Bangladesh’s ousted Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has taken what is being seen as the clearest sign yet that she intends to return home.
Hasina requested a new passport and identity card on Monday so she can return from self-imposed exile in India, according to a letter familiar in the know. The letter was emailed to Bangladesh’s diplomatic mission in New Delhi, where her lawyers at the London Based Matrix Chambers urged Bangladesh’s acting high commissioner Preeti Rahman to provide her a passport and national identity card. Reports describe it as her first such communication since fleeing Bangladesh in August 2024.
“In view of the reported revocation of her existing Bangladeshi passport and National Identity Card (NID) by the Interim Government and other authorities, I respectfully request that you take the necessary steps to issue a new Bangladeshi passport and National Identity Card for our client,” the letter said
The request follows her public comments on a return. Hasina told The Associated Press in an interview this month that she would return to Bangladesh in December at any cost.
Obtaining the documents may not be simple. Bangladesh’s interim government revoked her passport in 2025 over alleged involvement in enforced disappearances and the July killings, and she was earlier stripped of her diplomatic passport. According to sources, Hasina has been sentenced to death for crimes against humanity during the July Uprising, which adds a serious legal obstacle to any return.
Hasina has lived in India since the student-led uprising that ended her government. She has now been in exile for two years.
There was no immediate information on how Bangladeshi authorities would respond to the request. Whether she is allowed to travel, and what she would face if she does, how will it shape the political situation in Dhaka and relations between Bangladesh and India would be determined over time.