The Daily Star places student organizer Asif Mahmud’s effort to contact Muhammad Yunus, who later became Bangladesh’s chief adviser, before Sheikh Hasina left Bangladesh, while another account credits a journalist.
The Daily Star’s reconstruction, based on interviews with people involved in the transition, says Badiul Alam Majumder recalled Asif asking for help reaching Yunus’s team on Aug. 1, 2024. Majumder told the paper, “I helped put them in touch.” Asif said he contacted the team on Aug. 2 and spoke by phone with Yunus on Aug. 3. The report says Yunus first said he would not lead a transitional administration. Asif said Yunus agreed after additional calls following Hasina’s Aug. 5 departure.
The same reconstruction says student leaders wanted Yunus to head the next government because they feared political discussions could result in military-led rule. The account presents that concern as part of the organizers’ reasons for seeking Yunus’s leadership.
NDTV and India Today separately reported that Shafiqul Alam, Yunus’s former press secretary, credited journalist Qadaruddin Shishir with making an initial approach to Yunus for student leaders. The outlets reported that Alam made the statement in a Facebook post dated Oct. 28, and quoted him saying Shishir had “stepped up to fulfill that critical role.” The reports assign different roles in the contact chain but do not say whether both men took part.
The public announcement came later. On Aug. 6, student coordinator Nahid Islam said in a video that Yunus had agreed to head an interim government. The Bangladesh Government Press gazette lists Yunus’s appointment as chief adviser on Aug. 8. Bangladesh Sangbad Sangstha, the state news agency, reported that he was sworn in that day.
The dates support an inference that efforts to reach a possible leader for a post-Hasina administration began before her departure. They do not establish that the outreach was part of a plan to remove her. EconoTimes previously covered a Carnegie review of protest-driven political change that identified Bangladesh as the only substantially autocratic setting in its review where protesters overturned the governing power structure.
