Bangladesh’s army chief Wakeruz Zaman said on Monday he will form an interim government after Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina resigned and fled Dhaka in the face of overwhelming protests.

“We will form an interim government,” Zaman said in a broadcast to the nation on state television, adding Hasina had resigned.

• 56 killed in Monday’s unrest as death toll in protests crosses 300
• Internet services restricted, offices closed as thousands take to streets, defying nationwide curfew
• Protesters storm, loot PM palace after Hasina flees
• Ousted Hasina arrives at military base near Delhi, Indian media says
• President orders release of Khaleda Zia and those arrested
• Military to lift curfew at dawn on Tuesday

Since July, Bangladesh has been engulfed by protests and violence that has so far claimed the lives of at least 300 people, according to an AFP tally based on police, government officials and doctors at hospitals.

Protesting student groups have demanded the scrapping of a controversial quota system in government jobs, which escalated into a campaign to seek the ouster of Hasina, who won a fourth straight term in January in an election boycotted by the opposition.

Earlier today, students in Bangladesh called for a march to Dhaka in defiance of a nationwide curfew, a day after deadly clashes in the country killed at least 91 people.

Bedecked with medal ribbons on his green fatigues and wearing a four-star general’s cap, Zaman said he was “taking full responsibility” after Hasina was ousted.

“The country is going through a revolutionary period,” said Zaman, 58, who had taken over as army chief only on June 23. Hasina had trusted him because he was a distant relative.

“I give you my word that all the injustices will be addressed,” the career infantry officer said, although it was not immediately clear if he would head the new government.

“The country has suffered a lot, the economy has been hit, many people have been killed — it is time to stop the violence.”

Zaman said he had held talks with leaders of major political parties — excluding Hasina’s long-ruling Awami League — and would soon meet President Mohammed Shahabuddin to discuss the way ahead.

He called for a halt to “all violence in the name of protest” and promised that the new government would ensure justice for all the deaths that took place during the Anti-Discriminatory Student Movement, Bangladesh’s Dhaka Tribune reported.

President Shahabuddin also ordered the release of jailed former prime minister and key opposition leader Khaleda Zia, hours after Hasina was ousted and the military took power.

The president’s press team said in a statement that a meeting led by Shahabuddin had “decided unanimously to free Bangladesh Nationalist Party chairperson Begum Khaleda Zia immediately”.

“The meeting has also decided to free all the people who have been arrested during the student protests,” the statement added.

Bangladesh’s military said it would lift a curfew imposed to quash protests at dawn on Tuesday.

“Offices, factories, schools, colleges … will be open” from 6am on Tuesday (0000 GMT), the military said in a statement.

On Saturday, the army chief had told officers that the military “always stood by the people”, according to an official statement.

Earlier, the Bangladesh army had urged everyone to obey the curfew rules.

“The Bangladesh army will perform its promised duty in line with the Bangladesh constitution and existing laws of the country,” it said in a statement late on Sunday.

“In this regard, the people are requested to abide by the curfew as well as give full cooperation to this end,” it said, adding that the curfew was imposed to ensure the security of people’s lives, properties, and important state establishments.

The military declared an emergency in January 2007 after widespread political unrest and installed a military-backed caretaker government for two years.

Hasina flees to India

India’s ANI news agency said Hasina, 76, landed at the Hindon Air Base, a military airfield near Delhi, after she had earlier today fled Bangladesh.

Reuters could not immediately verify this, but commercial tracking services showed a Bangladesh Air Force plane leaving the country and flying west before it disappeared.

Citing sources, ANI reported that India’s National Security Adviser Ajit Doval and senior military officers met Hasina at the airfield and she was being moved to a safe location.

A top-level source said she wanted to “transit” on to London, but calls by the British government for a UN-led investigation into “unprecedented levels of violence” put that into doubt.

Hasina had left the country for her own safety at the insistence of her family, her son Sajeeb Wazed Joy told the BBC World Service.

Hasina was “so disappointed that after all her hard work, for a minority to rise up against her”, Joy said.

She would not attempt to mount a political comeback, he said.

He said she had transformed Bangladesh from a “failing state” to “one of the rising tigers of Asia”. “She’s very disappointed,” he said.

A source close to Hasina told AFP that the embattled leader had left her Dhaka palace for a “safer place”. “She wanted to record a speech, but she could not get an opportunity to do that,” the source added.

Joy urged the country’s security forces to block any takeover from her rule.

“It means don’t allow any unelected government to come in power for one minute, it is your duty,” US-based Joy said in a post on Facebook.

The flight into exile ended a 15-year second stint in power for Hasina, who has ruled for 20 of the last 30 years as leader of the political movement inherited from her father, assassinated with most of his family in a 1975 coup.

Tarique Rahman, the exiled acting chairman of the opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party, said Hasina’s resignation proved the “power of the people and will be an example for generations to come, showing how the courage of the people can overpower atrocities”.

“Congratulations to the students and protesters from all sections of society,” Rahman said in a post on X.

56 killed in Monday’s unrest

At least 56 people were killed during violent unrest in Bangladesh on Monday, police and doctors said, updating an earlier toll.

At least 44 of the dead were brought to the Dhaka Medical College Hospital, an AFP correspondent said, reporting all had bullet wounds. Police said 11 others were killed elsewhere in the capital, and another in the port city of Chittagong.

Jubilant crowds had waved flags, some dancing on top of a tank in the streets on Monday morning before hundreds broke through the gates of Hasina’s official residence ‘Ganabhaban’.

Bangladesh’s Channel 24 broadcast images of crowds running into the compound, waving to the camera as they celebrated, looting furniture and books, with others relaxing on beds.

Television visuals showed crowds in the drawing rooms of the residence, and some people could be seen carrying away televisions, chairs and tables from what was one of the most protected buildings in the country.

Others also climbed atop a large statue of Hasina’s father Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the country’s independence hero, and began chiselling away at the head with an axe, visuals showed.

After internet services were tightly restricted, Bangladesh telecoms operator Grameenphone later in the day reinstated 3G and 4G networks, allowing people to access mobile internet services across the country, Norway’s Telenor told Reuters.

Voice and SMS connectivity had been maintained throughout the recent political turmoil even as mobile internet services were disconnected, the company said.

Offices were closed and more than 3,500 factories servicing Bangladesh’s economically vital garment industry were shut.

Soldiers and police with armoured vehicles in Dhaka had barricaded routes to Hasina’s office with barbed wire, AFP reporters said, but vast crowds flooded the streets, tearing down barriers.

The Business Standard newspaper estimated as many as 400,000 protesters were on the streets but it was impossible to verify the figure.

“The time has come for the final protest,” said Asif Mahmud, one of the key leaders in the nationwide civil disobedience campaign.

Students call for march to Dhaka

Protesting students in Bangladesh have called for a march to Dhaka in defiance of a nationwide curfew to press Hasina to resign.

Army tanks and police vehicles were on the streets of the capital on Monday, with security forces patrolling on foot, an online news channel showed. There was almost no civilian traffic, barring a few motorcycles and three-wheel taxis.

At least 91 people were killed and hundreds injured on Sunday in a wave of violence across the country of 170 million people as police fired tear gas and rubber bullets to disperse tens of thousands of protesters.

Sunday’s death toll, which included at least 14 policemen, was the highest for a single day from any protests in Bangladesh’s recent history, surpassing the 67 deaths reported on July 19 when students took to the streets against the quotas.

The government declared an indefinite nationwide curfew starting at 6pm (12pm GMT) on Sunday and also announced a three-day general holiday starting from Monday.

“The government has killed many students. The time has come for the final answer,” protest coordinator Asif Mahmud said in a statement on Facebook late on Sunday. “Everyone will come to Dhaka, especially from the surrounding districts. Come to Dhaka and take a position on the streets.”

Hasina has said that “those who are carrying out violence are not students but terrorists who are out to destabilise the nation”.

Over the weekend, there have been attacks, vandalism, and arson targeting government buildings, offices of the ruling Awami League party, police stations, and houses of public representatives, local media reported. Violence was reported in 39 of the country’s 64 districts.

Bangladesh Railway said it had suspended all services indefinitely due to the escalating violence. Garment factories in the country, which supply apparel to some of the top brands in the world, have also been closed indefinitely.

The role of the country’s army in tackling the violence has come into focus with a group of retired military officers urging Hasina to withdraw troops from the streets and undertake “political initiatives” to resolve the crisis.

Critics of Hasina, along with human rights groups, have accused her government of using excessive force against protesters, a charge she and her ministers deny.

Last month, at least 150 people were killed and thousands injured in violence touched off by student groups protesting against quotas for government jobs.

The protests paused after the Supreme Court scrapped most quotas, but students returned to the streets in sporadic protests last week, demanding justice for the families of those killed and Hasina’s resignation.

Header image: Anti-government protestors display Bangladesh’s national flag as they storm Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s palace in Dhaka on August 5, 2024. — AFP