Bangladesh heads to the polls on February 12 in an election unlike any in its recent history.  

With the long‑dominant Awami League (AL) barred from participating, an Islamist alliance, strengthened by the student‑led National Citizen Party (NCP), has emerged as a powerful contender.

For the first time since independence in 1971, Islamist forces appear poised for their strongest electoral showing, reshaping expectations about the Muslim-majority nation's political future.

The dramatic shift follows the July 2024 student‑led uprising that ended then-Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's long, iron-fisted rule. Senior AL leaders now face trial over the deaths of hundreds during the unrest.

In November, Bangladesh's International Crimes Tribunal convicted Hasina of obstructing justice, ordering killings and failing to prevent punitive violence. Hasina is currently in exile in neighboring India.

With the AL banned pending trial, its iconic election symbol — the boat — will be absent from the ballot for the first time in the nation's history.

Islamist bloc on the rise

In this political vacuum, Jamaat‑e‑Islami (JI), long marginalized due to its opposition to Bangladesh's 1971 war of independence, has sought to consolidate the Islamist vote.

Although a key partner, Islami Andolan, pulled out at the last moment over seat‑sharing disputes, 11 parties have united under Jamaat's leadership.

Islamist parties have traditionally struggled at the polls. Yet, a recent survey points to an unexpectedly close contest: The International Institute of Law and Diplomacy places the alliance led by Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) at 44.1%, just edging past Jamaat's bloc at 43.9%. Several other polls, however, give the BNP a far more comfortable lead in projected seats.

Political analyst Altaf Parvez believes the country has swung from centre-left to centre-right, if not further right. "People have already accepted that whoever wins the elections, they will have to live in a right-leaning Bangladesh from now on," he told DW.

BNP, which once allied with Jamaat to counter the AL, now finds itself directly competing with the Islamist coalition — particularly for the millions of young voters energized by the 2024 uprising.

To sway undecided voters, BNP leaders have intensified efforts to portray Jamaat as "anti‑independence," invoking the latter's 1971 legacy.

NCP's unexpected alliance and internal divisions

The biggest surprise in this election cycle has been the trajectory of the NCP, a key student‑led force behind the 2024 uprising. A year ago, NCP leaders insisted that the party would contest seats nationwide on its own.

In February 2025, NCP convener Nahid Islam told an Indian media outlet that "voters would not trust Jamaat's leadership."

"People remember their [Jamaat's] historical mistakes," he said, arguing that Islamist politics had "no future in Bangladesh."

The party's decision to join the Jamaat‑led alliance less than a year later stunned its supporters.

In an interview with DW in January 2026, Nahid Islam stressed that the partnership with Islamist parties was "not ideological but purely electoral." He said, "it had proven unrealistic for the NCP to build a nationwide presence within a year."

The alliance offered "a chance to influence post‑election reforms." He underlined that Jamaat appeared "closer than the BNP on reform and anti‑corruption issues."

But the shift has exposed deep divisions inside the NCP. Several senior leaders have threatened to resign. Others have publicly opposed the move.

One of them, senior joint convener Samantha Sharmin, told DW that many voters saw the NCP as an alternative to establishment politics. But they're no longer certain and ask whether they should still vote for the party, she said.

Sharmin added that she did not view Jamaat as a reliable partner, citing its history of supporting Pakistan during the 1971 war.

Debates over secularism return to center stage

The election has also reignited long‑running debates over Bangladesh's constitutional identity.

The country's first constitution, written in 1972, enshrined secularism as one of the fundamental principles. But military rulers later reshaped it, first in 1979 under BNP's founder Ziaur Rahman's rule, when "Bismillahir Rahmanir Rahim" (in the name of Allah) was added to the preamble, and then later in 1988 when then-President Hussain Muhammad Ershad declared Islam the state religion.

After the 2024 uprising, demands for a full rewrite gave way to more limited reforms, with the Constitutional Reform Commission recommending that Islam remain the state religion, with secularism omitted.

In an interview with Qatar's state-owned media Al Jazeera, BNP Secretary-General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir said that "secularism was ill‑suited to Bangladesh," noting its overwhelmingly Muslim population. "If we can ensure their rights, then there is no problem," he said.

Although the AL long claimed to defend secularism, it never removed Islam's privileged status.

But tensions remain stark. Four leftist parties boycotted a key July meeting protesting the omission of secularism from the proposed constitutional reforms.

Mahfuz Alam, a key organizer of the uprising and a recently resigned adviser to the interim government, told DW that "divisions between secularists and Islamists have hardened into open confrontation," leaving "no space for negotiation."

"A state cannot function like this," he said.

Political analyst Pervez warned that minorities — religious, gender or ideological — risk further marginalization. He told DW that the next parliament risks becoming "a rich man's club," with "limited to no representation from workers, farmers, women or minorities."

Women's representation at historic low

Since 1991, Bangladesh has been led by female prime ministers for about three decades, including the BNP's former chair Khaleda Zia and Hasina. But the upcoming election marks the first time in decades that none of the major parties is led by a woman.

With Hasina exiled in India since 2024 and Zia passing away in December 2025, women's political visibility has sharply declined.

Parties have failed to reach an agreement with the National Consensus Commission on enhancing female representation in parliament.

Though they endorsed a July Charter committing to nominate women for 5% of seats, none met the target. The BNP nominated women in just 3.5% of constituencies. Jamaat nominated none.

A nationwide referendum on the constitutional reform proposals is scheduled to take place alongside the national elections, in which voters will choose either yes or no.

Jamaat Secretary-General Mia Golam Parwar said the party lacked "willing or qualified candidates" and cited unresolved policy debates, adding that women would be fielded in "future elections."

Controversy escalated after Jamaat leader Shafiqur Rahman said in an interview that a woman could not lead the party because "Allah made everyone in their own entity (…) And there are some differences between men and women. What Allah made, we cannot change it."

Eleven women's organizations filed a complaint accusing Jamaat of misogyny.

Mosherefa Mishu of the Democratic Revolutionary Party said Jamaat should stop its "continuous anti‑women, patriarchal and derogatory statements" and issue a public apology.

Dhaka University professor Samina Lutfa warned that failing to address such statements would normalize "continued insults against women."

Mahfuz Alam, the recently resigned adviser to the interim government, said Islamists' positions on women's rights were incoherent. "One says women cannot be in leadership, another says they can. Someone says women can be MPs but not prime ministers," he told DW, adding that these contradictions could hinder policy implementation.

Anti-corruption reform challenges

Corruption — long a central voter concern — has featured prominently in campaign rhetoric.

Jamaat has accused the BNP of using religion for political gain, and the BNP has highlighted Jamaat's role in the 2001–2006 BNP‑led coalition government, during which Bangladesh was ranked as the world's most corrupt nation in Transparency International's Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) for five consecutive years.

Jamaat now distances itself from that record, though two of its members served as ministers in that government.

The interim government formed after the 2024 uprising established 11 reform bodies, including the Anti‑Corruption Reform Commission.

But its chair, Iftekharuzzaman, of Transparency International Bangladesh, told DW that "most recommendations were ultimately not implemented."

He said that while the commission initially convinced the government to strengthen the Anti‑Corruption Commission's independence, key recommendations were removed after bureaucratic pressure.

Alam, despite having served as an adviser until recently, blamed "the old guard" within the government for obstructing reform. He rated the interim administration's reform efforts "no higher than 4 out of 10."

Student leaders who helped topple the Awami League were pushed out of the interim government within a month, in what Alam described as a "palace conspiracy."

Bureaucrats and political elites, he argued, derailed the reform agenda the students championed.

With elections approaching, doubts remain about whether any party will carry reforms forward. Iftekharuzzaman warned implementation would be "very difficult." Alam said he remained "doubtful."

Edited by: Srinivas Mazumdaru