Dhaka: India cannot give any deadline for ousted Bangladesh prime minister Sheikh Hasina's return as her extradition request is under examination through a legal process, Indian High Commissioner in Bangladesh Dinesh Trivedi said on Saturday.
"Nobody can give you a timeframe (over Hasina's return)," Trivedi said at a discussion organised by a private think tank in Dhaka, while responding to questions related to the repeated requests from Dhaka for Hasina's extradition to Bangladesh.
Hasina, 79, has been living in India after she fled Dhaka following the collapse of her government in August 2024 in the face of a massive anti-government agitation.
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India's external affairs ministry has maintained that the Bangladesh government's request for extraditing Hasina is being examined in line with established processes.
"Again and again, the government of India has replied to this that there is a process, and the process is legal, and it is well structured," Trivedi said on Saturday.
He also said Hasina had not been brought to India by the Indian Air Force or Army. A Bangladesh Air Force aircraft carried Hasina to India on August 5 as the protests, dubbed the July Uprising, toppled her government.
At the time, the Bangladesh Army-led security detachment escorted her from her official residence as protesters moved towards the premises.
"At that point in time, Hasina was still the prime minister of Bangladesh. We had hardly any choice on that. It was our duty as a neighbour to accept the reality of life, because situations are such where at times you are not prepared for it," Trivedi said.
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"What was our choice? If you would have said that no, we are not going to accept, we don't give landing permission. Things would have been I don't know what," he said.
Trivedi said the situation had unfolded because of "tragic circumstances" in Bangladesh and added that such circumstances should never be repeated anywhere in the world.
Bangladesh Prime Minister Tarique Rahman, who gave the opening remarks at the fifth edition of the Bay of Bengal Conversation 2026 on Saturday, was not present when Trivedi made the comments during the panel discussion at the same event.
The remarks were the first explicit comments by Trivedi on the issue of Hasina's extradition. He had previously declined to comment on matters involving "politics".
After Hasina's government was toppled, an interim administration led by Muhammad Yunus assumed office on August 8, 2024 and governed Bangladesh for the next 18 months.
India-Bangladesh ties witnessed a sharp deterioration during the Yunus-led interim administration.
During that period, Hasina was tried in absentia by a special tribunal and sentenced to death. The interim government also disbanded her Awami League party and sought her extradition through a diplomatic note.
After coming to power following the February 12 elections, which barred the Awami League from contesting, Tarique Rahman's Bangladesh Nationalist Party government endorsed the ban on Hasina's party and repeatedly renewed the demand for her extradition.
The extradition issue has emerged as a major strain in India-Bangladesh ties, and has also affected Rahman's proposed visit to New Delhi.
India had extended an invitation to Rahman to attend the BRICS Summit last month, while a separate bilateral invitation had been in place since February.
Rahman had declined the invitation to attend the BRICS outreach summit.
A virtual press conference addressed by Hasina in New Delhi on August 5 added to the strains.
The Bangladesh foreign ministry had earlier said the atmosphere for Rahman's visit had been "vitiated" by Hasina's virtual press interaction.
India has maintained that it had no role in the media event concerning Hasina and it does not endorse anything said at the forum about the Bangladesh government.
Despite the downturn in bilateral relations, Bangladesh State Minister for Foreign Affairs Humaiun Kobir, after meeting Trivedi on Tuesday, said it was "positive" about progress in discussions on Rahman's proposed India visit, though no date has been fixed yet.
