NEW DELHI: Former Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, who has been living in exile in India, has begun efforts to return home, applying for a new passport and national identity card with the aim of arriving in Bangladesh in December.
Her lawyers wrote to the Bangladesh High Commission in Delhi on Monday, Reuters reported. Hasina’s previous passport and national ID were reportedly cancelled by Bangladesh’s interim government, and the lawyers asked that replacements be issued and the application reviewed as soon as possible.
Dhaka has dismissed the move. Humayun Kabir, Bangladesh’s minister of state for foreign affairs, said Hasina does not need a new passport to be brought back and called on India to extradite her under the bilateral treaty. Law Minister Md. Asaduzzaman took the same position, saying the process would be carried out in accordance with the law.
Hasina arrived in India in August 2024 after she was forced from power amid student-led protests. In November 2025, a Bangladeshi special tribunal convicted her of crimes against humanity over the crackdown on those protests and sentenced her to death. She has rejected the verdict. Her plan is to return in December and surrender to the court.
The standoff is expected to return the issue to the centre of diplomatic talks between New Delhi and Dhaka and could weigh on India-Bangladesh relations.