By Brahma Chellaney Courtesy Taipei Times

Violent student-led, Islamist-backed protests in Bangladesh have toppled Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s government, and mob attacks targeting those viewed as supporters of her secular Awami League party — in particular, the country’s dwindling Hindu minority — are proliferating. At a time when neighboring Myanmar is engulfed in violence and the Pakistan-Afghanistan belt remains fertile ground for cross-border terrorism, political upheaval in Bangladesh, two years after the overthrow of Sri Lanka’s government, is the last thing India, the regional power, needs.

Achieving lasting political stability in South Asia would require entrenching democracy. However, this is no easy feat. India notwithstanding, the region remains in thrall to longstanding autocratic traditions and centralization of power. For example, Hasina had become autocratic during her more than 15 years in office. In this context, popular demands for democracy are far more likely to lead to violence and political chaos than to smooth political transitions.

As Hasina has shown, autocratic leaders do not necessarily survive popular challenges to their rule. Consider the chaos that engulfed Sri Lanka in 2022, when a severe economic crisis triggered mass protests against the Rajapaksa brothers’ dynastic, undemocratic regime. Though former Sri Lankan president Gotabaya Rajapaksa, like Hasina, initially unleashed a violent crackdown, his opponents proved too powerful. Like Hasina, he gave up and fled the country, without even formally resigning. Sri Lankan protesters then occupied the presidential palace, much as Bangladeshi mobs have ransacked Hasina’s sprawling official residence.

However, when an autocrat is toppled, it is often the military — not a democratic government — that takes over, even if behind a civilian facade. Bangladesh is no exception. The military has attempted at least two dozen coups since the country’s violent birth in 1971, and ruled for a number of extended periods since its 1975 assassination of Bangladesh founder Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.

Hasina, Rahman’s daughter, stood out for her success at keeping the military (and Islamists) in check, at least until last week, when the Bangladeshi army chief refused to continue supporting her crackdown on rampaging protesters. The military then facilitated her escape to India and established an interim government of civilian advisers” who have little experience with national issues.

To be sure, some South Asian countries have made some progress toward democracy. In particular, Bhutan’s democratic transition is proceeding apace, thanks to a benevolent king who has supported the transition from a traditional monarchy to a parliamentary system. Earlier this year, the country’s fourth national election brought an opposition party to power.

However, elections alone — even if competitive — do not guarantee popular empowerment or adherence to constitutional rules, especially when the military holds decisive power. Consider Pakistan, which held elections earlier this year. The military’s preferred candidate, Shehbaz Sharif, returned as prime minister, but his government would survive only at the pleasure of the country’s effective ruler, the army chief. Until the rule of law is firmly entrenched and those wielding extra-constitutional power are unequivocally reined in, democratic progress would remain limited and reversible.

Myanmar learned this the hard way. Though the military had called the shots in the country since independence in 1948, it began ceding power to a nascent civilian government in 2015, filling the country with hope for a democratic future. However, in February 2021 — barely six years later — it staged a coup. However, this time resistance has proved intense, and heavily armed insurgent groups — some receiving non-lethal aid” from the US — are managing to expand their territorial control. In response, the military junta has stepped up punitive air strikes and artillery barrages.

The violence and deepening humanitarian crisis are fueling instability beyond Myanmar’s borders. Already, more than 32,000 ethnic Chin have sought refuge in India’s Mizoram State, and thousands more have fled to Manipur, where their arrival has stoked violent ethnic conflict. It is not just the Chin: India is also home to millions of illegal immigrants from Bangladesh, whose ranks are set to grow as desperate Hindus flee Islamist attacks against them.

When it comes to security risks, immigration is just the beginning. Political turbulence in the Maldives — which began in 2012, when Islamist radicals forced the country’s democratically elected president to resign at gunpoint — has enabled China to gain a foothold in India’s maritime backyard. This year, China signed a military pact with the Maldives and docked a giant marine research ship in a Maldivian port. Meanwhile, Muslim radicals are expanding their grassroots base, establishing Islamic State and al-Qaeda cells on the archipelago.

Mounting economic pressures compound the security risks. Pakistan has repeatedly sought IMF bailouts in recent years. Hasina’s overthrow could usher in hard times for the once-booming Bangladeshi economy, as the country’s foreign reserves dwindle rapidly. None of this is conducive to regional prosperity. As long as South Asian countries remain plagued by political instability, strong and sustainable economic growth would remain elusive.

The difficulty of maintaining political stability and advancing democratization can also be seen in Nepal — a country with which India has close cultural and historical ties. Last month, the country swore in its 14th government in just 16 years, led by four-time Nepalese Prime Minister K.P. Sharma Oli of the Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist-Leninist). Oli, who spent years in jail in the 1970s and 1980s for waging war against the state, is Nepal’s fifth head of government in five years, having replaced another former communist guerrilla, Pushpa Kamal Dahal.

All of this puts India, the world’s largest democracy and South Asia’s geographical hub, in a difficult situation. It must minimize the spillover effects of political and economic instability in its neighborhood, even as it continues to seek economic and strategic partnerships far beyond its troubled region.

Brahma Chellaney, professor emeritus of strategic studies at the New Delhi-based Center for Policy Research and fellow at the Robert Bosch Academy in Berlin, is the author of Water, Peace, and War: Confronting the Global Water Crisis.