Former Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has vowed to return this year to her homeland from India, where she is in self-imposed exile, two years after her ouster in a popular uprising.

Hasina’s statement comes a week after her Awami League party marked its 77th Founding Day on June 23. However, scores of Awami League activists were arrested for defying a ban on the organization.

“I want to say clearly: overcoming every obstacle and every conspiracy, I will return to my country this year,” Hasina told India’s NDTV in an interview.

Hasina said the Awami League is not a “paper organization” but a “political force rooted in the soil of Bengal.”

The defiant former prime minister said her party “has shed blood many times and has been banned many times,” adding it made a comeback every time “through the strength of the people.”

In November 2025, Bangladesh’s International Crimes Tribunal (ICT) handed down a death sentence to Hasina in absentia for alleged crimes against humanity. 

The ICT is a domestic war crimes tribunal set up in 2009 – by Hasina’s government – to prosecute suspects in the genocide committed by the Pakistan Army and its local collaborators during Bangladesh’s liberation struggle in 1971.

Hasina is the daughter of Bangladesh’s first president, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, who was assassinated in a 1975 military coup. Her mother, brothers, and several other relatives were also assassinated in their Dhaka residence.

Mujibur Rahman, the founding leader of the Bangladesh liberation movement, was historically referred to as the ‘Father of the Nation’. But the interim government of Muhammad Yunus removed all such references to him.

Hasina termed the ICT verdict “an illegal, unconstitutional, and politically motivated process.” She alleged that the judiciary in Bangladesh has been turned into an instrument of political revenge to make the Awami League leaderless.

In February, Bangladesh held its first general election since Hasina’s ouster in which the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) led by present Prime Minister Tarique Rahman secured a commanding majority.

Hasina, who fled to India after the uprising in 2024, had said in a previous interview with RT that the court verdict was a “foregone conclusion.” 

Hasina claimed in the RT interview that there is “forensic evidence” suggesting that “foreign mercenaries” were present at the protests that led to her ouster.

The 2024 riots in Bangladesh, which led to her ousting, were backed by USAID and Hillary Clinton’s family, according to a former cabinet minister.