Sheikh Hasina, the former prime minister of Bangladesh who was forced from power and fled to India, has said she will return home by the end of December 2026. This is a striking promise because a court in Bangladesh has sentenced her to death. Speaking by audio link from a news conference in Delhi on August 5, 2026, Hasina called the court's decision politically motivated and said the threat of execution would not stop her (The Guardian).

Hasina, who is 78, picked December for a reason. She called it Bangladesh's 'month of victory,' because it marks the defeat of Pakistani forces in the 1971 war that created Bangladesh as an independent country. She said she would return with senior colleagues from her party to surrender to authorities and face court, knowing she could be imprisoned or executed (The Guardian; Kyodo News).

Her announcement puts India in an awkward spot. Hasina has been living under heavy security in India since she fled Bangladesh two years ago after a student-led uprising removed her from power. Her son, Sajeeb Wazed Joy, said she is being treated well and has the same level of security and services as a head of state. But India said it had nothing to do with organizing her news conference and does not support her political views (The Guardian). In December 2025, Bangladesh formally asked India to hand Hasina over so she could stand trial — a request called extradition, which is when one country asks another to send a person back to face legal charges (The Guardian).

The legal situation waiting for Hasina is severe. On November 16, 2025, a special court in Bangladesh called the International Crimes Tribunal sentenced her to death for crimes against humanity, specifically for the violent crackdown on protests in July 2024 (New York Times; Opinio Juris). A separate court also sentenced her to 21 years in prison for corruption (Al Arabiya English).

The protests that led to Hasina's downfall started over a government policy that set aside certain government jobs for specific groups. What began as a complaint about that system grew into a massive movement against her rule. The United Nations estimates that as many as 1,400 people died during the protests, while Hasina's supporters say the number was about 800. Her removal ended more than 15 years of rule by her party, the Awami League, which had become increasingly authoritarian (The Guardian).

Bangladesh's politics have changed a great deal since Hasina was removed. The Awami League was banned after the 2024 uprising (Reuters). In an election earlier in 2026, the Awami League was not allowed to take part, and a different party called the Bangladesh Nationalist Party, or BNP, won power. The BNP is led by Tarique Rahman, the son of former prime minister Khaleda Zia, who died in 2025. Rahman returned to Bangladesh on Christmas Day to run in the election after spending more than 17 years living abroad to avoid arrest (The Guardian). Bangladesh has also banned its own media from broadcasting or publishing Hasina's statements (The Guardian).

Before she returns, Hasina has made specific demands. She wants the ban on her party lifted, political prisoners released, and what she calls 'false cases' against party activists dropped. The current government in Dhaka has said she would likely be arrested the moment she arrives (The Guardian).

There is a deeper historical layer to Hasina's announcement. She returned to Bangladesh once before, in 1981, after six years of exile in India (The Guardian). By choosing December and invoking the 1971 victory, she is tapping into powerful feelings of national pride. The situation also puts India in a bind: it has given Hasina the security of a head of state but will not publicly support her political message, leaving it caught between its duty to shelter her and its relationship with the new BNP government in Bangladesh.

For people watching the region, the stakes go beyond Hasina herself. The governments that came after Hasina have used the International Crimes Tribunal to sentence a former head of government to death. Her supporters call this a political weapon, while the state describes it as a form of transitional justice — the idea of holding past leaders accountable after a period of authoritarian rule or conflict. If Hasina actually returns, the clash between her claim to be the rightful leader and the state's court system will test how strong Bangladesh's new political order really is.

Another group, the Jamaat-e-Islami, which was suppressed under Hasina's rule, could also gain an unusually large share of the vote, as seen during the February 2026 election cycle (The Guardian). That means if Hasina does come back, she would be walking into a political landscape that has been entirely reshaped without her.