Politics in Bangladesh is no longer an arena of ideology. It has become a crime-friendly, responsibility-free project for capturing state power. The country’s most uneducated, corrupt, violent and predatory networks now dictate the fate of millions. Under the banner of “democracy,” politics has turned into the most profitable business requiring no capital, producing a class of leaders who treat public office as a license to loot.
Bangladesh has no future unless its political architecture is fundamentally rebuilt. Across 48 local and international studies over the past two decades, one finding is unanimous – Bangladeshi voters rely on emotion, not evidence. Other key findings are: 74% of people who believe in political information without verification (BIGD, 2022), 68% treat party leaders’ statements as ‘truth’ without questioning, 82% view politics as hero worship and not logic, and 61% never research candidates independently. Meaning that politicians face a population that rarely checks facts and votes on emotion. This makes public opinion a blank slate vulnerable to lies, propaganda, religious manipulation, nationalism, and fear. Democracy in Bangladesh is thus built on emotions, not reasoning.
International reports, including TIB, Global Organised Crime Index, and UNODC show that 47% of elected representatives once faced criminal charges, 63% of influential local leaders engage in extortion or illegal transactions, and 80% of upazila-level leaders maintain direct links with crime networks. Why? Because politics in Bangladesh is a zero-risk, high-profit industry for criminals.
It is the easiest route to illegal wealth by tender manipulation, extortion, commissions, looting, project-based kickbacks- producing an underground economy of tens of thousands of crores. Also, political protection from prosecution where 72% of cases against criminals go inactive after joining politics. Political identity is treated not as moral virtue, but a license to dominate. To be a doctor or engineer you need degrees. But to become a political leader you need only violence, loyalty, muscle power, extortion capacity, and the ability to intimidate opponents. Politics in Bangladesh has become the natural habitat of the worst elements of society.
TIB’s structural analysis describes Bangladeshi political parties as “Organised, institutionalised crime syndicates operating under political banners.” This is because crime networks are embedded in party structure. In 59 out of 64 districts, parties maintain links with drug, extortion, and tender mafias. Promoted leaders are those who can capture polling centers, assault opponents, and silence critics thus showing their muscle power. Parties operate as looting machines. They control an invisible economy of over Tk14,000 crore annually. It also shows that nine major parties haven’t changed leadership in 15–30 years. If there is no democracy within parties, democracy in the State becomes fiction.
A political leader needs no skill, no education, no investment. Only muscle, patronage, and emotional exploitation. They can become from rags to millions after one election. According to TIB data (2018), a candidate with BDT10 lakh becomes worth BDT12 crore within a span of 5 years with an asset growth of 1,100%. From 2009 to 2023, local leaders had a 756% of average asset growth with union chairmen (1,134%), MPs (1,340%), and top leaders (1,900%). This is not considered as development but an industrial-scale corruption. ADB and TI rank Bangladeshi politics as the region’s richest corrupt profession.
A dangerous cultural belief dominates politics, while educated citizens face humiliation, intimidation, social isolation, and threats from violent party wings. Thus, the political field empties out leaving room only for criminals.
Bangladesh ranks #1 in South Asia for corruption (TI 2022) with an annual economic loss of Tk 1.1 lakh crore (World Bank, 2021), a rule of law ranking at 139th (2023). Top 1% elites capture 30% of national income (UNDP, 2022) and bureaucracy reduced to party subservience. When criminals run politics, no development is sustainable.
Bangladesh needs a set of ten core structural reforms to pull its politics back from its current slide into a mafia-like system. These reforms begin with strict registration rules for political parties, including requirements on education, tax records, profession, asset transparency and a clean criminal history. Politicians should be required to hold a professional license, similar to doctors or lawyers, and this license should be cancelled if they engage in misconduct. Every candidate must submit full biodata to the Election Commission with complete asset histories, sources of income and the financial profiles of their immediate families. Any politician who faces criminal charges should be suspended from party activities immediately. Nomination boards need independent experts, and election financing must be monitored internationally. Political education programmes should be mandatory, and political parties must practise internal democracy with a two-term limit for their top posts. Political funding should be fully transparent, and there must be large-scale programmes to improve political literacy among citizens.
In the end, the message is simple: reform politics or lose the State. Politics in Bangladesh has increasingly taken the shape of a mafia corporation. To reclaim the State, the country needs a shift in public mindset, greater involvement of intellectual and professional groups in politics and a national movement to free political life from criminal influence. Without this transformation, the State may continue to exist, but its people will remain trapped under a system of mafia rule.
(The views expressed in this article are the author’s own)
