Seven months after taking office, Prime Minister Tarique Rahman occupies one of the most unusual positions in Bangladesh’s recent political history. He commands an overwhelming parliamentary majority, leads a party restored to government after years in opposition, and has entered the international arena with considerably more confidence than many expected when he returned home.

Yet the contrast between success abroad and difficulty at home is becoming increasingly important.

In foreign policy, the government can point to several significant developments. Relations with China have expanded rapidly. Bangladesh has pressed ahead with the politically sensitive Teesta River project. Relations with Pakistan have warmed. Dhaka has widened engagement with other Asian and West Asian countries while attempting to preserve productive relations with the United States and the wider West. At the United Nations General Assembly in September, Tarique presented an ambitious vision of national Recovery, Restoration and Reconstruction, the “3Rs.”

The economic relationship with Washington has also acquired a new dimension through trade negotiations and ambitious commercial plans, including prospective purchases of American aircraft. At the same time, Bangladesh appears to be reconsidering important aspects of national defense, placing greater emphasis on drones, modern combat aircraft, maritime surveillance, technology, and eventually greater domestic defense-production capability.

At home, however, Tarique confronts an altogether more formidable landscape: stubborn inflation, a troubled banking system, weak revenue collection, unemployment and insufficient private investment; allegations of corruption, extortion and abuse of political influence involving members of his own political camp; an unsettled bureaucracy; a police force still struggling with the consequences of political polarization; and the continuing question of how deeply remnants and loyalties of the former political order remain embedded within state institutions.

Perhaps just as significant will be whether the government can build a good relationship with the opposition and follow through on its promises in the July National Charter to make long-term constitutional changes.

This is the paradox of Tarique Rahman’s first months in power. Foreign policy may prove to be the easier part of governing Bangladesh.

A Foreign Policy Beginning with Confidence

Perhaps the clearest early achievement has been diversifying Bangladesh’s external relationships.

Tarique’s June visit to China, his first major overseas tour after taking office, produced 15 memorandums of understanding, two agreements and a joint communiqué covering trade, investment, infrastructure, connectivity and strategic cooperation. The two governments also expanded discussions on defense and diplomatic coordination.

Is it a tilt towards China?  Some analysts argue yes, while others claim it's just one piece of Bangladesh's multi-alignment strategy. This makes a difference.  If Bangladesh traded overreliance on India for overreliance on China, it would not truly be strategically autonomous.

The Teesta issue illustrates both the opportunity and the danger.

For years, Bangladesh has waited for a satisfactory resolution of the Teesta water-sharing question with India. During Tarique’s visit to China, Beijing pledged support for managing the Teesta and other Bangladeshi rivers, and the Teesta River Comprehensive Management and Restoration Project became an important component of bilateral discussions.

For Dhaka, this offers practical possibilities for river management, flood control, dredging, irrigation and development of northern Bangladesh. But the Teesta is also geopolitically sensitive because of its proximity to India and the Siliguri Corridor.

The government’s approach toward India has consequently appeared firmer than the relationship Dhaka maintained during the later Sheikh Hasina years. Bangladesh has continued pressing New Delhi regarding Sheikh Hasina and has insisted that bilateral relations proceed on the basis of reciprocity, dignity and mutual interests.

Firmness, however, should not become hostility. Bangladesh and India share geography, rivers, borders, trade, transportation networks, energy connections and security concerns that neither side can wish away.

Tarique’s challenge, then, is not to be “pro-India” or “anti-India,” but to build a relationship in which cooperation does not require political subordination.

That principle should apply equally to China.

Pakistan, the Region and a Broader Bangladesh

Another noticeable development has been the improvement in relations with Pakistan.

At the UN General Assembly in New York, Tarique met Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif. The two governments described bilateral relations as having positive momentum and discussed expanding cooperation in trade, investment, connectivity, education, tourism and people-to-people relations.

Bangladesh has simultaneously broadened contacts elsewhere. During the UNGA visit, Tarique met leaders from Türkiye, Iran, Pakistan, Bhutan, Thailand, Croatia and Haiti. His government’s diplomacy has also emphasized economic relations with Malaysia, Saudi Arabia, Türkiye and other partners.

This diversification is sensible for a country of Bangladesh’s size, economic ambitions and strategic location. The country should be able to work with Beijing without becoming China’s satellite, cooperate with Washington without becoming entangled in every American strategic contest, maintain friendship with Pakistan without allowing that relationship to be defined by India, and cooperate with India without surrendering the ability to disagree with New Delhi.

That may ultimately be the practical meaning of “Bangladesh First.”

The same philosophy appeared in Tarique’s maiden address to the United Nations General Assembly on September 24. He presented his government’s program through three words: Recovery, Restoration, and Reconstruction. He addressed democratic and economic transformation, the Rohingya crisis, climate change, migration, and international conflict while emphasizing dialogue and diplomacy.

It was an effective international presentation. But the real test of the 3Rs will not take place in New York.

It will take place in Dhaka.

America, Trade and the New Economic Diplomacy

One consequential development deserves more attention: Bangladesh’s evolving economic relationship with the United States.

The new trade framework seeks to place relations with Washington on a more explicitly commercial footing. That matters because Bangladesh’s foreign policy cannot be measured only through meetings with presidents, prime ministers and diplomats. Economic diplomacy must ultimately produce exports, investment, employment, technology and access to markets.

Civil aviation provides an interesting illustration.

The government has pursued plans for Biman Bangladesh Airlines to acquire additional Boeing aircraft while also considering Airbus aircraft. If ultimately carried through on commercially sound terms, a mixed expansion could increase Biman’s capacity and international network while strengthening commercial ties with both the United States and Europe.

However, they will also need to meet normal business criteria.

Many factors affect an airline's profitability; having new aircraft alone does not cut it. Routes you can fly with certain aircraft, demand for those flights, the ability to service the plane, pilots who can fly them, and the cost to operate them all play a role.

Bangladesh should therefore treat aircraft acquisition as much an aviation-business decision as a diplomatic instrument.

The broader trade relationship deserves the same scrutiny.

The government should explain not simply that agreements have been achieved, but how Bangladeshi exporters, especially the garment industry, will remain competitive; how domestic producers may be affected by greater foreign market access; and what Bangladesh receives in investment, technology, and employment in return.

Good diplomacy is not measured by the number of agreements signed.

It is measured by the national advantage those agreements produce.

The Economic Reality Cannot Be Escaped

Here the picture becomes considerably more difficult.

Bangladesh's growth rate is still too low.  High inflation has affected the lives of ordinary people. We have taken steps back when it comes to poverty. The banks are overloaded with non-performing loans. And because of Bangladesh's incredibly low tax-to-GDP ratio, we cannot generate enough funds for public infrastructure.

International financial institutions have repeatedly emphasized banking reform, stronger revenue collection, inflation control, fiscal discipline, and financial-sector restructuring.

Tarique did not create these problems in seven months. Many accumulated over years.

But political inheritance offers only temporary protection. Eventually inherited problems become the responsibility of the government currently holding office.

Banking reform may be the most revealing test.

It is relatively easy to promise action against corruption. It is considerably harder to make politically connected borrowers repay loans, restructure weak banks, prosecute financial wrongdoing regardless of affiliation, and allow regulators to operate independently.

The same applies to employment. Bangladesh cannot indefinitely depend upon garments, remittances and government employment to absorb a large, increasingly educated population. Industrial diversification, information technology, maritime industries, pharmaceuticals, light engineering, logistics and modern agriculture must create jobs on a much larger scale.

Foreign investment will follow speeches only when investors encounter predictable regulation, reliable electricity, functioning banks, enforceable contracts and confidence in the rule of law.

The July Charter and the Relationship with the Opposition

The most important domestic political test may ultimately be constitutional reform.

The July–August 2024 uprising, the reform process that followed, the July National Charter signed in October 2025 and the February 2026 referendum created public expectations that Bangladesh would not simply change governments but reconsider the institutional arrangements that had allowed excessive executive power to develop.

The Charter contains more than 80 reform recommendations. Major proposals include a bicameral Parliament, limits on prime-ministerial power and tenure, stronger parliamentary checks, greater judicial independence, reform of the caretaker-government system, and broader protection of fundamental rights.

The referendum gave the reform project a substantial political mandate, but it did not resolve the legal disagreement over implementation.

The BNP maintains that constitutional amendments must proceed through Parliament under the existing Constitution. Jamaat-e-Islami, the National Citizen Party and other opposition representatives have argued that the Constitution Reform Council contemplated by the July Charter implementation process should be convened.

The disagreement should not become another winner-takes-all confrontation.

With its commanding parliamentary majority, the BNP possesses enormous legislative power. The more important question is whether it will construct a constitutional settlement that extends beyond that majority.

Constitutions are strongest when political actors believe the rules will remain legitimate even after they lose power.

The government therefore has an opportunity to establish a different political culture: invite the opposition into substantive negotiations, distinguish constitutional questions from ordinary partisan competition, publish a clear timetable for implementing agreed portions of the July Charter, and transparently identify the provisions requiring further consensus.

The opposition carries responsibilities as well.

Participation cannot mean transferring every disagreement from Parliament to the street. An opposition committed to democratic reform must use Parliament, committees, courts, public debate and peaceful political organization rather than treating confrontation as the default instrument of politics.

Bangladesh has repeatedly suffered because governments have viewed opposition parties as enemies and opposition parties have viewed governments as illegitimate occupants awaiting removal.

The July Charter offers an opportunity to break that pattern.

The State Tarique Inherited and the State He Must Build

The bureaucracy presents a different problem.

The administration cannot simply be purged and reconstructed whenever governments change. Yet concerns about politicization accumulated during the previous regime cannot be ignored.

The police face an even more delicate transition.

Officers implicated by credible evidence in corruption, unlawful violence, election manipulation, or partisan abuse should be investigated through credible procedures. But professional civil servants and police officers should not be punished merely for having served under another government.

Otherwise, Bangladesh will reproduce the very politicization it claims to be dismantling.

For decades, governments have been tempted to ask of senior officials: Whose people are they?

A reforming government should ask different questions:

Are they competent? Are they honest? Will they enforce the law impartially?

The objective must be a bureaucracy loyal to the Constitution rather than to the BNP, Awami League, Jamaat or any other party, and a police service whose officers enforce the law regardless of who occupies Ganabhaban.

Tarique’s Hardest Problem May Be His Own Party

An even more politically sensitive challenge remains.

Allegations of extortion, land grabbing, patronage and abuse of political influence involving people identified with the BNP have become impossible for the leadership simply to dismiss as opposition propaganda.

If someone uses the BNP’s name to seize property, collect money or intimidate a businessman, the government must investigate the conduct. If the allegation is false, the accused deserves protection. If it is true, political affiliation should offer no protection.

That principle is the dividing line between party government and rule of law.

After years of repression and exclusion, there may understandably be BNP members who believe political victory entitles them to opportunity, recognition or compensation.

It does not entitle anyone to the assets of the state or another citizen.

Recent political commentary has portrayed Tarique as moving toward a harder line against disorder and misconduct, including alleged misconduct involving people within his own political camp. One discussion supplied for this essay claims that the government is considering action against a group of prominent figures accused of corruption, extortion, and destabilizing activities.

Those allegations require independent verification before anyone can draw conclusions about particular individuals.

But the larger question raised by the discussion is legitimate:

Can a governing party impose the rule of law upon its own supporters?

The easiest crackdown for any government is against its opponents.

The more meaningful demonstration of political reform is enforcement against its own ministers, MPs, party officials, financiers and local leaders when credible evidence of wrongdoing exists.

If Tarique is prepared to do that through lawful investigation, prosecution and due process, he could establish an important precedent. If enforcement becomes selectively severe against political adversaries but negotiable for political allies, the government will simply reproduce an old Bangladeshi political tradition under a new administration.

The Temptation of Another “Operation Clean Heart”

The deteriorating law-and-order debate has inevitably revived memories of Operation Clean Heart, the nationwide security operation undertaken during Khaleda Zia’s government in 2002.

The comparison is understandable.

When citizens see extortion, political musclemen, property seizures, organized violence and apparently untouchable local power brokers, demands for extraordinary action become politically powerful. A state that appears incapable of enforcing ordinary law eventually creates public demand for extraordinary enforcement.

But Operation Clean Heart should be remembered as both a precedent and a warning.

The 2002 operation deployed the armed forces alongside other security agencies in an attempt to confront crime, illegal weapons, and politically protected criminal networks. Supporters credited it with disrupting criminal organizations and restoring some public order.

Yet the operation was also deeply controversial because of allegations of torture, custodial deaths, and other abuses.

That history poses an important question for the present government.

Bangladesh certainly needs a cleaner heart.

It does not necessarily need another Operation Clean Heart.

The distinction matters.

The objective should be to produce the results citizens sought from such an operation: security, freedom from extortion, removal of political protection for criminals, and restoration of state authority without reproducing methods that generated serious human-rights concerns.

A modern democratic government should be capable of arresting an extortionist without torturing him, prosecuting a corrupt politician without making him disappear, removing a violent party activist without punishing his political associates, and investigating an opposition leader without turning prosecution into political persecution.

That is harder than conducting a sweeping security operation.

It is also far more valuable institutionally.

An “Operation Clean Government” Instead

The temptation to use the military whenever civilian institutions fail presents another danger.

Bangladesh’s armed forces are among the country’s most important national institutions. But continually asking the military to compensate for failures of policing, prosecution, and civilian administration ultimately avoids repairing the institutions that are failing.

The better legacy would therefore be an “Operation Clean Government” rather than another Operation Clean Heart.

Clean the ministries.

Clean the police stations.

Clean the contracting system.

Clean the banks.

Clean the regulatory agencies.

And, most importantly, clean the political parties themselves.

A ruling party cannot credibly demand discipline from the country while tolerating indiscipline within its own organization.

Tarique therefore has an opportunity to establish a simple principle: no BNP identity card should function as immunity from the law.

If ministers are corrupt, investigate them. If MPs improperly use political influence, investigate them. If local party leaders engage in extortion, prosecute them. If accusations are fabricated, protect the accused through due process.

The same standard must apply to every political organization.

This is where a harder line could reinforce democratic government, provided that hardness is directed against criminal conduct rather than political disagreement.

There is an enormous difference between suppressing disorder and suppressing dissent.

A businessman being forced to pay extortion money needs the state to be strong.

A journalist criticizing the government needs the state to exercise restraint.

A family whose property has been illegally seized needs decisive police intervention.

An opposition party holding a peaceful meeting needs police protection rather than obstruction.

A mature government must be able to understand all four situations simultaneously.

Strength Without Authoritarianism

This leads to a larger question about what Bangladesh means when it demands a “strong state.”

Bangladesh needs a state strong enough to prevent extortion, recover stolen assets, collect taxes, regulate banks, prosecute corruption, control organized crime, protect minorities, secure borders and enforce contracts.

But strength should not be measured by a government’s ability to silence newspapers, intimidate political opponents, arrest critics or deploy extraordinary security powers whenever ordinary institutions prove inconvenient.

Those are two fundamentally different concepts of state power.

Operation Clean Heart illustrates the distinction. Extraordinary coercive measures can sometimes produce immediate and highly visible results.

Institution-building is slower, less dramatic, and politically more frustrating.

Yet only institution-building creates durable capacity.

If Tarique wants a political “clean heart,” then he can begin with his own government and party. If he wants stronger law enforcement, he can professionalize the police. If he wants political stability, he can negotiate seriously with the opposition over the July Charter. If he wants to combat misinformation, he can make government information more transparent. If he wants a stronger state, he can strengthen the institutions that will remain after his government eventually leaves office.

That would constitute a more consequential form of political toughness than another extraordinary security operation.

Information, Disinformation and Public Confidence

There is also a genuine information problem.

Social media has transformed Bangladesh’s political environment. Rumors, edited videos, partisan commentary, and unverified allegations can circulate nationally within minutes.

Governments can no longer assume that an official press release issued several hours later will control public understanding of an event.

The answer, however, should not be government “narrative control” in the traditional sense.

It should be government credibility.

That requires rapid publication of verifiable information, accessible government data, regular briefings, independent fact-checking, transparent correction of official mistakes, and willingness to answer difficult questions from journalists.

A government that tells the truth quickly will eventually possess something considerably more valuable than narrative control:

Public trust.

Conversely, once citizens conclude that official information is merely another form of political messaging, even truthful government statements become less effective.

This is another reason independent journalism matters. A government genuinely confident in its record should not require a compliant press to defend it.

A New Defense Policy: Technology, Deterrence and Self-Reliance

Another significant development is occurring with less public debate: Bangladesh appears to be reconsidering the structure of its defense policy.

The emerging approach places greater emphasis on technology, drones, modern combat aircraft, cyber capability, maritime surveillance and domestic defense production.

This represents an important conceptual change.

Bangladesh has traditionally purchased much of its major military equipment abroad. Modernization based entirely on imports, however, creates permanent dependence not simply on the original equipment but on ammunition, spare parts, upgrades, maintenance, and technical expertise.

A credible self-reliance strategy should therefore emphasize technology transfer, licensed production, local maintenance and overhaul capability, electronics, communications, shipbuilding, unmanned systems and eventually the ability to manufacture selected equipment and components domestically.

Drones deserve particular attention.

Recent conflicts have demonstrated how relatively inexpensive unmanned aircraft can transform reconnaissance, surveillance and battlefield operations. Bangladesh should develop indigenous capabilities in unmanned systems rather than remaining entirely dependent upon imported technology.

The same principle applies to fighter aircraft.

Bangladesh has been examining modern combat-aircraft options as part of its military modernization. But a fighter aircraft is not simply an aircraft purchase. It creates decades of expenditure involving weapons, simulators, pilot conversion, maintenance infrastructure, engines, spare parts, and software support.

The objective should therefore not be to acquire the most impressive equipment available.

It should be to build the most coherent defense capability Bangladesh can sustainably operate.

There is also a wider economic opportunity. Bangladesh already possesses substantial capabilities in shipbuilding, engineering, electronics, garments and manufacturing. A carefully constructed defense-industrial policy could connect some of these capabilities to military requirements while creating skilled employment and reducing foreign-exchange expenditure.

But defense self-reliance should not become an excuse for unaccountable expenditure.

Parliament should retain meaningful oversight of major procurement decisions, and national-security requirements must be balanced against Bangladesh’s enormous needs in education, healthcare, infrastructure and employment.

The Armed Forces: Modernization, Professionalism and the Civil–Military Balance

No discussion of the Tarique Rahman Government can ignore the Armed Forces. They played a major role in Bangladesh's current state after 2024. When our country went through turmoil, the Armed Forces stood tall and kept law and order intact when most civilian agencies, i.e., the police, failed to do so. They also played a vital role during the political transition and the 2026 elections.

The important question now is what role the military should play under an elected civilian government.

Tarique has publicly stated that the Armed Forces belong to no individual, family, or political party and that their loyalty must remain with the Constitution and the people. This principle is particularly significant in Bangladesh, given its history of military governments, coups and military involvement in political transitions. A professional military must be powerful enough to defend the state but politically neutral enough never to determine who governs it.

At times, Bangladesh has resorted to using the Armed Forces to maintain law and order in the country. This may be necessary when there is no other option. We shouldn't make it a habit to rely on military forces to do the jobs our Police Force isn't doing. They can only help us to a certain extent.

This is especially relevant to renewed discussion about an Operation Clean Heart-type campaign against extortion, organized crime and politically protected criminal networks. The 2002 operation demonstrated the organizational effectiveness the military can bring to a security crisis, but it also became controversial because of allegations of custodial deaths, torture and other abuses.

Bangladesh may need stronger law enforcement, but the objective should be an "Operation Clean Government" rather than another Operation Clean Heart. Police, prosecutors and courts must ultimately have the capacity to confront criminals regardless of political affiliation, without routinely depending on the military.

At the same time, keeping the Armed Forces out of partisan politics does not mean keeping them weak. Bangladesh's strategic position on the Bay of Bengal, maritime interests, ports and expanding economy require credible defense capabilities.

With this in mind, the government's plan to improve its military will consist of drones and counter-drone technology. Modern fighter aircraft and air defense systems.  Cyber and Electronic warfare.  Surveillance at sea and increasing co-operation between the different branches of the military. There are many reasons to look more closely at modernizing our fighter aircraft. When you buy an aircraft, you are tied to that platform for many years with weapons, engines, personnel, maintenance, computer programs, etc.

That's why we need to focus on our own "Made in Bangladesh" initiative. We need to start making some of these things in our country. Like drones, electronic communication, Ship maintenance engineering, and a few other defense-related industries. That doesn't mean we have to produce all of these. But at least make sure that no country can hold us hostage if they decide to stop supplying these to us.

Ultimately, however, Tarique Rahman's most important military reform may have little to do with weapons.

What Bangladesh needs is a fresh understanding between civilian rule and the military. Civilian rulers should honor the professionalism and needs of our Armed Forces. On the other hand, the military should remain under civilian control and avoid political affairs.

No politician should invoke the help of our Armed Forces to fight against other civilians. And our Armed Forces should not be an institution people look to when civilian rule fails.

The strongest military is not necessarily the one most visible in civilian life. It is one capable of defending the country while remaining firmly outside the struggle for political power.

If Bangladesh can combine technologically modern, increasingly self-reliant Armed Forces with civilian supremacy and genuine political neutrality, it will have achieved something more consequential than acquiring any fighter aircraft, submarine or missile system: a military that is simultaneously stronger in defending the state and more restrained in governing it.

Simplicity Is Valuable, but Institutions Matter More

One favorable aspect of Tarique’s public image has been the perception of a less extravagant and more restrained personal style.

Such symbolism matters in Bangladesh. Leaders who demonstrate modesty can communicate that public office is service rather than entitlement.

But individual simplicity can't make up for corruption in higher levels of government.

The Prime Minister may live simply, but his cabinet, party members, and contractors, etc., can be riddled with corrupt individuals and crooks.

The stronger legacy, therefore, would be to transform personal restraint into institutional restraint.

Can He Overcome So Many Adverse Conditions?

Seven months is too short a period for a definitive assessment of any government, and it is certainly too early to determine the eventual outcome of Tarique Rahman’s premiership.

We can, however, identify the conditions against which that record will eventually be measured.

Foreign policy has given the government a consequential beginning. China has been engaged without formally abandoning relations with the West. Teesta has returned to the diplomatic agenda. Pakistan-Bangladesh relations have expanded. Dhaka is reaching toward a broader range of Asian and West Asian partners. The relationship with the United States has acquired a stronger commercial dimension. Bangladesh is simultaneously attempting to modernize its defense posture while moving toward greater technological and industrial self-reliance.

The United Nations gave Tarique a platform to articulate the 3Rs and present Bangladesh as an independent state seeking multiple partnerships rather than becoming the client of one regional or global power.

The difficult part will be in Bangladesh. 

They need to fix their banking system without covering for big loan sharks.

Collect more tax money from people who can actually pay it.

Create jobs instead of giving out bribes. 

It must professionalize the police without conducting a partisan purge.

It must reform the bureaucracy without merely replacing one party’s loyalists with another’s.

It must deal firmly with criminal conduct among its own supporters.

It must modernize national defense without allowing procurement to escape financial discipline and parliamentary accountability.

And it must find a political accommodation with the opposition over the July Charter rather than allowing constitutional reform itself to become the next source of national polarization.

Most importantly, Tarique Rahman must demonstrate that the BNP has learned something from Bangladesh’s political history.

With a two-thirds parliamentary majority, his government possesses enormous power. The most consequential question is not how much of that power it can exercise, but how much of it it is prepared to place within durable institutional boundaries.

Which means accepting the fact that there will be an opposition that will try to bring it down, media that will try to expose it, courts that can find against it, regulatory agencies that will try to take on politically affiliated groups, and a parliament where they will have to listen at times, not just count their votes.

Bangladesh has already experienced governments in which the party gradually became indistinguishable from the state.

Repeating that cycle under another banner would not constitute reform.

Breaking it would.

It's incredible how Tarique Rahman has been able to accomplish all this. After living in foreign countries and leading an opposition that was constantly losing, he returned to Bangladesh, helped take the BNP to power, and became Prime Minister of Bangladesh.

But winning power and governing well are different achievements.

The next phase of his government will therefore be more revealing than the first. Diplomatic visits, trade agreements, aircraft purchases, defense modernization and international speeches can demonstrate energy and ambition.

They can't change things on their own.

It will happen when the constitution limits presidential power. When there is opposition in our politics. When banks are no longer political bank accounts. When we can interact with our police and officials without party affiliation. When we invest trust that our contracts and properties are safe. And when ruling party members realize that winning an election doesn't put them above the law.

If Recovery, Restoration and Reconstruction are to become more than memorable words delivered from the podium of the United Nations, they must ultimately produce a professional civil service, accountable police, independent judiciary, healthier banking system, competitive economy, disciplined ruling party, credible national-defense capability and a political culture in which governments can change without the machinery of the state changing political ownership with them.

The July Charter may prove particularly important in this respect. Bangladesh’s constitutional problem has never been merely the wording of individual articles. It has been the recurring concentration of authority and the weakness of institutions that can restrain it.

The Charter and Referendum have allowed us to solve this issue. If the BNP and the Opposition can fulfill the will of the people and achieve a legal resolution which everyone can agree on. Will we be able to see what July stood for take effect?

The same principle applies to Tarique’s broader concept of “Bangladesh First.”

Strategic independence is not achieved merely by balancing China against India or America against China. Genuine independence requires economic strength, functioning institutions, technological capability, military preparedness, political stability and public confidence in the state.

A country dependent on foreign creditors, foreign weapons, foreign technology and politically connected domestic institutions cannot become strategically autonomous simply by declaring that it is so.

Bangladesh therefore stands at a consequential point.

Its government possesses an unusually strong parliamentary mandate. Its foreign relationships are diversifying. New commercial relationships are being negotiated. Defense policy is being reconsidered. Constitutional reform remains possible. And a generation shaped by the upheaval of 2024 expects something more substantial than a change of personalities at the top.

That combination creates both opportunity and danger.

The opportunity is to construct a more confident Bangladesh economically competitive, strategically independent, institutionally restrained and politically pluralistic.

The danger is that familiar habits of Bangladeshi politics will gradually reassert themselves: concentration of authority, politicization of institutions, patronage, intimidation of opponents and the assumption that an electoral mandate gives the winner temporary ownership of the state.

This is why the debate about another Operation Clean Heart ultimately reaches far beyond law and order.

Bangladesh does not merely need another campaign to clean criminals from the streets.

It needs to remove the political conditions that repeatedly allow criminality, corruption and impunity to return.

It would take something much subtler but far harder to achieve. We would need police that are free from political influence. Prosecutors that will prosecute those in high power. Courts that we can trust to render just decisions. Regulatory bodies that will go after the politically influenced. Political parties that will punish their own.  A government that will accept checks on its power.

That would be the real Operation Clean Government.

Tarique Rahman has already accomplished the political task of returning the BNP to power.

The much larger task is to demonstrate what that power will be used to build.

The ultimate measure of strong leadership is not how many opponents a government can control.

It is whether a government possessing extraordinary political power can build institutions strong enough to control the government itself.

That is a far more difficult project than winning an election, signing a trade agreement, purchasing aircraft, modernizing the armed forces, or conducting successful diplomacy.

It is also the project by which Tarique Rahman’s period in office will eventually be judged.