Bangladesh Untold

Tag: Khaleda Zia

  • Five Years at Number One: How Bangladesh Became the World’s Most Corrupt Country and Nobody Talks About It

    2001. 2002. 2003. 2004. 2005. Five consecutive years. Five first-place finishes. Bangladesh wasn’t just corrupt under BNP-Jamaat rule — it was the most corrupt nation on Earth. And the people who ran that government are back in power today.

    There is a number that should haunt every conversation about Bangladesh’s political history, and it is this: five.

    Five consecutive years. From 2001 to 2005. Every single year that Khaleda Zia’s BNP-Jamaat coalition governed Bangladesh, Transparency International ranked the country as the most corrupt in the world.

    Not “one of the most corrupt.” Not “struggling with corruption.” Not “has corruption problems.” The most corrupt. Number one. The bottom of the list. The worst of the worst. Five times in a row.

    Let me put that in perspective. There are roughly 200 countries in the world. Some are war zones. Some are run by dictators. Some have no functioning government at all. And for five straight years, Bangladesh — a country of 140 million people with a functioning bureaucracy, a parliament, a judiciary, and a free press — ranked below every single one of them.

    This is not ancient history. The people who presided over that distinction are running Bangladesh right now. And nobody — nobody — is talking about it.

    What the Corruption Perceptions Index Actually Measures

    Before we get into the specifics, let me explain what Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index is and why it matters.

    The CPI is not a opinion poll. It is not a political hit job. It is not compiled by opposition politicians or foreign intelligence agencies with axes to grind. It is the world’s most widely cited metric for measuring public sector corruption, used by governments, international organizations, investors, and development agencies around the globe.

    The CPI aggregates data from multiple independent sources — including the World Economic Forum, the Economist Intelligence Unit, Freedom House, the World Bank, and others — to produce a composite score for each country. The methodology is transparent, peer-reviewed, and consistent year over year. Countries are scored from 0 (highly corrupt) to 10 (very clean). The lower the score, the more corrupt the public sector is perceived to be.

    When Bangladesh scored a 1.2 out of 10 in 2005, that wasn’t Transparency International’s opinion. That was the collective assessment of every major institution that measures governance, combined into a single number. It was the mathematical expression of a reality that every Bangladeshi lived through.

    The Scores: Year by Year

    Here are the numbers. Read them slowly.

    • 2001 — Bangladesh ranked #1 most corrupt in the world. Score: 0.4 out of 10. This was the year BNP won the October election and Khaleda Zia became Prime Minister.
    • 2002 — Bangladesh ranked #1 most corrupt in the world. Score: 1.2 out of 10. This was the year Operation Clean Heart killed 44 people in custody and the BNP government passed an indemnity law to protect the killers.
    • 2003 — Bangladesh ranked #1 most corrupt in the world. Score: 1.3 out of 10. This was the year Transparency International Bangladesh released its own survey showing that Bangladeshi households paid more in bribes than in taxes.
    • 2004 — Bangladesh ranked #1 most corrupt in the world (tied with Haiti at 1.5 out of 10). This was the year of the August 21 grenade attack that killed 24 people and the Chittagong arms haul that seized 27,020 grenades from a government jetty.
    • 2005 — Bangladesh ranked #1 most corrupt in the world (tied with Chad at 1.7 out of 10). This was the year JMB bombed 63 districts in a single day, Tarique Rahman was running Hawa Bhaban as a parallel government, and the US Embassy was calling him a “symbol of kleptocratic government.”

    Five years. Five last-place finishes. A score that never rose above 1.7 out of 10.

    To put this in context: in 2005, Somalia — a country that literally had no functioning central government — scored higher than Bangladesh. Afghanistan — which was in the middle of a full-scale war — scored higher than Bangladesh. Iraq — which was under foreign military occupation and fighting an active insurgency — scored higher than Bangladesh.

    Let that settle. Bangladesh had a parliament, a prime minister, a cabinet, a judiciary, police, military, intelligence agencies, and a complete government apparatus. And it was ranked more corrupt than countries that had no government at all.

    Why This Wasn’t an Accident

    Here is the argument that BNP supporters always make: “Corruption was always there. It’s not a BNP problem. It’s a Bangladesh problem.”

    Let me destroy that argument with two facts.

    Fact one: Bangladesh had appeared on the CPI before BNP took power. In 1999, under Awami League rule, Bangladesh ranked 15th from the bottom. In 2000, it ranked 11th from the bottom. Not great. Not good. But not the worst. Not number one. Not even close to number one.

    Fact two: In 2006, after BNP’s term ended and the caretaker government took over, Bangladesh’s CPI ranking immediately began to recover. By 2007, the score had risen to 2.0. By 2008, it was 2.3. By 2010, it had reached 2.4. Still bad. Still in the bottom quarter. But no longer dead last.

    The pattern is unmistakable. Bangladesh’s corruption spiked to world-worst levels during the precise years that BNP-Jamaat held power. It improved when they left. This is not a coincidence. This is cause and effect.

    And the mechanism was not mysterious. BNP didn’t just fail to control corruption. BNP institutionalized corruption.

    Hawa Bhaban: The Corruption Headquarters

    You cannot understand Bangladesh’s five-year reign as the world’s most corrupt country without understanding Hawa Bhaban.

    Hawa Bhaban was the BNP chairperson’s office — the political headquarters of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party. But under Khaleda Zia’s 2001-2006 government, it functioned as something else entirely: a parallel power center where government contracts were traded for bribes, political appointments were sold to the highest bidder, and the country’s resources were funneled into private hands.

    At the center of it all was Tarique Rahman — Khaleda Zia’s eldest son, who operated from Hawa Bhaban with what can only be described as brazen impunity. US Embassy cables released by WikiLeaks described Tarique as a “symbol of kleptocratic government” and noted that his office was “frequently accused of acting as a parallel power center where government contracts were influenced in exchange for bribes.”

    The US Embassy didn’t mince words. In a 2005 cable, diplomats wrote that Tarique had “a reputation for violent politics” and that his influence was so pervasive that it had become a “law unto itself.” The cable, which was classified as “confidential” before WikiLeaks published it, was not political commentary. It was the professional assessment of American diplomats stationed in Dhaka, reporting to Washington through official channels.

    But Tarique wasn’t working alone. Hawa Bhaban was an ecosystem:

    • Giasuddin Al Mamun — Tarique’s closest associate and business partner, later convicted of money laundering alongside him. Mamun was the front man, the deal-maker, the person who turned political influence into cash.
    • Shamim Iskander — Khaleda Zia’s younger brother, who turned Biman Bangladesh Airlines into his personal ATM, extracting Tk 40 crore in commissions and nearly bankrupting the national carrier.
    • Saiful Islam Duke — Khaleda’s nephew, who leveraged family connections for personal enrichment.
    • A network of businessmen, bureaucrats, and political operators who paid for access and received contracts, appointments, and protection in return.

    Hawa Bhaban was not a side operation. It was the operation. The official government — the cabinet, the ministries, the civil service — existed to implement decisions that were made in Hawa Bhaban. The bribe economy didn’t leak around the edges of the system. It was the system.

    The Scale of the Corruption

    Corruption under BNP-Jamaat rule was not limited to a few bad actors. It was systemic, structural, and staggering in its scope. Let me walk you through what Transparency International Bangladesh itself documented during this period.

    In 2003, TIB released its National Household Survey on Corruption. The findings were extraordinary:

    • Bangladeshi households paid more in bribes than in taxes. Let me say that again: the average Bangladeshi family paid more money to corrupt officials than they paid to the government in taxes.
    • 97.8% of households that interacted with the police reported paying bribes.
    • 88% of households interacting with the judiciary reported paying bribes.
    • 75% of households interacting with land administration reported paying bribes.
    • The total estimated bribe paid by households in 2002 was approximately Tk 3,700 crore ($640 million) — in a country where per capita income was less than $400.

    This was not petty corruption. This was not a few bad apples. This was a system where virtually every interaction with the state required a bribe. Where the police, the courts, the land office, the tax department — every institution that a citizen might turn to for protection or service — had been converted into a revenue extraction machine.

    And the money didn’t flow upward by accident. It flowed upward by design. When Tarique Rahman’s Hawa Bhaban was the clearing house for government contracts, when Shamim Iskander was siphoning tens of crores from the national airline, when every police station and every courtroom demanded payment — the money moved up the chain. The bribe paid to a local official fed the system that fed Hawa Bhaban that fed the Zia family’s bank accounts in Singapore and beyond.

    The Khamba Tarique Scandal: Poles to Nowhere

    Of all the corruption stories from the BNP era, few capture its absurdity and its cruelty quite like the “Khamba Tarique” scandal.

    “Khamba” means “pole” in Bangla. The scandal was named for exactly what it was: under Tarique Rahman’s influence, the government spent millions of dollars installing electric poles across rural Bangladesh. The poles were erected. The wires were never connected. The electricity never came.

    This was not an infrastructure project. This was a money-laundering operation disguised as rural electrification. Contracts for pole procurement were funneled through Hawa Bhaban. Prices were inflated — sometimes double or triple the market rate. The poles were installed in remote areas where nobody would check whether they actually worked. And the money — millions of dollars of it — disappeared into the pockets of Tarique’s associates.

    Time magazine, in a January 2026 article, noted that Tarique Rahman continues to be referred to by the derogatory nickname “Khamba Tarique” by critics. The nickname stuck because it encapsulated everything wrong with BNP-era corruption: the government didn’t even bother to deliver the service it was supposedly paying for. It installed the poles, took the money, and left the villages in the dark.

    Literally in the dark. People who had been promised electricity received concrete poles instead. Concrete poles sticking out of rice paddies, connected to nothing, generating nothing, useful for nothing. A monument to theft that you could see from the road.

    That is what being the world’s most corrupt country looks like. Not just money stolen — though there was plenty of that. But infrastructure stolen. Development stolen. Electricity stolen. The basic promise of government — that your taxes will pay for services — replaced by a system where your taxes paid for poles that led nowhere.

    The Police: Bangladesh’s Most Corrupt Institution

    If there was one institution that embodied the corruption of the BNP era, it was the police.

    In 2002, Transparency International Bangladesh revealed that Bangladesh Police was one of the most corrupt public institutions in the country. The Asian Human Rights Commission went further, stating that “the people of Bangladesh paid more to the police than to the government.”

    Think about that. In a country of 140 million people, the institution responsible for enforcing the law was extracting more money from citizens through bribes than the government was collecting through legal taxation. The police had become a revenue-generating operation — not for the public treasury, but for the private enrichment of officers and their political masters.

    The numbers from TIB’s household survey tell the story:

    • 97.8% of households interacting with police paid bribes
    • Bribes were demanded for filing FIRs (First Information Reports — the basic first step of criminal justice)
    • Bribes were demanded for investigating cases
    • Bribes were demanded for not filing cases against the innocent
    • Bribes were demanded for releasing detainees
    • Bribes were demanded simply for doing the job the taxpayers were already paying for

    And at the top of this pyramid sat a Home Minister — Lutfozzaman Babar — who was simultaneously overseeing the police force, facilitating the August 21 grenade attack cover-up, enabling the Chittagong arms haul, and ordering the Shamsunnahar Hall raid on female university students. The police didn’t just tolerate corruption under Babar. They were instructed in it. When the Home Minister is himself a criminal, what exactly is the police force supposed to model itself on?

    But the police corruption wasn’t just about individual officers shaking people down. It was about who was protected and who was persecuted. When 97.8% of interactions with police required a bribe, the system wasn’t just extracting money — it was creating a two-tier justice system. The wealthy and connected could buy their way out of anything. The poor and powerless could be jailed, tortured, or killed with impunity.

    This was the system that produced Operation Clean Heart’s 44 custody deaths. This was the system that produced RAB’s 600+ extrajudicial killings. This was the system that couldn’t — or wouldn’t — properly investigate the August 21 grenade attack. When the enforcers are for sale, the law is for sale. And when the law is for sale, the powerful are untouchable and the vulnerable are disposable.

    The Biman Bleed: How One Man Gutted an Airline

    Let me tell you about one specific corruption story that illustrates how the system worked at the top — because the macro numbers can feel abstract, and the human stories don’t.

    Biman Bangladesh Airlines is the national flag carrier. It is owned by the government. It is supposed to serve the people of Bangladesh by providing air connectivity, supporting trade, and representing the country internationally.

    Under BNP rule, it served one family.

    Shamim Iskander — Khaleda Zia’s younger brother — was a former flight engineer at Biman who transformed his family connection into total control over the airline’s commercial operations. Here is what he did:

    • Arranged the lease of three aircraft that cost Biman approximately Tk 250 crore ($30 million) in lease costs — when six planes could have been purchased outright for the same amount
    • Leased a defective Airbus from the United States that cost Biman about Tk 100 crore ($12 million) over 5 years — the plane’s market value was only Tk 62.10 crore
    • Arranged an unnecessary Boeing 747 lease, further draining the airline’s finances
    • Earned at least Tk 40 crore ($4.8 million+) in commissions on these deals
    • Controlled aircraft maintenance, engine overhaul, and spare parts contracts through his brother-in-law Shahedul Haq as local agent for foreign firms
    • “Dictated the terms of every transfer, dismissal and appointment of Biman staff” — as reported by The Daily Star

    The result: Biman Bangladesh Airlines — the national flag carrier of a country of 140 million people — was nearly bankrupted. By 2006, the situation was so dire that Biman employees and pilots launched a movement to “save Biman.” They weren’t protesting market conditions or fuel prices. They were protesting the systematic looting of their airline by the Prime Minister’s brother.

    And then, in March 2025, a Dhaka court discharged Shamim Iskander and his wife from the corruption case that had 36 prosecution witnesses documenting his crimes. Case dismissed. Walked free.

    In March 2026, Shamim Iskander sat in the VIP gallery of Parliament at the maiden session of the 13th Parliament. Second row. Next to his wife. Next to the Prime Minister’s family. From accused corrupt figure who bled the national airline dry to VIP at Parliament.

    This is what the world’s most corrupt country looks like when it’s run by the world’s most corrupt family. The airline bleeds. The brother profits. The courts clear him. And then he gets a VIP seat to watch his nephew become Prime Minister.

    What “Most Corrupt” Actually Means for Real People

    Rankings and scores and indices are important. But they can feel abstract. So let me tell you what “most corrupt country in the world” actually means for the people who live there.

    It means a pregnant woman going to a government hospital and being told she needs to pay a bribe to see a doctor. It means a farmer trying to register his land and being told he needs to pay a bribe to the land office. It means a small business owner trying to get a trade license and being told he needs to pay a bribe to the municipal corporation. It means a family trying to file a police report after a crime and being told they need to pay a bribe just to have the FIR registered.

    It means that 97.8% of people who interact with the police pay bribes. Not 10%. Not 30%. Not even 50%. 97.8%. Almost every single person who walked into a police station during the BNP era walked out having paid money they couldn’t afford to an officer who was supposed to serve them.

    It means that the total bribe burden on Bangladeshi households was estimated at Tk 3,700 crore — in a country where the average annual income was less than $400. This wasn’t rich people paying their way out of trouble. This was poor people paying to access basic services that their government was already supposed to provide.

    It means that when Transparency International released its rankings and Bangladesh came last — again — the BNP government’s response was not to fix the problem. The response was to attack Transparency International. BNP leaders called the CPI “biased,” “politically motivated,” and “part of an international conspiracy against Bangladesh.” They did not dispute the data. They did not propose reforms. They attacked the messenger.

    This is the playbook. When you cannot defend the numbers, attack the people who published them. When you cannot explain why your country is the most corrupt on Earth for five straight years, claim that the organization measuring corruption is conspiring against you.

    Transparency International is not a political organization. It is a global coalition with chapters in over 100 countries. Its methodology is public, peer-reviewed, and used by the World Bank, the IMF, and virtually every major development institution on Earth. When Bangladesh ranked last, it wasn’t because TIB had an agenda. It was because the data was devastating and the reality was worse.

    The Aftermath: What Changed (And What Didn’t)

    After the BNP-Jamaat government fell on January 11, 2007 — the 1/11 caretaker government intervention that BNP now calls a “dark chapter” — Bangladesh’s CPI score began to improve. Slowly. Incrementally. But unmistakably.

    By 2010, the score had risen from 1.2 to 2.4. Still deeply corrupt. Still in the bottom quarter globally. But no longer dead last. No longer the world’s most corrupt country. The improvement wasn’t dramatic, and it wasn’t fast enough, but it was directionally correct.

    The caretaker government’s anti-corruption drive — the very same drive that BNP condemns as persecution — filed cases against Tarique Rahman, Shamim Iskander, Khaleda Zia, and dozens of other corrupt officials. The cases had evidence. The convictions were secured. The money trails were documented by the FBI, by Singapore courts, by Bangladesh’s own Anti-Corruption Commission.

    And then, one by one, every single conviction was overturned. Every single case was acquitted. Every single accused walked free. Not because they were innocent — but because the courts of Bangladesh, under BNP rule, produce the outcomes that the ruling party requires.

    The money that was stolen? Not recovered. The victims who paid bribes? Not compensated. The institutions that were gutted? Not rebuilt. The national airline that was looted? Not compensated. The five years at number one? Not even acknowledged.

    The Current Government’s Corruption Problem

    And now the BNP is back in power. Tarique Rahman — the man the US Embassy called a “symbol of kleptocratic government,” the man who ran Hawa Bhaban as a parallel corruption headquarters, the man who gave Bangladesh the nickname “Khamba Tarique” — is the Prime Minister of Bangladesh.

    His uncle Shamim Iskander sits in the VIP gallery of Parliament. His mother’s corruption cases have been acquitted. His own 84 cases have been acquitted. The courts that convicted them have been overruled. The institutions that investigated them have been neutralized.

    And Bangladesh’s CPI score? In 2024, before BNP returned to power, Bangladesh scored 23 out of 100 on the CPI, ranking 111th out of 180 countries. Bad. But not the worst. Not even close to the 1.2 out of 10 that BNP achieved during its last stint in power.

    What do you think that score is going to look like in five years?

    The pattern is clear. The mechanism is documented. The people are the same. The playbook is the same. The only thing that has changed is that now they have five more years to run it.

    Why This Matters Now

    You might be wondering: why write about corruption rankings from 2001-2005? What does that have to do with today?

    Here is why.

    When a country ranks as the most corrupt in the world for five consecutive years, that is not a statistical fluke. That is a governing philosophy. That is what happens when a political party does not just tolerate corruption but organizes it. When corruption is not a bug but a feature. When the system is designed — from the top down, from Hawa Bhaban to the local police station — to extract wealth from citizens and funnel it to the powerful.

    And the people who designed that system are now running the country again.

    Not metaphorically. Not indirectly. Literally the same people. Tarique Rahman is Prime Minister. His uncle sits in Parliament’s VIP gallery. His party controls the courts, the police, the intelligence services, and every institution that is supposed to check corruption.

    The BNP’s defense is always the same: “Those were old cases. Those were politically motivated. The courts have cleared us.”

    The courts cleared them under a BNP government. The same courts that convicted them under a different government. The same legal system. The same evidence. Different political masters. Different outcomes.

    Transparency International’s rankings were not issued by a Bangladeshi court. They were not the product of a political prosecution. They were the assessment of the world’s leading anti-corruption organization, using data from the World Bank, the World Economic Forum, the Economist Intelligence Unit, and every other major institution that measures governance.

    You cannot acquit a ranking. You cannot overturn a CPI score. You cannot appeal the mathematics of 97.8% of police interactions requiring a bribe.

    The data doesn’t care who is in power. The data is the data. And the data says: when BNP governs, Bangladesh becomes the most corrupt country on Earth.

    The Numbers Don’t Care About Your Politics

    I want to end with the numbers. Not opinions. Not interpretations. Not political spin. Just the numbers.

    2001: Bangladesh is ranked the most corrupt country in the world. CPI score: 0.4 out of 10.

    2002: Bangladesh is ranked the most corrupt country in the world. CPI score: 1.2 out of 10.

    2003: Bangladesh is ranked the most corrupt country in the world. CPI score: 1.3 out of 10.

    2004: Bangladesh is ranked the most corrupt country in the world. CPI score: 1.5 out of 10.

    2005: Bangladesh is ranked the most corrupt country in the world. CPI score: 1.7 out of 10.

    Five years. Five last-place finishes. The worst score on the planet.

    This is not BNP’s political opponents talking. This is not Awami League propaganda. This is not a foreign conspiracy. This is the Corruption Perceptions Index — the gold standard of corruption measurement, used by every major international institution, compiled from multiple independent sources, peer-reviewed, transparent, and consistent.

    And these are the same people who are now telling you that they will fight corruption. The same people who gave Bangladesh five consecutive years as the world’s most corrupt nation are now promising clean governance. The same man whose office was described by US diplomats as a “parallel power center” for bribery is now the Prime Minister.

    Five years at number one. That’s not a ranking. That’s a record. And records this bad don’t happen by accident.

    Sources

    • Transparency International: Corruption Perceptions Index (2001–2005) — Bangladesh ranked #1 most corrupt for five consecutive years
    • Transparency International Bangladesh: National Household Survey on Corruption (2003) — 97.8% police bribe rate, Tk 3,700 crore estimated annual bribe burden
    • Asian Human Rights Commission: Statement on Bangladesh police corruption
    • US Embassy Cable (2005), published by WikiLeaks: Tarique Rahman described as “symbol of kleptocratic government”
    • Time Magazine (January 2026): “Khamba Tarique” nickname continues
    • The Daily Star (July 2008): “Shamim rode on Biman” — investigation into Shamim Iskander’s Biman corruption
    • The Daily Star (March 2025): Shamim Iskander discharged from corruption case
    • Dhaka Tribune (March 2026): Shamim Iskander in VIP gallery at Parliament maiden session
    • ACC case records: Shamim Iskander — 36 prosecution witnesses, Tk 250 crore Biman losses
    • Human Rights Watch: “Judge, Jury, and Executioner” (December 2006)
    • International Crisis Group: Asia Report No. 121, “Bangladesh Today” (October 2006)
    • The Business Standard: Khaleda Zia corruption case coverage
    • Hindustan Times (February 2026): WikiLeaks cables on Hawa Bhaban as “parallel power center”

    Published by Bangladesh Untold. Every claim in this article is sourced from Transparency International, international human rights reports, court records, verified media coverage, and official government documents. Five years at number one is not an opinion. It is a fact.

  • The Front Page: How the Prime Minister’s Nephew Built Bangladesh’s Most Influential ‘Independent’ Media Outlet — and Didn’t Tell Anyone

    The Front Page: How the Prime Minister’s Nephew Built Bangladesh’s Most Influential “Independent” Media Outlet — and Didn’t Tell Anyone

    212,000 followers. UK government awards. Coca-Cola sponsorships. And the founder is Khaleda Zia’s nephew. But you’d never know that from reading The Front Page.

    Let me tell you about the most interesting media outlet in Bangladesh right now.

    It’s called The Front Page. It has 212,000 Instagram followers. It’s covered by The Prestige Magazine. Its founder won a Study UK Alumni Award from the British government. Its sponsors include Coca-Cola, Nestlé, Walton, and Mojo. Its coverage of the July 2024 uprising drew millions of views. It calls itself “Bangladesh’s first forum and citizen journalism platform.” And it has a secret that its 212,000 followers don’t know.

    The founder’s name is Fasbeer Eskander. He is the son of Shamim Eskander. Shamim Eskander is Khaleda Zia’s brother. Which makes Fasbeer Eskander the nephew of the former Prime Minister — and the cousin of current Prime Minister Tarique Rahman.

    The Front Page has never disclosed this. Not in any interview. Not in any profile. Not in any award citation. Not on their website. Not on their social media. Not once, not ever.

    In a country where media independence is the difference between democracy and propaganda, that omission is not a footnote. It’s the whole story.

    Meet Fasbeer Eskander

    Let’s start with what we know.

    Fasbeer Eskander — sometimes spelled Fasbir Iskander in family documents — is a UK-based Bangladeshi media entrepreneur. He studied at UCL and Royal Holloway, University of London. He holds a CompTIA Security+ certification in cybersecurity. He’s the co-founder and publisher of The Front Page, which he launched on November 20, 2020 with co-founder Shah Md. Akib Majumder, who serves as Chief Editor.

    On paper, it’s a classic startup story: young Bangladeshi in London sees a gap in the market, builds a platform, attracts millions of readers, wins international recognition. It’s the kind of narrative that writes itself.

    Except the narrative leaves out one critical detail: Fasbeer Eskander is a member of Bangladesh’s most powerful political family. His father, Shamim Eskander, is the man who — as we documented in Part 3 of this series — looted Biman Bangladesh Airlines for Tk 40 crore in commissions, faced 36 prosecution witnesses in an ACC case, walked free when the case was discharged in March 2025, and now sits in the VIP gallery at Parliament sessions. His aunt, Khaleda Zia, was Prime Minister of Bangladesh twice. His cousin, Tarique Rahman, is the current Prime Minister. His other cousin, Zaima Rahman, is being positioned as BNP’s next-generation leader.

    This is not a minor family connection. This is Bangladesh’s first family. And the founder of one of its most influential digital media platforms is their nephew and cousin — a fact he has never publicly acknowledged.

    The Origin Story That Doesn’t Add Up

    In a November 2024 interview with The Prestige Magazine, Fasbeer told the story of why he started The Front Page. He was in America during the July 2024 uprising and Bangladesh’s internet blackout. He ran The Front Page’s coverage solo for two days, then assembled an international team of 20-30 volunteers from Canada, Australia, Japan, Romania, the US, UK, Germany, and Malaysia. He described it as “standing with the students” and “fighting from abroad.”

    Co-founder Akib Majumder said they started The Front Page because of a “lack of freedom of speech for almost 17 years” — a direct reference to Awami League rule from 2009 to 2024. This is, word for word, BNP’s central political narrative. The 17 years of Awami League rule were indeed years of press suppression. The Digital Security Act was used to jail journalists. Media outlets were pressured into compliance. BNP leaders and supporters were arrested for social media posts.

    All of this is true. But when the founder of a “citizen journalism platform” uses the exact same political framing as the ruling party — and happens to be that party’s leader’s nephew — the word “independent” starts to carry a lot of weight it can’t support.

    Consider the timeline:

    2020: The Front Page launches anonymously. Fasbeer later admits that even his family didn’t know he was behind it. The platform covers Bangladesh news from a UK base, building an audience during the pandemic and the final years of Awami League rule.

    2021-2023: The platform grows. It covers anti-government content. It positions itself as a voice for free expression. It attracts brand sponsorships. Its Instagram following climbs past 100,000. Nobody knows who’s behind it.

    July-August 2024: The uprising happens. The Front Page’s coverage goes viral. Fasbeer assembles his international team. The platform becomes one of the most visible Bangladeshi media outlets in the diaspora.

    Post-August 2024: BNP rises to power. Fasbeer’s father Shamim Eskander’s ACC case is discharged in March 2025. Shamim appears in the Parliament VIP gallery. The Front Page continues to grow, winning international recognition.

    December 2025: Fasbeer wins the Study UK Alumni Award for Business and Innovation. The award ceremony takes place at the Radisson Blu in Dhaka. In all the coverage, he’s described as a young media entrepreneur. No mention of his family.

    Ask yourself: if a media platform founded by Sheikh Hasina’s nephew had grown to 212,000 followers during BNP’s years in opposition, and had never disclosed that connection, would BNP consider it “independent”? Would anyone?

    The question answers itself.

    What The Front Page Covers — and What It Doesn’t

    I’m not going to pretend that The Front Page is pure propaganda. It’s not. It covers real news. It has genuine journalists. Its coverage of the July 2024 uprising was valuable. Its platform gives voice to stories that mainstream Bangladeshi media sometimes ignores. The student volunteers who joined Fasbeer’s international team during the blackout were real people doing real work.

    But independence isn’t just about what you cover. It’s about what you don’t cover. And what The Front Page doesn’t cover is as revealing as what it does.

    Let me walk you through some specifics.

    The Shamim Eskander story. This series has documented how Shamim Eskander — Fasbeer’s father — looted Biman Bangladesh Airlines, how his ACC case with 36 witnesses was discharged, and how he now enjoys VIP status. The Front Page has not covered this story. Not once. Not a single article, not a single Instagram post, not a single mention. A major corruption story involving the Prime Minister’s uncle — and the platform founded by that same uncle’s son has nothing to say about it.

    The Zaima Rahman story. Tarique Rahman’s daughter Zaima Rahman is being positioned as a BNP leader despite having no political experience. She’s 25 years old. She was born and raised in the UK. She has no track record in Bangladeshi politics. And she’s being fast-tracked into leadership positions within the party. The Front Page hasn’t covered this dynasty concern either. The platform that talks about “citizen journalism” and “fighting for democracy” is silent when the ruling party installs a 25-year-old with no qualifications into a leadership role — because that 25-year-old is the founder’s cousin.

    The acquittal wave. Since BNP took power, every single conviction from the BNP-Jamaat era has been overturned. Every major corruption case. Every major criminal case. Tarique Rahman’s 84 cases — all acquitted. The August 21 grenade attack convictions — overturned. The Chittagong arms haul death sentences — overturned. Khaleda Zia’s corruption convictions — overturned. This is the single most significant judicial development in Bangladesh’s recent history. The Front Page has covered individual acquittals, but it has never connected the dots. It has never run a story asking whether the systematic overturning of every case against the ruling party’s members constitutes a problem for the rule of law. It has never, in short, applied the same scrutiny to BNP that it applied to Awami League.

    The Al Jazeera coverage. The Front Page was, by its own description, “the first and only portal in Bangladesh” to cover Al Jazeera’s “All The Prime Minister’s Men” documentary — a deeply critical investigation into Sheikh Hasina’s government. This was important journalism. But the same platform has never applied equivalent investigative scrutiny to BNP’s government. When Al Jazeera or any other international outlet publishes something critical of the current government, The Front Page’s coverage is notably absent or muted.

    Individually, each of these omissions could be explained. Editorial judgment is subjective. Not every outlet covers every story. But collectively, a pattern emerges: The Front Page covers Awami League’s corruption aggressively and BNP’s corruption not at all. And the reason for that pattern sits in the founder’s family tree.

    The Anonymity Play

    There’s a detail from Fasbeer’s own telling that deserves closer examination. He started The Front Page anonymously. Even his family didn’t know. The platform grew behind a veil of secrecy that was only lifted when it became strategically useful to do so.

    In the context of 2020 Bangladesh — under Awami League rule, with the Digital Security Act actively criminalizing online speech — anonymity was a reasonable and even necessary choice. Many Bangladeshi journalists operated under pseudonyms or behind anonymous platforms. The risk of arrest was real. Fasbeer was right to protect himself.

    But that protection cut both ways. Anonymity didn’t just shield Fasbeer from the Awami League government. It shielded his family connection from his audience. The 212,000 people who followed The Front Page during 2021, 2022, 2023 — they didn’t know they were reading content produced by a member of the Zia family. They thought they were reading independent citizen journalism. They were reading content produced by the Prime Minister’s nephew.

    The timing of the reveal matters too. Fasbeer remained anonymous throughout the years when BNP was in opposition. The Front Page built its audience during the period when BNP was the underdog, fighting against Awami League’s authoritarianism. Its coverage aligned with BNP’s political interests, but its anonymity prevented anyone from connecting those interests to the family that would later take power.

    Then, after the July 2024 uprising and BNP’s rise, Fasbeer revealed his identity. He gave interviews. He won awards. He became the public face of The Front Page. But he never revealed the family connection. The anonymity that once served as protection against the Awami League government now serves a different function: it protects The Front Page’s credibility.

    Because once you know that the founder is the Prime Minister’s nephew, “independent citizen journalism” starts to sound like “family media operations.” And that’s a very different thing.

    The Brand Partnership Problem

    The Front Page’s commercial relationships add another layer to this story. The platform has sponsorship deals with major brands: Coca-Cola, Nestlé/MAGGI, Mojo, Walton, Beardo, and others. These are significant commercial partnerships that provide revenue and legitimacy.

    Here’s the issue: these brands are sponsoring content produced by a member of the ruling family. They may not know that — because Fasbeer has never disclosed it — but they are effectively funding political communications infrastructure for the BNP’s first family. Every sponsored post, every branded content piece, every “independent” article that happens to align with BNP’s narrative is being subsidized, in part, by international brands that believe they’re supporting independent Bangladeshi journalism.

    Coca-Cola probably doesn’t know that the founder of The Front Page is the Prime Minister’s nephew. Nestlé probably doesn’t know either. They signed sponsorship deals with a platform that presents itself as independent citizen journalism. If they knew the family connection, they would — or should — ask very different questions about editorial independence and conflicts of interest.

    This isn’t just a transparency issue for The Front Page’s readers. It’s a transparency issue for every brand that does business with it. And it’s a particularly acute problem in Bangladesh, where the line between media and political messaging has always been thin, and where international brands have historically struggled to understand the local media landscape.

    The UK Award: Legitimacy by Association

    In December 2025, Fasbeer Eskander won the Study UK Alumni Award for Business and Innovation. The ceremony was held at the Radisson Blu in Dhaka. The award was presented by the British government, through the British Council, as part of a program that recognizes UK university alumni who have made significant contributions in their home countries.

    On its face, this is a legitimate achievement. Fasbeer studied at UCL and Royal Holloway. He built a media platform with genuine reach. He mobilized an international team during a crisis. These are real accomplishments.

    But the award also serves a purpose that goes beyond recognition. It confers legitimacy. When the British government gives you an award for “Business and Innovation,” it signals to the world that you are a credible media entrepreneur. It makes it harder for critics to question your independence. It provides a shield against the very scrutiny that this article is applying.

    The British Council almost certainly didn’t know about Fasbeer’s family connection. Their selection process evaluates individual achievement, not family trees. But the effect of the award is the same regardless of intent: it legitimizes a media outlet founded by a member of the ruling family without disclosing that connection. It takes the question “is this independent?” off the table, because the British government has effectively answered it — without knowing the full picture.

    This is how propaganda works in the 21st century. Not through state-run newspapers with obvious party logos. Not through ham-fisted government press releases. Through legitimate-seeming platforms with real audiences, real brand partnerships, and real international recognition — platforms that happen to be controlled by people whose interests are never disclosed.

    The Dynasty’s Media Strategy

    Zoom out for a moment and look at the Zia-Rahman family’s broader media footprint.

    Shamim Eskander — Khaleda Zia’s brother — looted Biman Bangladesh Airlines and walked free from his ACC case. He now sits in the VIP gallery at Parliament. His criminal record has been erased by the same courts that his family’s government controls.

    Zaima Rahman — Tarique Rahman’s 25-year-old daughter, born and raised in the UK — is being positioned as a BNP leader. She has no political experience. She has no track record of public service. She is being fast-tracked into party positions because she carries the family name. Her role in BNP’s future is being shaped not by democratic selection, but by dynastic succession.

    And Fasbeer Eskander — Shamim’s son, Khaleda’s nephew, Tarique’s cousin — runs one of Bangladesh’s most influential digital media platforms. He has 212,000 followers. He has international brand partnerships. He has a British government award. And he has never told his audience who he is related to.

    Three members of the same family. Three different spheres of influence. The father handles the patronage network — the old-school corruption that extracts money from state institutions. The cousin handles the political succession — the dynasty’s claim on future power. And the nephew handles the narrative — the media operation that shapes public perception and shields the family from scrutiny.

    This is how modern political dynasties operate. They don’t need state television. They don’t need to ban opposition newspapers. They just need a media platform that the public believes is independent — and that happens to never cover stories that are inconvenient for the ruling family.

    The Front Page doesn’t need to publish pro-BNP propaganda. It just needs to not publish anti-BNP stories. It doesn’t need to attack the opposition. It just needs to not investigate the ruling party. It doesn’t need to lie. It just needs to omit. And omission, when you have 212,000 followers and international brand partnerships, is indistinguishable from propaganda.

    The Comparison That Matters

    Let me make a comparison that will make BNP supporters uncomfortable, because it’s the one that matters most.

    During Awami League’s 15-year rule, the party built an extensive media ecosystem. There were television channels that were openly aligned with the government. There were newspapers that received government advertising revenue in exchange for favorable coverage. There were online platforms that functioned as de facto Awami League mouthpieces. BNP correctly identified all of this as propaganda infrastructure and denounced it as evidence of authoritarian media capture.

    They were right. Media capture through ownership, advertising revenue, and editorial pressure was a hallmark of Awami League’s authoritarianism. It was one of the things that made Bangladesh’s information environment so toxic during 2009-2024.

    But BNP is now building the same infrastructure — and they’re doing it more effectively, because they’ve learned from Awami League’s mistakes. Awami League’s media operations were obvious. Everyone knew which channels were pro-government. Everyone knew which newspapers to trust and which to disregard. The propaganda was transparent, and transparent propaganda is easier to resist.

    The Front Page is not obvious. It doesn’t look like a party mouthpiece. It doesn’t sound like one either. It covers real news. It has real journalists. It has a real audience. It has real brand partnerships and real international recognition. And its family connection to the ruling party is invisible to anyone who hasn’t gone looking for it.

    This is what makes it more dangerous than Awami League’s crude media operations. Not because The Front Page publishes lies — it doesn’t, as far as I can tell. But because it has created a space where Awami League’s corruption is aggressively investigated and BNP’s corruption is invisible, and it has done so while claiming the mantle of independent journalism. The audience doesn’t know they’re reading content produced by the Prime Minister’s nephew. The brands don’t know they’re sponsoring political communications infrastructure. The British government doesn’t know it gave an award for independent media to a member of the ruling family.

    That’s not just a conflict of interest. That’s a systemic information asymmetry that benefits one political party — the one that happens to be in power, and the one that happens to employ the founder’s family.

    What Fasbeer Should Do

    I want to be clear about something. Fasbeer Eskander has built something genuinely impressive. The Front Page has a real audience. It covers real stories. Its July 2024 coverage was valuable. Its student volunteer network was a genuine civic contribution. None of that is in dispute.

    But the family connection is not a minor detail. It’s the defining context that transforms The Front Page from an independent media success story into a question about media capture in Bangladesh. And Fasbeer’s failure to disclose it — not after BNP took power, not after his father’s case was discharged, not after his cousin became Prime Minister, not during his award acceptance speech, not ever — is a choice that his audience deserves to know about.

    Here’s what an actually independent media founder would do:

    Disclose the family connection. Put it on the About page. Mention it in interviews. Let the audience decide whether they trust a platform founded by the Prime Minister’s nephew. If the journalism is truly independent, the disclosure won’t hurt — it’ll enhance credibility by demonstrating transparency.

    Appoint an independent editorial board. If The Front Page wants to be taken seriously as an independent outlet, it needs structural safeguards — an editorial board with no family ties to any political party, a public editorial policy that commits to equal scrutiny of all parties, and a transparent process for handling stories that involve the founder’s family.

    Cover BNP’s corruption with the same vigor as Awami League’s. This is the simplest test. If The Front Page runs investigative pieces on Shamim Eskander’s Biman Airlines looting, on the Zaima Rahman dynasty question, on the systematic acquittal of all BNP-era convictions, and on the institutional capture documented throughout this series — then it’s independent. If it doesn’t, it’s not. The test isn’t complicated.

    None of these steps would destroy The Front Page. They would strengthen it. An independent media outlet with 212,000 followers, international brand partnerships, and a British government award that also discloses its founder’s family connection and subjects itself to equal scrutiny of all parties would be a genuinely valuable addition to Bangladesh’s media landscape.

    But Fasbeer hasn’t taken any of these steps. And the reason is obvious: disclosure would change how people read The Front Page’s coverage. It would change how brands evaluate their sponsorships. It would change how the British Council evaluates its award recipients. It would change everything — which is exactly why it matters.

    The Bigger Picture: Dynasty Media in Bangladesh

    The Front Page is not an isolated case. It’s part of a broader pattern in Bangladeshi politics where family networks extend their influence beyond traditional political structures into media, business, and civil society.

    The Awami League had its media ecosystem — the channels, the newspapers, the online platforms that functioned as government amplifiers. BNP is building one too, but it’s learning from Awami League’s mistakes. Instead of controlling media through advertising pressure and legal intimidation — tactics that are visible and generate backlash — BNP’s media ecosystem operates through ownership and family connections that are invisible to the public.

    The result is a media landscape where the public can’t easily determine who’s funding what, who’s related to whom, and whose interests are being served by the content they consume. In a country with limited media literacy and a history of political manipulation, this opacity is dangerous.

    Bangladesh’s media has always been politicized. Every major newspaper has a party affiliation. Every major television channel has an ownership structure tied to a political family. This is not new. What’s new is the sophistication. The Front Page represents a new model: independent in appearance, connected in reality, credible through international recognition, and opaque in its most important relationship — the one between its founder and the government his family runs.

    If Bangladesh is going to have a genuinely free press, it needs more than laws that protect journalists from arrest. It needs transparency about who owns and controls media outlets. It needs disclosure requirements that prevent political families from operating media platforms behind a veil of anonymity. It needs an audience that knows who’s producing the content they consume and can evaluate that content accordingly.

    The Front Page has none of this. And until it does, its claims of independence ring hollow.

    The Question That Remains

    I keep coming back to the same question, because it’s the one that matters most: if Fasbeer Eskander had disclosed his family connection from the start, would The Front Page have 212,000 followers today?

    Maybe. Maybe the content is good enough that the audience would have grown anyway. Maybe the July 2024 coverage was valuable enough that people would have followed regardless. Maybe the brand partnerships would have survived the disclosure. Maybe the British government would have given the same award.

    But we don’t know, because the disclosure never happened. And that’s the problem. Not that The Front Page exists. Not that it’s successful. Not that it covers news. The problem is that it built its audience, its credibility, and its international recognition while hiding the one piece of information that would have allowed that audience to make an informed judgment about its editorial independence.

    The Front Page calls itself “Your Daily Informant.” But the informant hasn’t informed you about the most relevant fact about itself. The platform that promises to tell you what’s really happening in Bangladesh hasn’t told you who’s behind it. The outlet that positions itself as a voice for transparency operates without the most basic transparency — disclosing who owns it.

    In a democracy, media ownership is public information. In Bangladesh, where media capture has been a tool of every ruling party since independence, that transparency is not optional. It’s the minimum standard for credibility.

    Fasbeer Eskander can keep running The Front Page. He can keep winning awards. He can keep signing brand partnerships. He can keep building his audience. But he can’t call it independent — not while hiding the fact that he’s the Prime Minister’s nephew. Not while his platform scrutinizes one party and gives the other a pass. Not while his father walks free from a corruption case that his family’s government arranged.

    The Front Page has a choice. It can be the independent media outlet it claims to be — by disclosing the family connection, appointing an independent editorial board, and applying equal scrutiny to all parties. Or it can continue as it is — a platform with a massive audience, international legitimacy, and an undisclosed relationship with the ruling family that makes “independent” the one word it can’t honestly use.

    Bangladesh’s audience deserves to make that choice with full information. Right now, they can’t. And that’s the story The Front Page will never tell you.

    Sources:

    • The Prestige Magazine (November 19, 2024): Interview with Fasbeer Eskander and Akib Majumder — “Next Generation Media”
    • Study UK Alumni Awards 2026: Business & Innovation category — Fasbeer Eskander
    • The Front Page (@thefrontpagebd): Instagram — 212K followers, 14K posts, brand partnerships
    • LinkedIn: Fasbeer Eskander — Head of Operations, Footsteps Bangladesh; Co-founder, The Front Page
    • The Daily Star (March 25, 2025): Shamim Eskander case discharged by Dhaka court
    • Dhaka Tribune (March 2026): Shamim Eskander in Parliament VIP gallery
    • ACC Charge Sheet (2008): 36 prosecution witnesses, Tk 1.33 crore illegal acquisition
    • Bangladesh Untold Series 8, Part 1: “Looting Biman Airlines — Tk 40 Crore in Commissions”
    • Bangladesh Untold Series 8, Part 2: “17 Years, No Job, Luxury Life — Houses in Australia & Canada”
    • Bangladesh Untold Series 8, Part 3: “36 Witnesses, Case Discharged, VIP in Parliament”
    • Al Jazeera: “All The Prime Minister’s Men” — documentary on Sheikh Hasina’s government
    • Digital Security Act 2018 / Cyber Security Act 2023: Press freedom restrictions under Awami League

    Series 8 — The Shamim Iskander Exposé | Part 4: The Front Page

    Article #75 | Bangladesh Untold documents what happened. What you do with that information is up to you.

  • They Promised Accountability. Then They Pardoned Themselves.

    BNP swore they’d deliver justice for the oppressed. Then every single conviction from their own era vanished. Every. Single. One.

    Let’s get one thing straight before we start.

    The July 2024 uprising was real. The students who died were real. The anger that brought down a 15-year autocracy was genuine and justified. Nobody — least of all this page — is questioning that.

    But something happened on the way to justice. Something that should make every single person who marched in those streets stop and think very carefully about what comes next.

    BNP rode into power on a wave of democratic promise. They talked about accountability. They talked about rule of law. They talked about ending the culture of impunity. And then — systematically, case by case, court by court — they erased every single conviction against their own people. Not some of them. Not the questionable ones. All of them.

    Let me walk you through what that actually looks like.

    The Acquittal Wave: A Complete List

    Since the July 2024 uprising and BNP’s rise to power, every major criminal case from the 2001-2006 BNP-Jamaat era has been acquitted. Not reduced. Not commuted. Acquitted. Here’s the scorecard:

    Tarique Rahman: 84 cases. Eighty-four. Every single one — acquitted. The man US embassy cables called a “symbol of kleptocratic government,” the “Dark Prince” of Bangladeshi politics, accused of laundering $20 million through international networks, of operating a parallel government from Hawa Bhaban, of facilitating the August 21 grenade attack that killed 24 people — walked free on every charge. Not because he was innocent. Because the courts, now under BNP influence, decided he was.

    August 21 Grenade Attack: 49 accused. Death sentences, life imprisonments — all overturned. On December 1, 2024, the High Court acquitted every single person convicted for the attack that killed 24 people and injured over 500. The judge who originally heard the case had declared that “specialised deadly Arges grenades that are used in wars were blasted at the Awami League’s central office in broad daylight with the help of the then state machinery.” The grenades were military-grade. The state machinery was BNP’s. The court didn’t say they were innocent. The court said procedural issues made the convictions untenable. And then, on September 4, 2025, the Appellate Division dismissed the petition for retrial entirely. Case closed. Twenty-four people died and nobody is responsible.

    Chittagong Arms Haul: The largest arms smuggling operation in Bangladesh’s history — 4,930 firearms, 27,020 grenades, 840 rocket launchers, over 1.14 million bullets, all destined for an Indian insurgent group, all moving through a state-owned fertilizer jetty under the noses of the National Security Intelligence and DGFI. Death sentences for the masterminds, including State Home Minister Babar and Jamaat chief Nizami. In December 2024, the High Court acquitted Babar and five others. In January 2025, the arms case convictions were also overturned. Paresh Baruah’s death sentence was reduced to 14 years. Everyone else walked.

    Khaleda Zia: The Zia Orphanage Trust case — where she was convicted of embezzling over Tk 2.1 crore meant for orphans. The Zia Charitable Trust case. Three dozen cases total. All acquitted between November 2024 and January 2025. The woman who presided over the most corrupt government in the world — five consecutive years of Transparency International’s #1 ranking — now has a clean legal slate.

    Shamim Iskander: Khaleda’s brother. The man who nearly bankrupted Biman Airlines with Tk 40 crore in corrupt lease commissions. Thirty-six prosecution witnesses documented his crimes. On March 25, 2025, a Dhaka court simply discharged the case. Not acquitted on appeal. Discharged at trial. He now sits in the VIP gallery at Parliament sessions.

    Lutfozzaman Babar: The architect of Operation Clean Heart (44 deaths in custody). The man who oversaw the August 21 grenade attack cover-up. Convicted and sentenced to death for the grenade attack. Acquitted in December 2024 along with everyone else. Free.

    Do you see the pattern? Because it’s not subtle.

    The Selective Justice Problem

    Here’s what makes this so dangerous: BNP didn’t just acquit their own. They weaponized the justice system against their opponents with surgical precision.

    While every BNP-era conviction was being systematically overturned, the new government was busy filing new cases. Against Awami League leaders. Against journalists. Against anyone who questioned the narrative. The Anti-Corruption Commission, which we’ve already covered in this series, was repurposed from an independent watchdog into a political weapon — investigating BAL figures with vigor while BNP figures walked free from far more serious charges.

    This is the exact playbook Awami League used for 15 years. The same selective prosecution. The same two-tiered justice system where your guilt or innocence depends entirely on your political affiliation. The difference is that BNP spent those 15 years in opposition complaining about exactly this kind of politicized justice.

    They knew the system was broken because they were its victims. And then they got power and broke it the same way, just with different names on the indictments.

    What “Acquitted” Actually Means

    I need to be very precise here, because this distinction matters and it’s one BNP supporters will intentionally blur.

    When a court acquits someone, it doesn’t necessarily mean they’re innocent. It means the prosecution failed to prove guilt beyond reasonable doubt. In Bangladesh’s current context, that failure often has less to do with evidence and more to do with who’s running the prosecution.

    Consider the August 21 grenade attack. The original trial court heard testimony from Mufti Abdul Hannan, a HUJI leader who confessed that the attack was coordinated with BNP leaders including Tarique Rahman. He described how the grenades were military-grade Arges weapons, how they were thrown from rooftops with state support, how the investigation was deliberately sabotaged by the Home Minister’s office. This wasn’t speculation. It was sworn testimony from inside the conspiracy.

    The acquittal didn’t contradict any of that. It cited procedural irregularities. Delays in the trial. Questions about the investigation process. These are real issues — but they’re issues that the BNP government itself created during 2001-2006 when it was actively obstructing the investigation, inventing the “Joj Mia” fabrication, and destroying evidence.

    Think about that for a second. BNP obstructed the investigation. The investigation was therefore flawed. Decades later, BNP’s allies in court cite the flawed investigation as grounds for acquittal. They literally benefited from their own obstruction of justice.

    This isn’t a bug. It’s the most elegant feature of authoritarian legal systems. Create the conditions for a flawed prosecution, then use those flaws to escape accountability. Awami League did it. BNP watched. BNP learned. BNP is now doing it better.

    The Impunity Feedback Loop

    Here’s what absolute impunity looks like in practice:

    2001-2006: BNP runs Bangladesh. Opposition members are killed in “crossfire.” Grenade attacks target political rallies. The state smuggles weapons to foreign insurgents. Corruption is so systemic that Transparency International names Bangladesh the world’s most corrupt country five years running. Nobody is held accountable.

    2007-2008: The caretaker government tries to hold people accountable. Cases are filed. Investigations happen. Some convictions are secured. But the process is politically messy and the military-backed government has its own legitimacy problems.

    2009-2024: Awami League weaponizes those cases. They become instruments of political control, not justice. Many cases are genuine, but the selective prosecution undermines their credibility. BAL uses the justice system against opponents while protecting its own criminals.

    2024-present: BNP takes power. Every case against their people is thrown out. Every conviction overturned. The justice system, already discredited by BAL’s manipulation, is now fully captured by BNP. And the cycle continues.

    What does this teach the next generation of Bangladeshi politicians? It teaches them that crime pays. That corruption is consequence-free. That the only risk is being on the wrong side when the government changes, and even that risk can be managed if you’re powerful enough. It teaches them that accountability is a fairy tale told by opposition parties who have zero intention of practicing it themselves.

    And it teaches the people of Bangladesh — the ones who bled in the streets in July 2024, the ones who lost family members to RAB’s crossfire, the families of the 24 grenade attack victims, the Hindu women of Bhola, the students of Shamsunnahar Hall — that their suffering doesn’t matter. That justice in Bangladesh is not a right. It’s a tool. And tools belong to whoever holds power.

    The International Silence

    Here’s what should trouble everyone watching from outside Bangladesh.

    When Awami League was committing its abuses, the international community was vocal. Human Rights Watch issued report after report. The US Treasury sanctioned RAB. The International Crisis Group documented democratic backsliding. Western governments expressed concern.

    Where is that same international community now?

    When every conviction for the August 21 grenade attack is overturned — 24 people killed, 500 injured, military-grade weapons used — where is the statement from the US Embassy? When the man called a “symbol of kleptocratic government” in American diplomatic cables becomes Prime Minister with a clean legal slate, where is the concern from the European Union? When Transparency International’s five-time most corrupt country is now run by the same people who earned that distinction, where is the commentary from the World Bank?

    The silence is deafening. And it’s exactly what BNP is counting on.

    Because here’s the thing about international accountability: it tends to follow political winds. When Awami League was the authoritarian, Western governments felt free to criticize. But Bangladesh under BNP is now presented as a “democratic transition” — a government that came to power through a popular uprising against autocracy. That narrative makes criticism awkward. It complicates diplomatic relationships. It’s easier to stay quiet.

    But staying quiet has consequences. When the international community gives BNP a pass on the same abuses they condemned under BAL, they’re not being neutral. They’re being complicit. They’re telling BNP that accountability is optional — that as long as you came to power through the “right” kind of uprising, you can rewrite your own criminal history without consequence.

    The 2001-2006 Pattern: Why It Matters Now

    Some will argue that this article is living in the past. That 2001-2006 was a different era, different circumstances, different Bangladesh. That we should judge BNP 2026 by what they’re doing now, not what they did twenty years ago.

    To which I say: fine. Let’s judge them by what they’re doing now.

    They are, right now, presiding over a justice system that has acquitted every single person convicted of crimes committed during their previous stint in power. They are, right now, using that same justice system to prosecute their political opponents. They are, right now, capturing institutions — the ACC, the judiciary, the press — in the exact same pattern that Awami League used. They are, right now, telling the international community that this is all legitimate because they were democratically elected.

    And they are, right now, counting on everyone forgetting what they did the last time they had power.

    We haven’t forgotten.

    The 24 people killed on August 21, 2004 haven’t been un-killed. The 44 people who died in Operation Clean Heart custody haven’t been brought back. The 600+ women of Bhola haven’t received justice. The 18,000 rapes documented by the judicial commission haven’t been un-raped. The Tk 2.1 crore stolen from orphans hasn’t been returned. The $20 million laundered through Singapore hasn’t been recovered. The “Khamba Tarique” power poles still stand in rural villages, connected to nothing, monuments to a corruption so brazen it literally installed empty infrastructure.

    These aren’t ancient history. They’re the foundation of the current government’s power structure. The same people who committed these crimes, covered them up, and were convicted for them are now running the country. They haven’t apologized. They haven’t acknowledged wrongdoing. They haven’t offered restitution. They’ve simply declared themselves innocent and moved on.

    What Real Accountability Looks Like

    Real accountability doesn’t mean prosecuting every political opponent while letting your own people walk. It doesn’t mean a “justice system” that conveniently acquits everyone on your team and investigates everyone on the other side.

    Real accountability would mean:

    Acknowledging the crimes. Not deflecting. Not blaming the caretaker government. Not claiming every case was “politically motivated.” Some cases were politically motivated. Many were not. The August 21 grenade attack happened. The Chittagong arms haul happened. 44 people died in Operation Clean Heart custody. These are facts, not opinions. A government committed to accountability would say: “These things happened on our watch. We will not hide from them.”

    Independent prosecution. If the original investigations were flawed — and some were — the answer isn’t acquittal. The answer is a genuinely independent, international-standard reinvestigation. Invite the FBI back. Invite Interpol. Let the evidence lead wherever it leads. If the evidence doesn’t support a conviction, then acquit. But don’t acquit because the prosecution was deliberately sabotaged by your own party and then claim that’s justice.

    Restitution. The people of Bangladesh — not the Awami League, not the BNP, the people — are owed reparations for the corruption, the violence, and the institutional damage. Tk 2.1 crore was stolen from orphans. Return it. $20 million was laundered abroad. Recover it. 44 people died in custody. Their families deserve compensation and an apology. Real accountability means making the victims whole, not just freeing the perpetrators.

    Institutional reform. If the justice system is so broken that it can be weaponized by whichever party is in power, then fix the system. Independent judicial appointments. Protected tenure for judges. An ACC that can investigate the ruling party without fear of being dismantled. These aren’t radical ideas. They’re the minimum requirements for a functioning democracy.

    None of this is happening. And until it does, the acquittal wave isn’t justice. It’s just the other side of the same coin Awami League was flipping for 15 years.

    The Road We’re On

    I’m going to end this article the same way I end most of them, because the conclusion keeps being the same and it keeps being ignored.

    Bangladesh has been here before. Multiple times. A popular movement overthrows an authoritarian government. Hope runs high. The new government promises change. And then, slowly but surely, the same patterns emerge — not because the people are the same, though often they are, but because the system rewards the same behavior. Capture institutions. Prosecute opponents. Protect allies. Repeat.

    Awami League did it for 15 years. BNP is doing it now. And if the pattern holds, whatever replaces BNP in the future will do it again. Because nobody has yet been held genuinely accountable in Bangladesh. Not under BAL. Not under BNP. Not under any government since independence.

    The July 2024 uprising was supposed to break this cycle. It was supposed to be different. And maybe the students who led it still believe that. But the government they helped install is proving, with every acquittal and every new political prosecution, that the cycle isn’t broken. It’s just under new management.

    The cost of impunity isn’t abstract. It’s measured in lives — the lives lost in 2001, 2002, 2004, 2005, 2006, and now the lives being destroyed by a justice system that serves power instead of truth. Every acquittal that’s driven by political affiliation rather than evidence sends a message: you can get away with anything in Bangladesh, as long as you’re on the winning team.

    The winning team changes. The impunity doesn’t.

    And that’s the real scandal. Not that BNP is acquitting its own. Not that BAL prosecuted selectively. But that in 54 years of independence, Bangladesh has never once built a justice system that serves the people instead of the party in power. Every government has had the chance. Every government has chosen otherwise.

    Until that changes, the acquittals will keep coming. The prosecutions will keep being selective. And the people who suffer most — the ordinary citizens of Bangladesh who just want a country where crime has consequences regardless of who commits it — will keep waiting.

    They’ve been waiting since 1971.

    They’re still waiting now.

    Sources:

    • Transparency International Corruption Perceptions Index, 2001-2005
    • US Embassy Cable 08DHAKA1143 (WikiLeaks): Tarique Rahman described as “symbol of kleptocratic government”
    • High Court Verdict, July 21, 2016: Tarique Rahman sentenced to 7 years for money laundering (overturned December 2024)
    • Appellate Division, March 6, 2025: Tarique Rahman acquitted in money laundering case
    • High Court, December 1, 2024: All 49 accused acquitted in August 21 grenade attack case
    • Appellate Division, September 4, 2025: Dismissed retrial petition, upholding acquittal
    • High Court, December 18, 2024: Babar and 5 others acquitted in Chittagong arms haul case
    • Supreme Court, January 2025: Khaleda Zia acquitted in Zia Orphanage Trust case
    • High Court, November 2025: Khaleda Zia acquitted in Zia Charitable Trust case
    • Dhaka Court, March 25, 2025: Shamim Iskander discharged from corruption case
    • Human Rights Watch: “Judge, Jury, and Executioner” (December 2006)
    • International Crisis Group: Asia Report No. 121 (October 2006), No. 187 (March 2010), No. 277 (April 2016)
    • The Daily Star, Prothom Alo, Dhaka Tribune: Multiple reports on court proceedings and acquittals

    Series 9 — BNP 2026 = BAL 2.0? | Article #73

    Bangladesh Untold documents what happened. What you do with that information is up to you.

  • Ivy Rahman: She Held On for Three Days. Bangladesh’s Government Spent That Time Covering Its Tracks.

    She survived the initial blast. That made it worse.

    On the afternoon of August 21, 2004, thirteen grenades were thrown into a crowd of thousands at the Awami League’s central office in Dhaka. Sixteen people died on the spot. Their deaths were immediate — final, at least, in that sense. The shrapnel did not wait.

    Ivy Rahman was not that lucky.

    She was the Awami League’s Women’s Affairs Secretary. She was 58 years old. She was standing near the stage when the grenades hit. She took serious shrapnel wounds to the body. She was rushed to hospital. She held on for seventy-two hours — three days — before she died on the morning of August 24, 2004.

    Those seventy-two hours matter. Not because they were unusual in a country where hospitals are crowded and victims sometimes linger. But because of what happened during them.

    While Ivy Rahman was fighting for her life in that hospital bed, the government of Bangladesh — the same government whose ministers would later be convicted of ordering the attack — was busy destroying the evidence that might have held them accountable.

    Who She Was

    Jebun Nahar Ivy. That was her full name. She went by Ivy — Ivy Rahman after her marriage to Zillur Rahman, a senior Awami League leader who would later become the President of Bangladesh.

    She had spent decades in the Awami League’s women’s wing. Not as a figurehead. Not as a placeholder name on a committee. As a working politician who showed up, organized, spoke, and fought. By 2004 she had risen to serve as the party’s Women’s Affairs Secretary — one of the most senior positions a woman could hold in Bangladeshi party politics at the time.

    On August 21 she was there for a reason: the Awami League was holding a rally at 23 Bangabandhu Avenue to protest a string of bomb attacks targeting Awami League leaders across the country. It was meant to be a show of defiance. A public statement that the opposition would not be silenced by fear.

    What happened instead became the single deadliest political attack in Bangladesh’s history.

    5:22 PM, August 21, 2004

    Sheikh Hasina had just finished speaking. The crowd was dense — thousands of people packed into the street in front of the party office. It was an ordinary Saturday afternoon in Dhaka.

    Then the grenades started landing.

    Thirteen grenades in total. Thrown from rooftop positions by a twelve-man attack team. Military-grade Arges grenades — the kind used in wars, not available in any civilian market in Bangladesh. Each one was designed to kill.

    The blasts tore through the crowd in seconds. Sixteen people died where they stood. Sheikh Hasina’s bodyguard, Mahbubur Rahman, positioned himself between the explosion and his principal. He absorbed the shrapnel. He died. Hasina survived — but with permanent hearing damage she carries to this day.

    Over five hundred people were injured. Dozens critically.

    Ivy Rahman was among them. She had been close to the stage. The shrapnel found her.

    While She Was Still Alive: The Cover-Up Begins

    Here is the part of this story that demands to be said plainly:

    Ivy Rahman did not die immediately. She spent three days in hospital. And during those three days, the Bangladesh government — led by Prime Minister Khaleda Zia, whose son Tarique Rahman would later be convicted of planning the attack — did not investigate. They destroyed.

    The crime scene was washed with water and detergent.

    Hours after the attack. While the injured were still in surgery. While people like Ivy Rahman were in intensive care. Government-directed personnel washed 23 Bangabandhu Avenue, removing blood, removing fragments, removing any forensic evidence that might point to who had done this and who had helped them.

    Grenades that were recovered intact — four of the thirteen did not detonate — were deliberately destroyed rather than preserved as evidence. The Supreme Court Bar Association later called this exactly what it was: systematic destruction of evidence. A cover-up operation conducted by the state.

    Police refused to register any criminal case.

    The Awami League filed cases. Police refused to accept them. They accepted a general diary entry — the most minimal possible procedural acknowledgment, equivalent to recording that something happened without committing to investigate what. The message from the BNP government was unambiguous: this case will not be investigated on your terms.

    No minister visited the hospitals.

    Not one BNP minister went to see the injured in those first days. Not to express condolences. Not to demonstrate the government’s concern for victims of political violence on its watch. Nothing. The ruling party treated the aftermath of the deadliest political attack in Bangladesh’s history as a problem to be managed, not a tragedy to be acknowledged.

    Ivy Rahman died on August 24. She died while all of this was happening around her.

    The Fabrication: “Joj Mia Did It”

    With the crime scene sanitized and the real investigation blocked, the BNP government needed a story. So they invented one.

    The Crime Investigation Department — under a government that had already signaled its intentions by washing away the evidence — produced a theory: the attack had been carried out by Joj Mia (also known as Jamal Ahmed), a petty criminal from Noakhali, along with fourteen members of a gang called the Seven Star Group led by someone named Subrata Bain. They had allegedly met in Moghbazar and rehearsed on a remote island before the attack.

    On June 10, 2005 — nearly a year after Ivy Rahman’s death — Joj Mia was arrested from his home. On June 26, under what investigators would later document as torture in custody, he gave a confessional statement under Section 164 implicating the Seven Star Group.

    The story had one problem: it was entirely false.

    Shaibal Saha Partha, another person arrested and implicated by the same investigation, was also tortured into giving a false confessional statement. He was eventually released. He still carries the psychological damage from his time in custody — arrested for a crime he had nothing to do with, tortured by a state apparatus that needed a scapegoat.

    Simultaneously, the government commissioned a one-man judicial probe. Justice Joynal Abedin was appointed to investigate. His commission produced a report blaming the attack on unnamed “foreign and local enemies.” It named no planners. It identified no chain of command. It reached no conclusions that could lead to any prosecution of anyone who actually mattered.

    Two years later, Justice Joynal Abedin was elevated to the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court.

    The Daily Star later called his elevation a “shame” for the judiciary of Bangladesh. That is a precise description.

    The Truth That Emerged After 1/11

    The BNP government fell on January 11, 2007 — a military-backed caretaker government took power in what became known as 1/11. A new CID investigation was ordered. This time, investigators were not operating under the oversight of the people who had ordered the attack.

    In November 2007, Mufti Abdul Hannan — the chief of Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami (HuJI), who had been arrested by the BNP government in 2005 but deliberately never linked to the August 21 case — made his confession. He described in detail how the attack had been organized. He named names.

    The planning meetings had taken place at Hawa Bhaban — the Gulshan office from which Tarique Rahman, Khaleda Zia’s son and the de facto power center of the BNP government, ran what was effectively a parallel government. Mufti Hannan identified Lutfozzaman Babar, then State Minister for Home Affairs, as having provided the government and security apparatus backing that made the attack possible. He identified Abdus Salam Pintu, Deputy Minister for Education, whose brother Maulana Tajuddin was the key liaison between BNP and HuJI.

    He named Harris Chowdhury, Khaleda Zia’s political secretary. He named senior officials of the Home Ministry, police, the Directorate General of Forces Intelligence (DGFI), and National Security Intelligence (NSI).

    And he named Tarique Rahman.

    The grenades themselves — military-grade Arges grenades, war weapons — had come from Pakistan through a chain involving Tehrik-e-Jihad Islami operatives. They were not available in Bangladeshi markets. They were military ordnance that had been moved through channels that required state complicity to function.

    Ivy Rahman was killed with a military weapon that traveled from Pakistan to Dhaka specifically to kill the Awami League leadership at that rally.

    The 2018 Verdict: 49 Convicted, 19 Sentenced to Death

    On October 10, 2018 — fourteen years after the attack, fourteen years after Ivy Rahman’s death — the Speedy Trial Tribunal-1 in Dhaka delivered its verdict. Judge Shahed Nuruddin’s finding was unambiguous:

    “The attack was a well-orchestrated plan, executed through abuse of state power.”

    Nineteen people were sentenced to death. They included Lutfozzaman Babar, former State Minister for Home Affairs. They included Abdus Salam Pintu, former Deputy Minister for Education. They included Brigadier General (Retd) Abdur Rahim, former Director General of National Security Intelligence. They included Brigadier General (Retd) Rezzaqul Haider Chowdhury, former Director General of DGFI. They included Maulana Tajuddin, the man who linked the politicians to the killers.

    Nineteen more were sentenced to life imprisonment. That list included Tarique Rahman — BNP acting chairman, son of Khaleda Zia, the man convicted of planning the attack that killed Ivy Rahman and twenty-three others. Harris Chowdhury, Khaleda Zia’s political secretary, was sentenced to life. So were several BNP lawmakers who had facilitated meetings between the party leadership and HuJI operatives.

    Former Inspector Generals of Police — Ashraful Huda and Shahudul Haque — were sentenced to two years each for harbouring offenders. The officers who had fabricated the “Joj Mia” story, the policemen who had misled the investigation, received four and two-year sentences respectively.

    All 38 people sentenced to death or life imprisonment were also found guilty of grievously injuring the attack’s victims and given additional twenty-year sentences to run concurrently.

    Ivy Rahman’s death was acknowledged in court. The grenade attack that took her life three days after it reached her body was proven, beyond reasonable doubt, to have been ordered by the ruling government of Bangladesh at the time.

    Her husband Zillur Rahman had become President of Bangladesh in 2009. He died in office in 2013. He never saw a final justice delivered for his wife’s killing.

    December 2024: All 49 Walk Free

    In July 2024, the student-led uprising ousted the Awami League government. By August, the political landscape of Bangladesh had been transformed. By late 2024, the judiciary was being reconstituted under the new political order.

    In December 2024, a reconstituted High Court acquitted all 49 individuals convicted in the August 21 case. All of them. Including Tarique Rahman. Including Lutfozzaman Babar, who had been sentenced to death. Including every police officer and intelligence official who had been found guilty of faciliting the massacre or covering it up afterward.

    In September 2025, the Supreme Court of Bangladesh upheld the acquittal.

    Forty-nine convictions, established over fourteen years of investigation and trial, with confessional statements and documentary evidence and witness testimony — all of it annulled. The reasoning of the courts was not examined in public detail. The process moved quickly. The outcome was complete.

    Tarique Rahman is now the Prime Minister of Bangladesh.

    What This Means for Ivy Rahman

    There is a particular cruelty in the arc of this story.

    Ivy Rahman spent her life in politics. She understood that politics in Bangladesh was dangerous work. She was standing at a rally to protest political violence when political violence found her. She survived the initial blast. She held on for three days — long enough, perhaps, for some part of her to understand what was happening in the world outside her hospital room.

    And now, twenty-two years after her death, the man convicted of ordering the grenades that killed her is the head of government of Bangladesh. The men convicted of supplying state resources to make the attack possible have been acquitted. The cover-up that was conducted while she lay dying — the washing of the crime scene, the destruction of evidence, the fabrication of the “Joj Mia” narrative — has been rendered moot by the erasure of every conviction it was designed to prevent.

    The one-man commission that produced a report clearing the actual perpetrators. The justice who wrote that report and was rewarded with a Supreme Court elevation. The pattern that ran through every phase of the aftermath: protect the principals, sacrifice the expendable, make the evidence disappear.

    That pattern won.

    The Numbers That Should Not Fade

    Twenty-four people died in the August 21, 2004 grenade attack.

    More than five hundred were injured — some permanently disabled, some carrying shrapnel in their bodies to this day.

    Sheikh Hasina suffered permanent hearing damage that has never fully healed.

    Ivy Rahman survived seventy-two hours and then died. She was fifty-eight years old. She had spent decades in the service of the Awami League and the women’s movement within it. She had a husband who loved her and would go on to lead the country she helped build — but not with her beside him.

    The grenades that killed her were military weapons. They required state connections to procure. They were thrown by men who had been recruited, organized, and equipped with the knowledge and backing of people operating from the ruling party’s power center.

    This was not a random act of political violence. It was an assassination operation conducted by the government of Bangladesh against the opposition. Twenty-four people died. One of them was Ivy Rahman.

    She held on for three days.

    Bangladesh should remember those three days. And remember what was done during them — and after them — by the people who ordered her killing, and by the system that ultimately let them go.

    This article is part of Series 4: The Victims — profiles of the people killed, injured, and erased in the course of Bangladesh’s documented history of political violence from 2001–2006. Sources include the 2018 verdict of Speedy Trial Tribunal-1 (Case No. 01/2008), CID investigation records, Dhaka Tribune, The Daily Star, and bdnews24 contemporaneous reporting.