relationship. One thing we cannot rule out, these two countries are of extreme importance to us, both in strategic and security terms. Strategically, let's take Myanmar first. You have all, I'm sure, been familiar with the concept of originally the Act East policy. Burma or Myanmar, as it's known today, serves as a land bridge that connects the northeastern states of India with ASEAN, which I think is something that we have been trying to consolidate by establishing connectivity routes, which unfortunately remain in a limbo as of now.

 

The other part has been the issue of security where Myanmar is concerned. We have insurgent groups from India that are located on the soil of Myanmar, which are from time to time given support by either China directly or indirectly through its ethnic groups that it tends to control within Myanmar. This is one major problem, and if Myanmar does not receive stability in the next few years, the security issue, the security problems for India will only continue to grow, because particularly the neighboring parts of Myanmar with India are effectively outside the control of NAPITOR.

 

In the case of Bangladesh, the BNP in the past has been a party led by the mother of the present leader, Khaleda Zia, who had very critical and I would say anti-Indian relationships with India. I haven't served in Bangladesh, but I have dealt with Bangladesh, particularly in my last posting in the Ministry of External Affairs, when I had to visit Bangladesh on two or three occasions. At that time, Khalida Zia was the Prime Minister, and it was a very difficult relationship that we had. During her period, we had insurgent groups from the northeast located in Bangladesh, being offered training, being offered all kinds of hospitality, and the territory being used against India's security interests.

 

So this is something that we have to bear in mind. Will the new BNP leadership be more sympathetic towards interests with India, or will it continue more or less the old policy? This is something that will only become clearer as they take charge. But I would say that the recent statements that we have heard from an advisor and from a leader of the BNP directly, one gets a feeling that they have realized that they need to mend their relations with India and mend them as quickly as possible.

 

At the same time, they have made it very clear that they will have a relationship that serves their interests, and in that they have named India, Pakistan, and China. So there is a kind of a balance that they are trying to strike as far as their relationships are concerned. Effectively, can they ignore India? Can they leave out India's interests from their reckoning? These are the issues that they will have to deal with. And how will India deal with the new dispensation as far as the Prime Minister's recent congratulatory messages to the new leadership indicate that India has moved rapidly in trying to establish, let us say, a firmer relationship with the new dispensation, which is a very positive factor.

 

So what exactly can we expect now? One side you have a newly elected government in Myanmar, which will come into being sometime in the month of March. Issue will be, will the senior general now become president of Myanmar? Because that is one of the issues that the new parliament will have to deal with, because they will have to elect a president. That is one aspect that is somewhat unclear at the moment. But the fact of the matter is that that is something that once the panelists get into the details, you will be able to get at least a reasonable picture of what can be expected.

 

From my reading of the situation, I would imagine that the gentleman will be more or less an uncontested president of the country. So in a manner of speaking, we'll continue to deal with a known figure. We have been dealing with him now for over two years. And he's a known figure as far as India is concerned. In the case of Bangladesh, of course, we have a new leader. But a leader who in the past was accused of corrupt practices, of throwing his weight around, and has been in exile for, what, 17 years. Will he now be a person who's changed, who's learned from his experiences, who's understood the consequences of dealing with a country which has got problems, which cannot be ignored?

 

It has an economic issue. It has issues of dealing with society in general. It also has to deal with youth, an element which today happens to be important. You can't ignore the fact that it was a youth-led revolt against the previous prime minister and her regime. And they managed and succeeded in getting her out of power. They have also, although they may have only got six seats or whatever, the fact of the matter is that they can't be ignored any longer. They have to be taken into account. And I noticed that Mr. Tarique Hussain has visited not only the Jamaat-e-Islami group, but also the students group. So that shows that there is a recognition of what are the important areas that need to be taken into account.

 

So let me just say that mine is purely an introduction. I'm not going to go into any details. But I will leave that to the very distinguished panel that we have. Two of them will be giving you their ideas and their knowledge of what Myanmar is up to. The other two will give you a clear idea of what Bangladesh is up to. So we will hear them and then after that we will have a discussion, I hope, which will throw further light on what we are faced with.

 

So thank you very much and now it is open to the panel.

 

Sreeradha Datta: Thank you. Thank you, Chair. I would like to review this panelist, all of whom you have been friends for very long. Special thank you to Anwesha and Sripathi for this invitation and of course ICWA.

 

Let me just begin with the points that was touched upon by Chair Ambassador Malik. The word inclusive has often been used. Before elections, Government of India was constantly talking about wanting to see Bangladesh have peaceful and inclusive election. Post election, of course, we haven't used the word but there is certainly a context as to why this word inclusive is becoming a pertinent point. In fact, as you all recall, the last inclusive election Bangladesh ever saw was 2008 December.

 

And subsequent to Sheikh Hasina winning a huge thumping victory and taking over in January 2009, she soon made some very deep reforms, broad and deep constitutional reforms, which not only made Bangladesh look far more secular than it was in the past, but it also did away with a few constitutional bodies which actually unravelled this particular inclusive word that we are discussing. She took away this entity which is known as Ketika government. Now Ketika government is not something that we are very familiar with.

 

It's one of the few experiments in this part of the world, but it has worked fabulously well for Bangladesh, where despite being in the government, the political parties don't trust that political party which is heading the government, which is why Ketika government was usually ushered in, which is headed by the last retired Supreme Court judge. And the entire cabinet was formed of technocrats, again, consensually decided. All parties sat together and decided that. They would assist the election commission and their duration used to be not more than 90 days, within which they had to do the job, hold elections and go back.

 

When Sheikh Hasina brought in many constitutional amendments, as I just mentioned, she did put up a committee and asked for their comments. The committee is actually comprising of five members, again, Awami League members, mind you, not a multi-party member committee, actually said that while they do agree that caretaker government should be done away with, for the next two elections caretaker should be there and for the third, then they will take a call. The last day of the particular parliament of that session, she ushered in the bill without any discussion, which was her nature, as we've seen for the last several subsequent parliaments and that was it.

 

So the next election in 2014, BNP refused to be part of it, saying that it will never be free and fair, so we are not going to fight the elections. 2018 USA convinced them that this is looking extremely one-sided, it's not looking good, please. So we did see BNP campaigning, we did see a bit of interest and attempt for them to reach out. Again for some of us who watch Bangladesh closely, on 18th, 11 a.m., the Bangladesh government declared election result, which is overwhelming majority for Awami League.

 

So then one started reaching out to friends, what happened? They said none of us, and I have many friends over the years, having been watching this country very closely, going there at least four times a year, if not more, so clearly we've developed many linkages and friendships there. And each and every one I spoke to said that we went to the polling stations, we were not allowed to enter the booth. So clearly everything was arranged beforehand, night before, and that was it.

 

And then of course we saw in 2012, I was there in Dhaka on 24th January, the election day, and I actually said that I didn't see Awami League coming out to vote for Awami League, because it was essentially that, Awami League, multi-party parties, spread in different names, but there was zero of these, almost, I mean I did say it was a 15% turnout, but I think I was being extremely generous. Of course, then we saw what happened, the youth uprising and all of that.

 

The interim, as we've seen, I mean there has been several rounds of discussions and debates about that. I, again having watched that space a little bit, I've been in Bangladesh three times ever since the interim took over. And I am of the firm believer that the movement, of course, was from the bottom up. And then of course other stakeholders brought in, because I also often meet the Jamaati leaders and I remember having several discussions about it, but I also remember Dr. Tahir, whom I meet actually, the Vice-Chairman of Jamaat, who actually said, no, this is a movement that we initiated. It was actually a movement initiated by every single political party, which was, it was BNP, it was Jamaat, whoever it was. But it was students themselves.

 

One does, of course, know about the US links, and one does know about all of that, but I'm seeing the movement was from the bottom. And then, of course, we've seen what happened, how it unraveled, and 5th August happened. Ever since interim took over, we've seen a lot of violence in Bangladesh. Mobocracy was the term that we often used. In fact, the first mobocratic event that took place in Bangladesh was actually done by the bureaucrats who had been thrown out by the Awami League in the previous government. Hundreds of them gathered around the secretariat, so many of them were reinstated.

 

That was the beginning of the mobocracy that we saw in Bangladesh. Class 9 students said, reschedule our board exam. Class 12 students said, you have to not hold exams now. We should be given our final mark sheet on the basis of the last class examination. And a whole lot of traitors, ready-made governments, just name it. It was like that. But we also saw a lot of targets against the weaker section, as they call it, but the minorities and the Hindus specifically.

 

So for many of us watching here from Delhi, and especially different parts of Delhi and India and Delhi specifically, it didn't look good. And despite the fact that foreign secretary went, and he came back and gave an extremely positive statement in the parliament, where he said that the Yunus government was keen to work with India, but his one request was that the former prime minister, Sheikh Hasina, should not be making any political statements. He said it in the parliament, but of course, we've seen otherwise. We claim that we had no hand over it. Social media is being used.

 

But just two weeks before Bangladesh goes to election, two media events were being held by former ministers, who were very much part of the repressive movement that we saw when the students, as I said, was a completely unarmed student's movement against quota reservation. I think all of you are aware of it, so I'm not going to go to the detail, which was then very severely handed by Awami League security forces. We have, of course, now, the day before, I think Hassan gave another interview and says that, oh, the security forces did what they had to. My mother had nothing to do with it.

 

So we've seen many such narratives. But over the last 18 months, there was a very deep fear within Bangladeshis themselves about whether elections are going to be held, because they felt, and there's a very popular narrative, which is also buttressed in India, that Professor Yunus is not going to go. Elections are not going to happen. This is just a farcical thing. There were, in fact, friends in Bangladesh on interviews with me and other panel programs that, oh, the army is taking over. This country is doomed. This is a Bangladeshi opinion I'm talking about. Of course, this particular last 18 months has been a humongous display of misinformed narratives, media narratives, from both sides of the border.

 

They've used AI effectively to give you wrong impressions. People are gullible. We've fallen for those, many of these WhatsApp news that we came across. So when I was planning, I was the only foreign election observer from India. The rest of them were media representations who went. There were about 650 of us in Bangladesh, which included about 400 of media observers and 250 of election observers who were invited by the Bangladeshi government. I was the only one from here. And I wasn't able to watch the campaigns, but I was able to attend the first chief election commission's press media meet that he did. And extremely saying that all of you can access anything anywhere. You want to do live televisions, do live podcasts, do anything. There is absolutely no bar on that, so feel free to reach out to wherever.

 

So even when I was going for my accreditation stamp to be signed, and I said, oh, I'm not going to be in. I'm only going to stay in Dhaka. He says, no, I'm doing all of Bangladesh in case you change your mind. We are encouraging everybody to go to every different part of Bangladesh. As I said, I'd spent a couple of days in the January last elections that Aba Milligar held. And my experience here was vastly different. First and foremost, as I said, there was nobody on the streets in January '24. This time around, I was out on the streets. The polling started from 7.30 in the morning. I was out from 9.30 in the morning. The polling stations closed at 4.30. I was out on the roads till 6 p.m.

 

The kind of joy and merriment and the fear factor, we always had thought, even if elections are being held, it's going to be full of violence. The fact that we saw children playing on the roads, in fact, most of the polling stations that I visited in Dhaka were usually in schools and college premises. So you had playgrounds. So you had children running around, eating ice cream. There was balloons in the air. And of course, every booth, I wish I could send you the photographs, the balloons, the colorful. So I've always seen it. Very many years ago, I was there once in Bangladesh. And I'd seen how joyous election days are. They sing, dance. It's full of flowers all over. I didn't see flowers so much. It was balloons more this time. But it was extremely merry kind of environment.

 

So essentially, what I'm saying, it was a safe, secure environment that we saw when elections were held. I think every single observer has said it was free and fair completely. There's no questions about that. Then we saw that it was, of the 299 seats declared, they've got 212 BNP and 78 for Jamaat. Very interesting, I thought, because if you look at Dhaka by itself, it's almost half and half. I mean, a little bit more BNP, but Jamaat. We have conventionally always thought that the urban, modern Bangladeshis don't vote for Jamaat. But I was also there when Jamaat first, the Shibir, which is a student faction of Jamaat, held their students' union election, Daxo elections. I was there for that week. I was there on the day of the elections. I saw the way they had reinvented themselves.

 

Of course, there are many Jamaat women even now, and I keep joking about it, that you can only see their eyes. The rest of them is closely attached. But there are also many, many youngsters who've joined in who are wearing regular jeans. And I keep saying that I'm so encouraged to see white shirt and blue jeans of Tarique Rehman. He's been wearing that for his complete campaign trails. And the youngsters of Jamaat have reinvented themselves. I mean, I don't have time to get into the details. But I think what I would like to believe, and I'm very upbeat about it, that all of them have learned their lessons from the past. And from the point that Ambassador Malik also alluded to, how do we see it now unraveling for India?

 

Just as we speak, I think in another few minutes' time, we see the cabinet swearing in happening. Interesting portfolio has been given to the foreign minister, who was a former national security advisor. He was the only one who didn't fight the elections. He's not a regular MP, but he's been brought in as a foreign minister. Rest of them have all fought very well. Some of the seats, and this is very interesting, there has, of course, been some very robust fights there, and many of the seats, especially in Dhaka. Especially there's some special seats in Dhaka, which always says the act controls. If Dhaka seats are won by that party, it controls the rest of Bangladesh.

 

Very close fights. One has won by 1,000 margin, only 1,000 votes. But a large number has won by 2,000 votes. So I'm going to wrap up by saying, how do I see this unraveling for India? As of yet, we've heard some extremely moderate voices coming, not only from BNP, but also from Jamaat-e-Islami. As I said, I've met them a few times over, and I said, well, what about your 71? And then your anti-India association. They said, well, we've learned our mistakes. We realize Bangladesh is an entity we have to accept. We've gone over it, our leaders have talked about it. So I'm just very hopeful. Of course, there are many issues. We know how minority is an issue here.

 

I was just hearing an interview by one of the joint secretaries, Humayun Kabir, who talks about the fact that we all have issues on both our sides. So let's not make it believe that's only one-sided problem. We have water issues that you've not discussed. So right now, we have Ganga's water treaty, which was 30 years, which is up for renewal in another few months' time. We have Teesta, which is, again, a critical bid. Because as you recall, during the interim, the Teesta management project, which they had, Sheikh Hasina, actually, her cabinet had designed, was almost being given to China. But that has been kind of stopped.

 

So I'm hoping that India is going to address. One, of course, is the Hasina factor. And I think they all understand and agree that Hasina is a very honored guest for India. So extradition is not a choice. The matter here is that whether India is going to allow her to do these political activities. The two events that I talk about were certainly done with the… I mean, wouldn't have been possible without the Government of India making it happen. So I think that's what we have to see ahead.

 

As I said, they've said the… whether Tarique Zia can walk the talk is something which we'll have to see, because as we know, while Prime Minister say something, there are many layers within every nation, which also includes the bureaucracy, who have a different point of view, who have strong different point of view. And one of the first challenges that Tarique Rehman has for himself here is to ensure law and order. We've seen the police force, which has been a very maligned force because they were very misused during Hasina's time. So that force has been half revamped, not fully. So that's a critical bit.

 

So law and order, political stability. During Sheikh Hasina's time, despite the fact that we always talk about the fantastic growth story of Bangladesh, no, Bangladesh was slowly and steadily going into the rabbit hole, which we were not talking about. So interim has tried to address it, but it's not a problem that it can solve in 15, 18 months. So that's something that BNP government will have to do. So obviously domestic issues are their priority, but I think nobody has ever denied the fact that India is their most important neighbor. Every single statement of yours, it comes to whether it's Shafiq-ur-Rehman, which is the Jamaat chief, or whether it was BNP. There are contentious issues on both sides, but I think with the intention being right, I'm very upbeat that India and Bangladesh can, I think, reset their relationship, need to reboot their relationship. And I think for us, it's kind of important that we also reach out to Bangladesh.

 

And I'm hopeful this is going to be a stable government. It's a government where we'll see opposition really put the pressure on. And not only the opposition, 40% of the first-time voters, which was between 18 to 38, are going to keep the pressure on Bangladesh. Bangladesh always has an extremely robust civil society, and I feel this term round, both opposition and the government is going to be responsible partners, and we hope Bangladesh is going to see stable days ahead. Thank you.

 

Jayanta Roy Chowdhury: Thank you. I think my friend, Sreeradha has covered more or less the exit of the Sheikh Hasina government. And of course, she has mentioned the mobocracy which existed during these 18 months. Unfortunately, with whatever the student revolt had stood for, regardless of how popular or unpopular it was it became extremely unpopular during these 18 months. There were mobs which roamed the streets, there were extortions, some of it done by BNP's cadre, some of it done by others and of course, there were targeted killings, there were forced resignations in the academia and in the civil service.

 

So one party benefited from it, this was mostly the Jamaat, they did manage to bring in their people into academia, they did bring in a lot of people into the civil service, too. Which elections in South Asia are mostly conducted by teachers, not so much by civil servants. At the bottom level it is the teachers who are brought in as election officers, as polling booth officers etc., etc. So it does have an impact. Let's see what happened during these 18 months. Sheikh Hasina's government had brought Bangladesh to a certain economic level where it was going to come into the middle, it was going to come out of the less developing countries list. Unfortunately, then you had the COVID and then you had a lot of more extra competition for Bangladesh in the textile sector.

 

The problem for Bangladesh has always been that it is connected with just one industry, textiles. They tried to bring in new industries, ship breaking, ship building, leather, but frankly, it was always the tailors to the world. So once your tailoring thing goes down, the GDP growth started tapering off. But during these 18 months it was disastrous. Factories were burned down during the revolt, some of those were owned by Ahmadiyas, which is why they were burned down because obviously some people did not like them. Factories which were supposedly owned by Awami leaguers were also burned down. So you had what is called de-industrialization.

 

On top of that, the buyers from USA, Europe and from Japan, they just fled. They went to Cambodia, they went to India. In fact, you would be surprised to know that there is a factory which has been set up in Jharkhand at a cost of INR 5,000 crores, mainly to replace Bangladeshi producers who were selling directly to the Europeans. Everybody wants a source of supply, which is stable, which is politically stable, which will not be disrupted by any kind of problems. So this became Bangladesh's biggest problem. The economic downfall during these 18 months, you had 8% plus inflation in every month. In some months, it was double-digit.

 

Now this is something which is not acceptable to the normal people and which is why you had a lot of unrest besides the mobocracy, besides the extortions from normal small businessmen petty village shopkeepers. It was a mess. As far as the Yunus government was concerned, it was a mess. This is one blemish, unfortunately, Yunus will have to carry with its shoulder a man who had won a Nobel Prize, who was a hero in India too, will have to carry that problem.

 

Now let's look at the elections Bangladesh has never had a very robust election, regardless of who has ruled, BNP or Awami League. The best elections were in 2008, my colleague is absolutely right, that was actually the best elections. That was a time when you had 80% voting. This election's official results are 59.44, that means a drop of 20% just if the official results are accepted. And independent analysts, and I'm not talking about partisan analysts, someone from BNP or someone from Awami League, like Kamal is there, they are saying that probably the actual voting was much lower, nearer 40%.

 

Even if we don't go by that, even if we go by the 59.44% result, there is a drop of 20%. That leads us to the other thing, Awami League cannot be written off. If there is a voting drop of this after Sheikh Hasina carried out a campaign, no vote, no vote, it means Awami League is still there, it still has support. Secondly, we all know, even the newspapers in Bangladesh have accepted this, that there was tactical voting by Awami League supporters in favour of BNP which helped BNP jump. From 2008 when it was 22.5%, it is now 49.97% vote. So that's a rise of nearly 18%.

 

So they are saying, this is Awami League supporters, minorities were the first ones to vote in this election, mainly because they were afraid that if they did not vote, they would face problems. And by problems I mean the usual attacks that happen, we have seen those attacks in the past, regardless of whichever party has come. So that is another thing which has to be taken into account. Jamaat-e-Islami, I am sure Jamaat-e-Islami would have improved its tally, but let's look at the figures. 4.7% in 2008 and 31.76% today. Its best figures ever before this was in 1991 when it got 12% of the popular vote.

 

And that was when it was in alliance with BNP. It is not in alliance with BNP this time round, it's the opposition. It has gone up 31.76%, there are, of course, claims from both sides, Jamaat is claiming that BNP has stuffed the ballot box and BNP has also claimed that Jamaat has stuffed the ballot box. So we will not go into who is correct, who is not correct, but there are allegations on both sides. In fact, at one time, Jamaat almost looked like rejecting the elections and then they said okay, we are okay with it. So that is another point.

 

The interesting point again is that Jamaat has won in all the border districts next to West Bengal. And a few border districts next to Assam, not all, a few. That would be something which Indian security planners will have to think of when they plan. Because we know that during the student revolt, jails were emptied. All the militants who had terror-related charges, cases against them, some of them were even designated terrorists, were released. None of them have been arrested and put back into jail. It is believed that they have regrouped, that they have reformed themselves there.

 

So if these groups are reforming and if the government remains weak, Bangladesh's governments have always been weak, whatever we say. The writ of the Dhaka government does not really run throughout Bangladesh, which is why the NGO movement has been so strong in Bangladesh, which is why Grameen Bank, which is why BRAC, all these have come up. Because the government could not do what it should be doing, which is why you had NGOs coming in and doing it. So the government's ability to control everybody is much, much lesser. And it will continue to remain challenged at all times.

 

So first of all, Tarique Rahman has one challenge, the economy, which is his biggest challenge. Second, which is also equally important, is to bring back law and order. And he has said that these are the two things which I'm going to really address, and I hope he is able to address. The problem for him will be the Jamaat, because Jamaat is now going to demand, along with this election, there was another Gono vote, or a referendum, on a number of issues, which we can broadly categorize into four issues.

 

Nobody really knew what the yes vote meant. If they were agreeable to two, were they agreeable to the other two? Have they voted yes for just two, or have they voted no for, because they did not like two? Nobody is very sure of that. So that is something which now BNP will have to tackle. They have all now sworn that they are not only going to be members of Parliament, but they are also taking an oath to be the Reforms Commission, Constitutional Reforms Commission for Bangladesh, which means they will discuss these reforms.

 

I would imagine that the BNP will cherry pick. BNP will take in those parts of the reforms which were put up for a referendum, which they are comfortable with. But they will not accept everything that the Jamaat wanted through the referendum. Remember, the referendum was on the Yunus government's behalf, and the Yunus government at that time was heavily influenced by the Jamaat and other parties, including the NCP, which didn't fare all that well in this election. Some of their big leaders actually weren't elected. A few have been elected. They are still a force. As Ambassador said, NCP will also have to be taken into account in future negotiations. But this fight on what will be the soul of Bangladesh, how will Bangladesh be? Will it be an Islamist nation? Will it have two terms for the prime minister and no third term? All this will have to be decided in this parliament which means 77 people who are part of the Jamaat led alliance will be battling it out with 212. But not only inside the parliament, because the Jamaat has more street power, the battle might spill out into the streets. That is a possibility.

 

Now comes the Awami, Awami is the silent big factor in this election, if BNP has won it should be thanking Awami League, there are some who say that there was a deal between the BNP and Awami, I do not know, I have no ways of knowing it, I am just a journalist, so I would not be privy to anything that they would have struck up in their salons, but even if that had happened it would have been a tactical thing. So will Awami League be allowed to come over ground? It has not been banned, it has been banned from elections, so ideally they should be allowed to come up, whether they will be or not is something again which the Jamaat and the BNP will have to decide because Jamaat will have a voice on this too.

 

Let's see how it moves, if they are not allowed, we will have to remember that there will be this section of population which will not be happy with whatever is happening. We have to go back a little in history to understand that even in the 1930s there were two streams of thought in what was then Bengal. For the Muslim Bengalis there were two parties, one was the Muslim League which had been founded by the Nawab of Dhaka and the other was the Prajakrishak party which was a more pro-peasant party, I would not really call it a socialist party, but it was certainly more pro-peasant led by Fazlul Haque, Fazlul Haque was Premier of Bengal as you all know, united Bengal, he also tried Saurabh Ardi, all of them tried for a united Bengal, it didn't work out, neither Muslim League under Jinnah nor Congress was willing to accept this, nor was Bengal willing to accept it, so Bengal was split.

 

Fazlul Haque had by then joined the Muslim League in 1940, he was the mover of the Pakistan, yeah, I will wind up. So very quickly they again came out, they became the Awamis, so these two streams of consciousness remain and the third is Jamaat. So we cannot say that we will get rid of one stream of thought and go on running that country, if that country continues there will be problems within that country and that will be added to whatever problems Bangladesh already has, consequently my belief is they will have to come to some kind of an understanding and all three political players will have to be allowed to play, if they don't there will be problem.

 

Bringing back Haseena is a problem for Tarique Rahman, he will be stuck with, if he jails her or if he hangs her he is going to have problems, if he allows her to be a politician he will have problems, he will be happy if she remains in India, that's it. Thank you.

 

 

Rami Niranjan Desai: Good evening and namaskar. Right at the outset, I'd like to thank Sripathi, Anwesha, ICWA for putting this together because I really do believe that Bangladesh and Myanmar need to be seen as a whole instead of separately. My very highly esteemed co-panelists just spoke about Bangladesh and I could see so many parallels that I will talk about. But I only have 10 minutes and Myanmar has so much of things happening that it's a mammoth task that the chair has given me. But with the permission of the chair, sir, I'd like to begin.

 

I was given three areas to speak about by Sripathi. I was asked to speak about the elections. I was asked to speak about the EOs and the future, how I see it. So I'm going to stick to that because of the limitation of time that we have. The elections, they were highly anticipated because it was after the coup and the coup was highly publicized because of the arrest of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. I had the opportunity to be an independent international observer in the third phase of the elections, which were concluded at the end of January.

 

So I'll give you some observations, but those are entirely my own observations on the elections. But just to give you an idea, the 64 parties approximately contested, six were national level parties and the rest were regional parties. 4,900 candidates shed their uniforms, military uniforms, to join, contest the elections. USDP was the favorite in terms of anybody who was watching Myanmar thought that USDP would come into power. It's the erstwhile military-backed party.

 

We also saw that all these observations came true because USDP won by 81%. The lower house, 232 out of 262 seats, upper house, 109 out of 157 seats. 67 constituencies they could not contest in, approximately, give or take a couple of them here or there. I will come to that in a while, because it's very important for us to understand why they couldn't contest in those 67 constituencies and what happens here on.

 

Now everybody's anticipating what's going to happen, who's going to be the president, what is General Min Aung Hlaing going to do. By first of April, they'll have chosen a president and the three vice presidents will be chosen before that because the Hluttaw, like the parliaments are called, will be sitting in. One vice president is chosen by the president himself. One is chosen by the elected MPs. And one is chosen by the combined Hluttaw.

 

Now, while I was there, it was very interesting. There were a handful of countries that had come to observe. Nepal had the election commission chairperson who was there. We had Belarus. We had a couple of other countries like Cambodia. We visited six constituencies, understood the processes of the elections. And what was interesting was this was the first time that they were using the EVMs. Before this, the previous elections were paper ballot. And one of the reasons of the coup, now there is no value judgment here whatsoever. This is what you hear on ground.

 

One of the reasons for the coup was that there was an allegation against the NLD that there was double voting because there were paper ballots in the hope that NLD led by Aung San Suu Kyi would get overwhelming majority and they could change the 2008 constitution which reserves 25% seats for the armed forces. Now, because of that, they decided to have an EVM. The EVMs are very much like the Indian EVMs. They are inspired by the Indian EVMs. We don't have a role in making them. They're indigenously made. I happened to meet and discuss at detail with the EVM committee as well.

 

The union election chairperson oversaw the elections and EVM construction. And there were very, very capable people who were working on the EVMs and they told me what the processes were. This is the fourth prototype that they've actually used. So that is to be said about the actual processes of the elections. But just to throw in an interesting thing there, the elections actually had, when I was moving around and looking at how they were looking at the lists, the polling lists, 75,000 notebooks, digital notebooks or they're like little iPads, that were given to every agent across the polling stations which had all the lists, the addresses, the names poll-wise of all the voters. They were given by the Chinese and they were China-made.

 

Now coming to the EOs, what happens post the elections? Again, a very important question. Because we've said, whether you call them ethnic armed organizations, you call them ethnic resistance organizations, you call them democratic forces, we did see them come under an umbrella entity called the National Unity Government right after the coup. The fact remains that KIA did not disrupt the elections, allowed the elections to happen. MNDA did not disrupt the elections. NLT and LA, these are the bigger EOs, did not disrupt the elections. Where they did have a problem, and I'll come back to [51:00] what I mentioned before, that about 67, 64 constituencies they couldn't contest in. 60% of those constituencies are across India's borders.

 

So about 40 of those constituencies, sir, are right across our borders, because they were the Chin state, the Arakan state. Arakan state, they'd initially said that they'll contest about 10 out of the 17. They could only just about manage three. Chin state, we know the Chin groups are hugely fragmented. They barely could manage elections there, apart from one or two places. So out of the 64, 67 constituencies that they couldn't fight elections in, 40 were across India's borders.

 

What does that mean? It really means that we are going to not see a resolution of the conflict, but we will have to reconcile with the conflict. What it also tells us is that these EOs are going to remain active more so across India's borders than across any other borders. You said, sir, that my friend Jayanta said that Jamaat had won borders in Bangladesh. So we have a problem maybe on those borders. We definitely have a problem across India's borders in Myanmar.

 

I will also talk a little bit about what happens to NUG and NUCC. Again, they've lost their luster because any way to begin with, the bigger EOs were not a part of the NUG. Arakan Army, which we talk about a lot and is a very formidable organization, was never a part of the NUG. Do they have a common political roadmap? No, they don't have a common political roadmap. Is there a leadership, can you think of a name, that leads the opposition? No, you can't. Unlike the previous revolutions, you had Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, who was the face, the leadership of the opposition. Do you see an opposition here? Do you know a name? You don't.

 

Therefore, that fragmentation is going to cost them a little bit. You look at Arakan Army, have they used a particular word to say what we want to negotiate or no? They've used the word confederation, they've used the word federation, they've used the word unitary. You ask KIA, KIA will say, we'll see what we'll do. There isn't a clear roadmap. You ask the chin groups, CNF, the erstwhile big umbrella group, chin group, has about 16 groups under it. You look at CB, has about six, seven other groups under it.

 

Who do you negotiate with? It's going to continue like this, it's going to be problematic, but let me just tell you that in the northern areas, where TNLA, MNDA, where you have the United Bar State, many of you who've studied Myanmar will be familiar with these names, had a 95% voter turnout. That just shows you the influence of China on these borders. Now, I was told before we started that I better keep to time. Otherwise, there'll be repercussions to it. So I'm going to ensure that I do.

 

The final point that Sripathi wanted me to elaborate on was a little bit on the consequences, geopolitical, geostrategic consequences. There is a problem. And I think the more we talk about it, the more we discuss it, is when we're going to understand the intensity of the problem. Myanmar cannot just be looked at in this simplistic way of who has more territory, the Tatmadaw or the EOs. There's a lot more going on. It's become the hub of metamphetamine production.

 

Ever since the ban of poppy cultivation in Afghanistan, they found a ready supply chain in Myanmar. UNODC has called Myanmar the epicenter of synthetic drug production. If you take only 10%, which is what UNODC usually does, it's estimated at USD 40 billion. That's also only what is intercepted. We are looking at also a very quick turnout on different varieties of methamphetamines. We had initially heard of Ya ba pills, which have been around since the 70s.

 

But now, they're processing faster. They're experimenting. And these are no small labs. These are sophisticated, high-tech laboratories made for this, run by Chinese syndicates. I often quote this number because I find it mind-boggling, sir, that in Andaman and Nicobar Islands in 2024, we caught about USD 2.5 billion worth of methamphetamines, about I think it was 60,000 tablets, 3,000 kilos, Indian Coast Guard, whatever. It's as bad.

 

So either way, I think we have a big problem on our hands. Major areas of transit into India, Champhai District through the Mizoram borders, distributed from there, Moreh Tamu from Manipur, Nagaland, repercussions is just the fact that it's narcotics trafficking, has repercussions on safety. No, there are developmental repercussions, and there are health repercussions. There's a reason that Mizoram has the highest rate of HIV in the country. It's about 2.5% more than the national average. Manipur has second, Nagaland has third.

 

What else is happening there? And again, I am just giving you a brief outliner. Cyber scams. Cyber scams cost us INR 22,500 crores last year in revenue. And again, sir, that's only what is reported. There's a lot of cybercrime that's not reported. Having visited these places and interviewed people who were inmates in cyber industries, in Mesa, across the border. I can tell you that a lot of people who are going into the cyber scam industry come from India, because we speak English, and a lot of these scams are in English. But also, the fact that all of them are not innocent. A lot of them are choosing to go there. Out of the three people I interviewed, one of them knew why he was going.

 

Number two, apart from it being financially problematic for us, the fact of the matter is, again, cyber scams are run by Chinese syndicates. This money is going to Chinese syndicates. And by all accounts of the NGOs that I met, it is considered the largest human trafficking event after slavery in the history of the world with, at any given point of time, 200,000 people in these cyber scam compounds. These compounds have everything you can imagine. They have supermarkets, they have discotheques, they have pubs, they have HR, they have training centers.

 

And if you end up failing, there could be organ trade. India has done a great job with repatriation. What is really sad is some of the smaller countries, maybe from Africa, maybe other countries, their inmates remain there. There isn't anybody to repatriate them. The third thing is what happens. The critical earth. Again, just give me two minutes. This is very important. The critical earth minerals. We've started talking about it. But we've started talking about it 15 years after China's already started doing it. The China-US tariff war really moved things. When the US put tariffs on China, the first thing China did is it said, we can't sell you any critical earth minerals. The minute they did that, US lift sanctions off the Tatmadaw. How did that happen so quickly? Because the US lens on the Tatmadaw, the armed forces, the military junta has been always very clear.

 

But they lifted sanctions. Not only did they lift sanctions, there were also credible reports. And this is all public reports that you can find, which said that they were looking at offers from KIA and other groups to access critical earth in Myanmar. The problem, obviously, is China has processing units, is the biggest buyer of critical earth and heavy rare earth elements from Myanmar. 90% of the processing is done in China. And 90% of any of this across the world comes from China.

 

So by the time the rest of the world catches up, I think we're going to have a fairly big problem on our hands. India, for India, it's also going to be problematic, because it's going to be a big problem to bring a lot of foreign interference in our backyard. A lot of other countries are going to be interested in cutting deals, getting entry. The narcotics is going to keep the ethnic armed organizations alive to this date. I've been watching the EOs very closely from the kind of weapons they used to have, the kind of systems they used to have. They're far more sophisticated in two years.

 

Ladies and gentlemen, when I say that they were buying parts for drones, today, they're just buying the most sophisticated drones outright. They are also buying anti-drone systems. So they're not going to have a dearth of money to buy any of this. I'll end by saying, I believe my 10 minutes is over. So I'll end by saying that we don't know what's going to happen politically in Myanmar. There is, as we've spoken about it quite a bit, but there is the National Defense Security Council has enacted a law, which is, what is it called? They've enacted a council, the Advisory Council.

 

The Advisory Council has a fair bit of powers. Because the debate earlier on was, what is President Ling going to do? Is he going to become president? How is he going to control the parliament and the armed forces? Now, this council, we don't know a lot about it. But what we do know, that it will have a considerable amount of powers, which can influence rule of law, which can influence foreign relations, and which can influence a couple of other things. What it can't influence is executive powers and judicial powers.

 

But it, in influence, has more powers than the president, and in authority, a little bit less. Whether President Ling he's acting president, but whether he becomes president or not, one way or another, in my opinion, he's going to retain power, both on the government and on the armed forces. How India deals with it is up to it. We've done a good job playing a tightrope. We've kept our channels of communication open. I think, to end, I would say a bigger problem is our security challenges on our border, our geopolitical, geostrategic, realistic idea of the future that we must have. And finally, that the conflict is just, we'll have to reconcile with it. The elections is not a resolution. Thank you.

 

Sabyasachi Dutta: Thank you very much for this invitation to ICWA and Sripathi and Anwesha. I'm the last speaker, and I know that we're already 20 minutes behind time. So I will try and the previous speaker, Rami, who's a good friend, has already given a very good takedown on the issues in Myanmar. But what I will attempt to do is, first of all, I say that Asian Confluence, the organization I am with, is a think tank in the Northeastern region. And we have borders both with Bangladesh and Myanmar. And it is vital for India's interests in the connectivity to the Bay of Bengal.

 

Both of these countries, whether it's through Bangladesh or through Myanmar, is what makes the Northeast, relieves it from its landlockedness. So therefore, looking at it from that perspective, the first thing I see is that, if we look across the borders, we have a huge humanitarian crisis in Myanmar. There's a lot of population who are discontent, economically deprived. Rami has talked about the crime angle, the drug angle, the contestations. And we have, so when we look at security, when we look at economics, we have to see that we are operating on a landscape where the population is extremely deprived and subject and very vulnerable to humanitarian, whether it's disasters or whether it's disease or whatever it is.

 

With that prism, if I look at the elections, I did have a chance to visit Myanmar several times. And once, also, we were received by the general himself in a so-called peace meet, which talked about how he wanted to bring peace to the country. But what this, and after speaking to quite a few people, there were glimmers of hope that the elections might be a window to something new, to something different. Post-elections, what we see is that the elections are being looked at as sort of a power engineering exercise. And it will give the general, especially with the establishment of the Union Legislative Council, sweeping powers.

 

So it gives him a lot of leeway on what is the future direction of what's going to happen, him as an individual. The second thing is that we see a large number of votes, of course, people who have been voted by the USDP. How the USDP, with their large numbers and the relations

between the general and the USDP. So the military and the political party is going to play out, is going to be an interesting prism, I think, to watch out for. It may offer opportunities and I think that is a ray of hope that we can see.

 

Some overtures from the general after the elections. You might have heard that one of the former senior ministers Tun Tun Naung, who was arrested, and he was for charges against crime in these syndicates and all of that. So there has been an attempt to show that good governance and all of that, there are ways in which the general, they're trying to show that they are talking to people who have spoken to the, who are part of the national ceasefire agreement. So those overtures are happening. Whether these are symbolic or whether they are real remains to be seen.

 

Overall, I think the military is heading for a time where, with a military mindset, it is going to be looking at conflicts with the other players. And I'll just talk to you about the other players. I've clubbed them into two parts. But we see a lot of aerial bombing and especially with the new set of drones they've had. That has gone down as rather being the military being anti-people and exacerbated the humanitarian crisis. So whatever the guerrilla warfare is, whatever is happening, the military's carpet bombing almost across before the elections and even after the elections, as we speak, hasn't gone down well with the people. So if you believe in the principle that the government is for the people of the country, then this is not really gelling too well.

 

Second point is the Bamar heartland. When I say the Bamar heartland, the Anyar, which is the Mandalay, Bago, Sagaing, Yangon, that whole belt, Nay Pyi Taw, that belt, we see an uprising where the NUG, if to remain relevant, they have to be active. They are very top-down. But then we see the rise of things like the SRA, the Spring Revolution Army. We see a consolidation of several PDFs. We see NUG aligned PDFs doing their own thing.

 

So we see a whole motley amount of fragmented conflicts coming up in the heartland vis-a-vis the military. How the military is going to be dealing with this, we have to see. But certainly, there is a period of managed conflict and turmoil predicted in the heartland. If you go to the periphery, which is the other part of Myanmar, which is the ethnic armed groups, as my previous speakers said, most of these areas are not under the control of the military. Yes, the Kachin, if I go to from around the round, the Karens, the Kachins, there's a huge role of the Chinese. There's a huge role of factors like the rare earth, geopolitical interests.

 

Let's also remember that they have been around for a long time, particularly the Kachins, the Kachin Independence Army, the very institutionalized. The Chins are very, very divided. But what is interesting in this whole scope is the Arakan army. I think they have stood out as quite a quasi force to be dealt with. Firstly, they have pretty much control over a lot of their land. They are also sharing, along with a part of the Chin, where they have a considerable influence in towns like Paletwa, which is just south of our Mizoram, through the Chin Brotherhood. They have an alliance with the Chins.

 

And so they seem to be emerging as sort of a force factor in which the military would have to deal with the Arakan army on a different plane, as opposed to the other ethnic armed organizations. So my submission here is that it needs a very we have to deconstruct the problem. It is not homogeneous, which brings me to my point that the Arakan is also bordering Bangladesh. And how the Rohingya crisis will play out, we've just heard that Professor Mr. Khalilur Rahman is now the foreign minister of Bangladesh or tip to be, as I heard. I may be wrong also.

 

But let's remember that he was the one who was promoting this humanitarian corridor through the Rohingya through this area. So there's a whole bunch of factors which are going to play out between where the Arakans are and the Bangladeshi the Chittagong Hill Tracts and the Chittagong region of Bangladesh. And both, of course, at the very tip of our northeastern states, bordering the states of Manipur and Mizoram, in particular.

 

So it is going to be a very complex web of looking at various factors, pull and push factors, from the northeastern view. The role of the state governments become extremely important. How does the Mizoram government, how does the new Manipur government deal with all of this? How does the center and the state align politically on all of these? And how do we see a bigger problem or a bigger solution? In this complex web of small, small, micro-level systemic problems that exist right? In the backyard of India.

 

I think, because time is short, I think what will happen is post-elections, the military will use, you know, there'll be conditions set so that it's for bargaining, essentially. So whether it's bombing, whether it's negotiations, it's who has more bargaining power or control of territory, who has more bargaining power. My last point would be, in the interest of time, is that as far as India is concerned, I think we have a security, of course, serious concern.

 

But I think the bigger concern is or the prism to enter, entry point for that concern, should be people. Because at the end of the day, if people on the ground are caught up in power plays and geopolitics, it's not sustainable on the long term. Which is where I would say that China has lost out a lot. Because China doesn't have any job. People in Myanmar are dealing with China because they have to deal with China. But the trust factor with China is very low. Similarly, the trust factor with the military is very low.

 

Here, I think India, if I may suggest, should have a much more people-centric narrative and approach, looking at how people on the ground can be helped, regardless of where they are, so that there is much more of a positive spin on how things move forward. I think the role of the Bangladesh, new Bangladesh government, the role of the state governments, the role of engaging the SAC, the role of engaging the so-called non-state, but state actors in this case, like the Arakan army, it's a whole bunch of stakeholders who are converging in a very small geography.

 

And how we engage with them, how one engages with the other, remains to be seen. This would be a point where the senior general, there is one light at the end of the tunnel, which is my wishful thinking. I give it all my is that if some morning he gets up and says, I've had enough of war. I think I should bring everybody across the table and make them talk to each other.

 

And my people are suffering. My people are suffering or our people are suffering. If that happens, that seems to be the only way. Of course, this is me talking, you know, as an individual. But other than that, I think we see a time of institutionalized fragmentation, prolonged conflict, at least in the short to medium term, and of course, how the long term plays is anybody's guess. Thank you very much.

 

Preet Malik: Is this working? Well, we have crossed every possible boundary as far as time is concerned. So quickly, let me open the floor for any questions. But before you do, can I ask one question? Nobody has referred to the quiet person behind everything and that is the United States of America, where Bangladesh is concerned. Perhaps you could tell us what your assessment is on that.

 

Sreeradha Datta: Thank you. The fact that I mentioned Khalil Rahman was because of that. He's really the US man sitting in the cabinet just now. He's on it already, I think. So yes, we have, of course, heard about the US influence post during the July uprising and also subsequently. We've also seen that for years, and this is not the first time that US has always said that, why not Jamaat as a political partner? There has been a bit of narrative saying that Jamaat is being made mainstream by US, but US has been working to make Jamaat mainstream for the last 50 years, actually. So it's not new.

 

And I think at this point of time, and this was probably the only chance, and I think that was, I think, adequately explained by both of us, that first time we've seen Jamaat become mainstream. And their linkages with US is very clear. The fact that NSA, who was not MP, the rest of all the ministers have won the election in some constituency. So there is a bit of influence.

 

We've also seen the interim governor, just three days before the election, four days maybe, they signed a pact with the US, which amongst many other, apart from the tariff line, which has been brought down to 19 from 50 and 30 and all that, there's also a large defense military side to it, including many trade issues, which was, I mean, if you look at the first few pages of the trade, the agreement, Bangladesh will, Bangladesh will, Bangladesh will.

 

Next page, US may, US may, but again, Bangladesh will. So clearly, there's no way this particular government can walk out of that. But on the other hand and we've a couple of times met the UK ambassador to Bangladesh, too and she has also I've often spoken about how, in these last 18 months, that one particular external power who's always been, we always refer to it as the non-resident South Asian power, which is China, has made far greater inroads into Bangladesh.

 

Now, China has actually been there. China's been a steadfast partner for Sheikh Hasina, for Khaleda Zia, for everyone, including this interim. So I think, but I would actually finish on this note, saying that US actually would be a viable partner for us, because on several issues, we are on the same page, democracy being one of them. But in other consideration of traditions, values, norms.

 

I think US and India align on various issues, while for us, China, of course, is an, again, despite the fact that China has worked so closely with Bangladesh, in fact, is the only one who's given them support for infrastructure and everything that works within China. But they've not gotten into a debt ratio problem. So Bangladesh has also been very cautious about that. So I think we not only have to watch US, but we'll also have to very closely watch China. And both of them are going to be factors for India.

 

Preet Malik: Okay. Thank you. I'll throw the floor open. I think he, please give your name and direct the question at whoever you really want to.

 

Subodh C Bharti: Thank you, Chair. I'm Subodh. I'm Research Associate at the Indian Council of World Affairs. And my question is to any panelists in Bangladesh. I just wanted to know what would be the direction of Bangladesh politics, given the context of Jamaat and NCPs sitting in opposition, and the history of revenge politics in Bangladesh and of course, the political appointments, especially. And of course, the Jamaat leadership meeting with Tarique Rahman and tweeting about that, and that they will be cooperating as a constructive opposition. And avoid revenge politics, it was also requested. Similarly, NCP leaders also meeting with Tarique Rahman and same thing. Thank you.

 

Jayanta Roy Chowdhury: Yeah. So okay, there are two things. I think there are two basic branches which you want to talk about. One is Bangladesh's internal politics and the other is the external politics. So let me address the external politics first. Obviously, they will have to reset their relations with India, if you want to use the word reset. But it has to be gradual. They will not want to rush into anything where they are branded by the opposition as pro-Indian, which was the problem for Sheikh Hasina. And India will also have to walk carefully, because it would like relations to improve without, again, being branded in any manner for that matter.

 

So it will be an incremental betterment of our relationship, which is what I would imagine Tarique Rahman would aim at. He would not like to make an enemy out of India. As Yunus did, whatever he wants to say, but the fact is we were not exactly on the best of terms. As far as domestic politics is concerned, I did say, and I think Sreeradha will also agree, that Jamaat will be increasingly more and more powerful both on the streets and in Parliament, so BNP will have to mind its P's and Q's accordingly. The decision on in what way Awami League will be allowed or not allowed will also again rest on these two parties and also on the streets, because if Awami League reframes itself, which it seems likely to do, so we'll have to watch out for that.

 

Unidentified Participant: [Question Inaudible] Now the question is, because there are intermeshing of domestic politics and foreign policy in both the countries, I think there will be a great pressure on both the governments and looking at the past history of both Bangladesh and Myanmar, it's going to be very unstable in the coming at least one year. I mean, that's the thing. I'm just a comment, not a question.

 

Preet Malik: Any other question go head. After that I can take only, I think, two or three questions. Let me take all three together.

 

Ashutosh Rath: Good afternoon. Thank you, Chair and panelists, for your insights. I'm Ashutosh Rath, a research intern at the Council. My question is regarding Myanmar. It is to both the panelists that do you think that the new administration led by USDP, which is backed by the military, can initiate a viable peace process among the different EAOs in Myanmar, given the fact that the elections are being labeled as a sham or a farce worldwide? Not by all the countries, but by a few countries have, though, supported the elections. But do you think, how does it affect the regional development, the regional development as in the internal politics as well as its foreign policy, the international relations, given the backing of China?

 

Preet Malik: Please, go ahead.

 

Zeeshan Ali: Hi, thank you. My name is Zeeshan Ali. I'm a research intern at the Council. My question is primarily in the context of these cyber scams that have been taking place in Myanmar. So a lot of these are backed by China and a lot of our youth who go there are technically high IT skilled professionals who are lured by higher paying jobs. They go to Thailand and then they are trafficked to Myanmar. So is there a need for more bilateral discussions with China on these issues? Because these are the best talent who are going to Thailand for looking for jobs but are being lured into human trafficking and other forms of trafficking. Or is this an issue that we have been not paying much attention to? Thank you.

 

Preet Malik: One more question. Anybody? Yes, please.

 

Mohammed Hadi Raza: Hello, everyone. My name is Mohammed Hadi Raza. And my question is that during 2001 and 2006 when BNP and Jamaat was in coalition, we have seen the rise in India's insurgent groups. So I would like to ask if anyone can answer that what will be the implications that India would face, especially the fact that we have now this one, I mean, relatively stabilized northeastern region? Thank you.

 

Preet Malik: All right. Would you like to answer that? Because I believe you have to go.

 

Sreeradha Datta: Yes. So the last few months we've heard several statements from all the political leaders of Bangladesh who have been fighting the elections that they want to have a good, positive, constructive relation with India. And I mentioned a particular interview which was given by the joint secretary of BNP who has mentioned that we don't see any occasion for such revisiting of these things. We need to move beyond it. We need to look at the things that provide dividends to people on both sides.

 

So basically, what they have conveyed is that they will not go back. And of course, India's concerns and fears remain. And the fact that the joint referred to the fact that we have a lot of jamaatis, but it's also true that on the borders the extremist positions always. And that's true for also if you go to our Bengal, Murshidabad, you will see similar positions. So it's not unknown for the border areas to have that kind of elements. But yes, of course, it's going to be a concern, but I also feel in today's world, India will actually have to stop relying on the neighborhood for their security considerations. India will have to take care of it itself.

 

Now technology is in with us. We are able to ramp up a lot. But again, it's too early to say, but as I said, we hope that BNP can walk the talk. The prime minister has so far in every interview, wherever he's been asked, has said that he wants to build good, positive relations. And he clearly knows that what happened in 2001 and 2006, that India is a different India today. He knows that has been very well conveyed all across. So I think we hope that there will be a different BNP government this time.

 

Sabyasachi Dutta: Just a very quick answer to the idea of peace process, right? You had asked. Well, it really depends on the military, the senior general. But there is, if he wishes to, of course. But he has to take, I think, the onus on how to build the trust, or at least an atmosphere of having a talk, which has not happened so far. I think the fundamental of it is that these continued bombings before the election, during and after, I think that has created an atmosphere where talks are looking very difficult to have. So it depends on them.

 

Rami Niranjan Desai: So I'll answer both the questions. I'm glad that you asked about the peace process. I will diverge a little bit from what Sabya said. Sabya totally taken that into account. I think the responsibility also lies on the EOs. The reason the responsibility lies on the EOs is it going to be ethnicity for the ethnic areas? Are the Chins going to allow non-Chins to be there? Are the Arakans going to allow the Rohingyas to come back? Is Kachin going to be Kachin-dominated? It has to then also, there has to be responsibility from there. And also, they have to appoint people who can negotiate.

 

Now, if Chin has over 30 fragments, who do you negotiate with? Who is the deciding person? If you go to CNF, CNF says that we think CB betrayed us because they partnered with Arakan and allowed them to take Paletwa, which is a Chin state. Does Arakan go any further into Chin state? Will there be that kind of fight as well? So I think it goes both ways. There is an institution called NSPNC, which is the negotiating body for ethnic armed organizations that have come on board. They've invited people to give them talks on federalism. There was one of them that Sabya and me were at as well. In my limited capacity, and with absolute humility I say this, there is a lot of capacity building that needs to be done for them to understand federalism in its true sense. It's an alien concept.

 

At this point, they're thinking of either moving towards Indian federalism or Swiss. Now, where has that come from? So I think these are things that we need to think about. China. China, yes, has a lot of influence on some of the northern EOs. It also, in a way, has influence on right down to Arakan, because they did cut a deal with Arakan to safeguard Chakrabort. Can India do the same with its EOs across the border? Can it be a mediating partner? This is something that I think agencies need to decide themselves.

 

Cyber scams. Cyber scams do not only attract highly educated individuals. The three people that I interviewed were all semi-literate, but they spoke English, because every Indian speaks some level of English. What they need is people to go on social media and to be able to type messages. These people had never traveled abroad. They didn't know where they were. They thought they were going to Thailand. They didn't know how to navigate the situation. It was lucky that they got out alive. So there are a lot of people who are not IT professionals.

 

So that makes it very difficult. To have a talk with China in a bilateral way for cyber scams isn't really going to work, because China itself did the Three Brotherhood Alliance in a crackdown. To make sure that the Tatmadaw did a crackdown on the cyber scams in Kokang region, that's when they moved to Mayavadi. So China wants to have nothing to do with them. It possibly has to be a multilateral platform, because it not only affects us, it affects other countries. It affects Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, Myanmar itself. So it has to be a multilateral platform. We need to have better intelligence sharing. We need to bring on other countries like US and EU that are impacted.

 

Last point, somebody mentioned legitimacy. The elections, as much as we can continue debating whether it's legitimate or not, it's going to become an excuse for legitimacy. So it's going to get legitimacy. It already has from half of the ASEAN countries. Malaysia will not give it legitimacy. US has lifted sanctions. If US does that, Singapore will, EU will. We can debate whether it's legitimate or not. That aside, it's going to gain them more legitimacy than they had before. So I'll end my topics, my questions with that.

 

Preet Malik: Thank you very much. I'd like to thank the panel. But can I make a quick, out of all the questions out here, and including whatever I said and whatever the panel said, none of us has mentioned one significant factor. And that is that if there is one lesson India should have learned from what happened in Bangladesh, it is that you cannot afford, as a country, to place all your eggs in one basket. That was one of the biggest factors which we should have discussed. None of us mentioned it. So I'm just mentioning it so that it comes on record. I think we have taken a hell of a lot of time. It just shows how interesting the panel was. And now I think we should get ready to have a cup of tea.

 

Unidentified Speaker: Thank you, sir. Thank you, the chair. Thank you, panelists. Thank you, everyone, for joining us. I request all of you to join us for high tea and refreshments in the foyer. Thank you.

***** 

List of Participants

1. Amb. Preet Malik, Former Ambassador of India to Myanmar (Chair)

2. Dr. Sreeradha Datta, Professor, JSIA, O.P. Jindal Global University, Sonipat (on Bangladesh)

3. Mr. Jayanta Roy Chowdhury, Editor, United News of India (on Bangladesh)

4. Ms. Rami Niranjan Desai, Distinguished Fellow, India Foundation  (on Myanmar)

5. Mr. Sabyasachi Dutta, Executive Director, Asian Confluence (on Myanmar)

 

Disclaimer: In case of any discrepancies in this transcribed article, readers should consider and refer to the original video recording of the event.