On Monday, India’s external affairs ministry announced that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had deferred a visit to Bangladesh planned for nex...
On Monday, India’s external affairs ministry announced that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had deferred a visit to Bangladesh planned for next week because the event that he was to attend had been postponed.
In a surprise move on Sunday, Bangladesh said it had postponed the event to inaugurate the birth centenary celebrations of its founder, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, scheduled for March 17 after three cases of Covid-19 had been detected in the country.
However, speculation is rife in Bangladesh that there was another factor at play: Modi’s presence itself. Last Friday saw large protests across several cities in Bangladesh, urging the Hasina government to cancel Modi’s invitation. According to the Dhaka Tribune, protestors also planned to gherao the Dhaka airport to prevent Modi from entering the city.
In view of this, the cancellation of the inauguration event has allowed the Bangladesh government to escape from a sticky situation.
Bangladesh is nowhere as intensely affected by the coronavirus pandemic as many other countries. Moreover, no other large gathering in the country has been cancelled due to this outbreak so far.
Bangladeshi bogey
The protests were another indication of the damage the Bharatiya Janata Party government has caused to relations with its eastern neighbour. For decades, India has close ties with Bangladesh and enjoyed enormous goodwill...
