India is in a tight spot following Bangladesh’s former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina taking refuge in the country after fleeing violent protestors in Dhaka as there is no clarity on when she will be able to find another nation that can offer her asylum. The UK and the US have distanced themselves from the ousted leader.

New Delhi is hoping for an early decision on the country that could offer asylum as sheltering Hasina for a longer term could make the new Bangladesh government hostile, sources said. Negotiations are on with a number of countries, including Finland, Belarus, UAE and Saudi Arabia, among others, but no decision is in sight yet.

“The Indian government is in kind of a diplomatic logjam. It cannot possibly ask Hasina to leave before she finds another country of asylum. But it also cannot risk keeping her here for long as it may then be branded as an Awami League sympathiser, which may not go down well with the new government that comes to power in Bangladesh,” a source close to the development told businessline.

Hundreds killed

Hasina escaped from Bangladesh to India on Monday after thousands of anti-government protestors marched to Dhaka demanding her ouster.

Anti-quota demonstrations in the country by students escalated to a movement for her resignation after hundreds got killed in the government’s crackdown.

Bangladesh’s interim government, which is to be headed by Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus, is unlikely to have any sympathy for Awami League or Hasina and if India is seen to be sheltering her for long, it could hurt bilateral relations, the source added.

In his statement in Parliament on Tuesday, Minister of External Affairs S Jaishankar said that Hasina had requested approval to come to India “for the moment”, which clearly indicated that her presence in the country was a short-term arrangement.

However, after reports that the UK, where her son is at the moment, may not be interested in offering her asylum, as was initially being surmised, the uncertainty on the time of her departure has deepened, the source said.

UK, US reactions

The UK Home Office reportedly pointed to technical problems in giving Hasina asylum as the laws there don’t allow a person to seek refuge from a third country. Another problem is that the UK, which officially talked about supporting a UN-led investigation into the events in Bangladesh, may not give Hasina immunity from the results of the probe, some reports said.

The US, which openly criticised Hasina’s government earlier this year for not carrying out “free and fair” elections, is said to have revoked her visa in disapproval of the way she handled the student protests.

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“With the UK and the US taking a hard posture, it remains to be seen how some other European countries, particularly Finland, responds to Hasina’s need for asylum. There is another hope that some of the Middle East countries, such as the UAE and Saudi Arab, may respond positively,” the source said.

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