How a young generation in Bangladesh forced the leader who ruled much of their lives
Jannatul Prome hopes to leave Bangladesh for further study or possibly a job after she finishes her university studies, frustrated by a system she says does not reward merit and offers few opportunities for young people.
“We have a very limited field here,” said the 21-year-old, who would have left sooner if her family had enough money to pay for tuition at foreign universities for both her and her older brother in the same time.
But recent events have given him hope that one day he might return to a transformed Bangladesh: After 15 years in power, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina resigned and fled the country last week – driven out by young protesters, among them Prome, who say they are fed up with the way her increasingly autocratic rule has stifled dissent, favored the elite and widened inequality.
Students initially took to the streets of Bangladesh in June demanding an end to rules that set aside up to 30 percent of government jobs for descendants of veterans who fought in the country's 1971 war of independence from Pakistan. Protesters said this benefited supporters of Hasina's Awami League, which led the fight – and who were already part of the elite. Quota and others for marginalized groups meant only 44 percent of civil service jobs were awarded on merit.
That such jobs are at the heart of the movement was no coincidence: they are some of the most stable and well-paid in a country where the economy has grown in recent years but has not created enough solid jobs and professional for its well-educated middle class. .
And the fact that Generation Z led this revolt was no surprise either: young people like Prome are among the most frustrated and affected by the lack of opportunities in Bangladesh – and at the same time, they are not bound by the old taboos and narratives of the quota system reflected.
Their desire to break with the past was clear when Hasina weakened their demands in mid-July, asking who, if not freedom fighters, should be given government jobs.
“Who will? Grandsons of Razakars?” Hasina retorted, using a deeply offensive word referring to those who collaborated with Pakistan to suppress Bangladesh's independence struggle.
But the student protesters wore the word like a badge of honor. They marched on the Dhaka University campus chanting, “Who are you? who am i Razakar. Who said that? the dictator.”
The next day, protesters were killed in clashes with security forces – only galvanizing the demonstrations, which expanded into a wider uprising against Hasina's rule.
Sabrina Karim, a Cornell University professor who studies Bangladesh's political violence and military history, said many of the protesters are so young they cannot remember a time before Hasina was prime minister.
They were raised, like the generations before them, on stories of the struggle for independence — with Hasina's family at the center. Her father, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, was the first leader of independent Bangladesh and was later assassinated in a military coup. But Karim said that narrative made much less sense to the young protesters than it did to their grandparents.
“It doesn't resonate with them as much as it did (before). And they want something new,” she said.
For Nourin Sultana Toma, a 22-year-old student at Dhaka University, Hasina's equating of student protesters with traitors made her realize the gulf between what young people wanted and what the government could provide.
She said she watched as Bangladesh slowly became immune to inequities and people lost hope that things would ever get better.
The country's longest-serving prime minister boasted about raising per capita income and transforming Bangladesh's economy into a global competitor — fields turned into garment factories and bumpy roads turned into winding highways. But Toma said she saw the daily struggle of people trying to buy essentials or find work, and her plea for basic rights was met with insults and violence.
“It could no longer be tolerated,” Toma said.
This economic distress has been keenly felt by the youth of Bangladesh. Eighteen million young people – in a country of 170 million – are not working or in school, according to Chietigj Bajpaee, who researches South Asia at the Chatham House think tank. And after the pandemic, private sector jobs have become even more scarce.
Many young people try to study abroad or move abroad after graduation in the hope of finding a decent job, decimating the middle class and leading to a brain drain.
“Class differences have widened,” said Jannatun Nahar Ankan, a 28-year-old who works with a non-profit organization in Dhaka and joined the protests.
Despite these problems, none of the protesters seem to have truly believed that their movement would be able to unseat Hasina.
Rafij Khan, 24, was preparing to join a protest in the street when he heard that Hasina had resigned and fled the country. He called home repeatedly to see if he could check the news.
He said that in the final days of the demonstrations, people from all classes, religions and professions joined the students in the streets. They now hugged each other while others sat on the ground in disbelief.
“I can't describe the joy that people felt that day,” he said.
Some of that euphoria is fading now as the enormity of the task ahead sinks in. Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus became interim leader on Thursday and he, along with a cabinet that includes two student protest leaders, will have to restore peace, build institutions and prepare the country for new elections.
The hope for most students is that the caretaker government will have time to fix Bangladesh's institutions while a new political party is formed – one that is not led by the old political dynasties.
“If you asked me to vote in an election right now, I don't know who I would vote for,” Khan said. “We don't want to replace one dictatorship with another.”
The young people who took to the streets were often described as the “Hate Politics” generation.
But Azaher Uddin Anik, a 26-year-old digital security specialist and recent graduate from Dhaka University, said it was a misnomer.
They don't hate all politics – just the divisive politics of Bangladesh.
And while he admits that the structural reforms the country now needs may be more difficult than sacking the prime minister, he is hopeful for the first time in a while.
“My latest experience tells me that the impossible can happen,” he said. “And maybe it's not too late.”
