Sheikh Hasina, the ousted former prime minister, pledged to return to Bangladesh this year, rejecting a death sentence handed down in absentia and calling the verdict “illegal, unconstitutional and politically motivated.”
Hasina, 78, who left for India after a student-led uprising toppled her government in August 2024, told NDTV she would face the risk and overcome “every obstacle and every conspiracy” to come home.
“I want to say clearly: overcoming every obstacle and every conspiracy, I will return to my country this year,” she said when asked whether she would return despite the sentence — her first public timetable for coming back.
A Dhaka court sentenced her to death last November after convicting her of inciting and ordering killings and of failing to prevent atrocities during the 2024 unrest. She dismissed the ruling and accused the judiciary of serving political revenge aimed at removing her party’s leadership.
“I do not fear death,” she added, saying previous efforts to break up the Awami League had failed and would fail again. She described her planned return not as personal ambition but as a broader effort to restore political rights, democracy, the rule of law and the spirit of the 1971 Liberation War.
Despite a ban on its activities, Hasina said the Awami League remains firmly rooted in Bangladesh. The restrictions, first imposed by the previous interim administration, continue under Prime Minister Tarique Rahman’s government, which took office after the February elections. “The Awami League is not a paper organisation but a political force rooted in the soil of Bengal, in the people of Bengal, in the history of Bengal and in the identity of the Bengali nation,” she said.