Even as questions continue to swirl over the ability of the Md. Yunus-led interim administration of Bangladesh for conducting free and fair elections in February 2026, the Home Ministry of Bangladesh has begun to take steps with far-reaching impact.
The Border Guards Bangladesh (BGB), which is primarily assigned the role of manning Bangladesh’s borders, used the opportunity of the elections to plead for more manpower.
And to no one’s surprise, the Home Ministry, which itself had informally pressed the BGB to ask for more personnel, has swiftly sanctioned the recruitment of an additional 3,500 personnel to the BGB.
These, alongside 35,000 existing BGB troops, are to be deployed in 492 Upazillas.
At a time when there is barely any rule of law, no administrative control worth its name and Islamic fundamentalists are running amok, it is enlightening to see where the priorities of Bangladesh’s Home Minister lie.
The raising of these additional 3,500 personnel is, however, not as benign as it is made out to be.
Over the past few months, the BGB has gone on a major offensive in the Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHTs), using disproportionate force to step on the rights of indigenous communities based there.
On the back of these moves, a large number of Muslim settlers have poured into the CHTs, enabled by the BGB and other elements to settle in areas hitherto primarily populated by the indigenous communities.
The BGB has aided such efforts by forcibly seizing and confiscating land belonging to the indigenous people in various areas.
The land thus taken belongs not just to private individuals, but also to religious entities like a Buddhist monastery in Barmachari, which is part of Laxmichari Upazilla of Khagrachari district. More such actions can be expected when the BGB’s strength increases by 10 percent at one go.
Not to be left behind, the Bangladesh Army has been co-opted by the BGB in order to work in tandem to conduct the election.
The General Officer Commanding (GOC) of the 66 Division of the Bangladesh Army even held a town hall meeting in Kurigram in November, urging soldiers from Army units under his control to ensure ‘free and fair elections’.
The BGB, meanwhile, continues its operations against villages populated by the Bawm and Chakma ethnic people, even launching an aerial attack in the jungles near the Salangsori river in Rangamati district.
While there were no casualties reported, survivors have described their plight. Having been forced to run away from their homes, they are now in no position to return, as these areas are now occupied by settlers from outside the CHTs.
The attacks by the BGB and Bengali Muslim settlers have not even spared schools, and a private primary school run by the indigenous people was attacked on December 14 in Baghaichari Upazilla of Rangamati district.
Any protests, survivors recall, are met with even more severe threats from the BGB and Bangladesh Army, who also threaten the displaced persons against reporting these excesses.
The last few days, following the killing of Osman Hadi, a student leader from July-August 2024, have further exacerbated the situation in the CHTs, with Muslim settlers conducting repeated physical violence against members of minority communities and ethnic groups.
As expected, the BGB and Bangladesh Army have been mute spectators to these developments, knowing that they have political protection from the interim administration operating out of Dhaka.
With the BGB effectively incharge of running the elections in CHTs, it is easy to guess that the elections, if held, would be far from free and fair.
From the preparation of electoral rolls to nominations to electioneering, there is no guarantee that any of these successive elements of an election would be conducted without fear or favour.
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The support extended to the settlement of outsiders is already changing the demographic balance of this ethnic minority region.
It is a logical, though regrettable, outcome that this would effectively lead to the disenfranchisement of the ethnic groups that have always formed a majority in the region.
