Bangladesh election reshapes politics after Hasina ouster (Full Transcript)

[00:00:00] Speaker 1: Bangladesh votes this week in its first election since a youth uprising overthrew the Awami League government. Students rose up in 2024 and were met with a deadly crackdown that killed up to 1,400 people, according to the UN. It forced the Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina to flee to India after 15 years of increasingly authoritarian rule. Many young Bangladeshis are voting for the first time. Here's our South Asia correspondent Azadeh Mashiri in Dhaka.

[00:00:27] Speaker 2: A sight unimaginable two years ago. Out in the open, a rally for the Bangladesh Nationalist Party, the BNP. Under Sheikh Hasina, their leader Tariq Rahman in self-imposed exile. Thousands of their members jailed, the last election boycotted. Now one of the frontrunners hoping for victory. Like others here, Asma says it's the first time she'll vote in nearly two decades. We couldn't vote. We were threatened. We want our country to be beautiful, happy, better jobs for our children.

[00:01:10] Speaker 3: Fascist Hasina did not allow any real elections. Now she's gone, we can vote freely.

[00:01:18] Speaker 4: While these supporters couldn't be out in the last elections, the BNP is still an older established party. As for the new student party, the National Citizen Party, formed by the faces of the uprising, they're in an altogether different situation.

[00:01:37] Speaker 2: Once a leader of the uprising, Nahid Islam now heading the NCP.

[00:01:41] Speaker 5: We have experienced many challenges as a newly formed political party. We came from a mass uprising.

[00:01:50] Speaker 2: Faced with lagging support, a controversial choice, a multi-party alliance with Jamaat-e-Islami, an Islamist party now sending a more secular message.

[00:02:02] Speaker 6: Everyone, irrespective of his faith or any consideration, everyone will enjoy the same rights here in Bangladesh.

[00:02:12] Speaker 2: Dozens of NCP members resign, including Tasneem Jara. Now canvassing as an independent candidate.

[00:02:23] Speaker 7: The concern is when we align with the old political forces, that is not what attracted people like us to the politics in the first place. The trust from people for established political forces has eroded because we've seen promises.

[00:02:38] Speaker 2: Looming over the election, Sheikh Hasina. Her party banned from contesting, calling all allegations against them false and fabricated. We travelled to meet an Awami League politician in hiding.

[00:02:54] Speaker 8: By excluding the Awami League, a free and fair election is no way possible. Some individuals within the Awami League have made mistakes. There is no denying that. But love for Sheikh Hasina and love for the Awami League exists in the hearts of every ordinary Bangladeshi citizen.

[00:03:11] Speaker 2: A party forced into the shadows, others see a future full of possibility and hope to break from the past. Azadeh Moshiri, BBC News, Dhaka.