Bangladesh is celebrating 50 years of independence, and none seems happier than India, the larger neighbour often derided as the “big brother.”
The reasons are many. Foremost, in this anniversary year, is that India bled—literally—while assisting Bangladesh’s independence in 1971. Confronted with the arrival of over ten million refugees fleeing civil war in East Pakistan, India had little choice but to shoulder the immense humanitarian and political challenge.
Throughout 1971, India mounted a global diplomatic campaign, highlighting the bloodshed in East Pakistan and the crushing economic burden of sheltering the displaced. The world reverberated with the “Concert for Bangladesh,” a moving collaboration between Yehudi Menuhin, Pandit Ravi Shankar, and the Beatles. Influential voices such as Edward Kennedy and André Malraux rallied international awareness.
When Pakistani forces attacked, India finally responded militarily. Five thousand Indian soldiers laid down their lives. On 16 December 1971, more than 93,000 Pakistani soldiers surrendered to the joint command of India and the newborn Bangladesh. Within three months, Indian troops withdrew.
This relationship, born in blood, has remained special. To consolidate it, and to join the Swarnim (Golden) celebrations, Prime Minister Narendra Modi will travel to Dhaka on 25–26 March at the invitation of Sheikh Hasina. Bangladesh’s longest-serving prime minister and daughter of its founding father, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, she has never missed an opportunity to thank India for feeding and sheltering her people during their darkest hour.
Gateway to the East
Among all its South Asian neighbours, India today enjoys its strongest ties with Bangladesh. Strategically, Bangladesh is India’s gateway to its north-eastern states and onward to Southeast Asia—central to New Delhi’s “Act East” policy.
Both countries are working to catch up on lost time by forging new communication links to facilitate trade and connectivity. Efforts are under way to connect the Chittagong port with north-eastern India via river routes.
India has also invested in five major infrastructure projects, the latest being the “Friendship Bridge” over the Feni River. Opened by Modi on 9 March, it forms part of a vital trade corridor between Tripura and Bangladesh. This, Modi stressed at the opening, will enhance connectivity for south Assam, Mizoram, and Manipur as well.
For Bangladesh, such projects open new access to South Asian markets; for India, they restore direct overland links to its isolated north-east for the first time since the 1965 war with Pakistan severed them.
Shared Borders, Shared Challenges
India and Bangladesh share the region’s longest border—4,300 km of riverine, densely inhabited terrain. Unsurprisingly, this has generated problems such as smuggling of people, cattle, and goods. Yet both nations have learnt to manage them, substantially if not entirely, by rationalising land boundaries and reaching maritime agreements that allow exploration of Bay of Bengal resources.
Security cooperation remains central, from policing borders to combating Islamist groups and tribal insurgencies. Much of the earlier backlog of grievances has been addressed during Hasina’s tenure.
A Changing Economic and Strategic Landscape
Over the past decade, Bangladesh’s economic progress has been striking. Rising growth and stronger development indicators are reducing the compulsion for outward migration, while making economic ties with India increasingly comfortable.
Yet the growing Chinese presence in South Asia and the Indian Ocean adds a new dimension. For India, strengthening relations with Bangladesh is not only about history or sentiment—it is a geopolitical necessity.