Sheikh Hasina won’t return to Bangladesh, Pakistan and US stoked protests, son says

“She said she will never go back to Bangladesh,” Sajeeb Wazed, Hasina’s son and an adviser in her ousted government, said in a phone interview from Washington. “In fact, to be entirely candid, she told me that none of our family will ever go back to Bangladesh.”

Her resignation marks the end of an era for a family that’s ruled Bangladesh for much of its modern history. Hasina’s father, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, was the nation’s first president and led the independence struggle against Pakistan that created an independent Bangladesh in 1971.

Hasina’s imprint on the country is no less indelible. She is Bangladesh’s longest-serving prime minister and has won successive elections since 2009. Under her tenure, Hasina lifted millions out of poverty through garment exports, adroitly balanced ties with China and India, and rooted out Islamists from politics in one of the world’s few Muslim democracies.

But critics say authoritarian impulses pulled Bangladesh in a darker direction, and that Hasina stamped out dissent by filling her administration with loyalists and hobbling opponents through legal pressure. Those frustrations boiled over on Sunday, when protesters began to forcefully demand her resignation.

By Monday, Hasina and her sister were on a plane bound for India. She is been moved to an undisclosed location in Delhi and will stay for as long as she needs, according to Indian officials who did not want to be named because of the sensitivity of the issue. Several nations, including India, are being considered for a more permanent move, according to the officials.

S. Jaishankar, India’s Minister of External Affairs, said in parliament that Hasina’s request to come to Delhi from Dhaka happened “at very short notice.” The ministry