A conversation on projecting Bangladesh in India
The new Press Minister in New Delhi talks about his plans
I talked with Faisal Mahmud, the new Press Minister in Bangladesh High Commission in New Delhi, on his plans to navigate the Indian media terrain.
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Let me clear up some misconceptions about Bangladesh politics:
The media tends to exaggerate everything. Regular political incidents against Hindu households get labeled as "genocide." Similarly, when Hasina cracked down on protesters, that too was called genocide. These terms get thrown around too easily.
People overstate India's role in Bangladesh. When something happens, anti-India groups in Bangladesh and Hindu nationalists in India both start claiming Bangladesh is becoming an Indian colony. This isn't true.
Take corruption claims - yes, there were issues in our electricity sector (around 10-15%), but some people are now claiming 50% corruption in our nuclear projects by making false comparisons with Kolkata's nuclear plant.
Hasina wasn't even that pro-India. During her time, China became our biggest foreign investor. We got military equipment and training from China. We joined BRI. When India was dragging its feet on the Teesta river issue, Hasina approved a Chinese project to dam it - basically telling India to get lost.
Indian media gets BNP completely wrong too. They paint them as some far-right anti-India party. Palki Sharma even claimed there was an "India Out" campaign by BNP in early 2024, which never happened. They're trying to draw parallels with Maldives. I bet Indian media thinks BNP is anti-Liberation War, even though a war hero founded it. BNP is really just made up of people who got disillusioned with Mujib.
One last thing - outsiders often misread Bengali conservatism. They think it leads to Islamism, but that's wrong. Islamism isn't about conservatism - it's a radical globalist ideology. The people who support Islamism today come from the same backgrounds as those who became communists a century ago.