Bangladeshi Republic

Bangladesh's founding leader Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, as Prime Minister, with U.S. President Gerald Ford at the Oval Office in 1974

President Ziaur Rahman and erstwhile first lady Khaleda Zia being hosted by the Dutch royal family in 1979.

2006 Nobel Peace Prize winner Muhammad Yunus with former Brazilian president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva

After independence, Bangladesh became a secular democracy and a republic within the Commonwealth. The world's 7th most populous nation at the time was ravaged by wartime devastation and widespread poverty, receiving massive international aid as a result. It joined the Non-Aligned Movement and the OIC in 1973, followed by the United Nations in 1974. The Mujib administration signed a 25-year friendship treaty with India and was courted by Western and Eastern bloc powers. Bangladesh expressed strong solidarity with Arab countries during the Arab-Israeli War in 1973, sending medical teams to Egypt and Syria.^[111][112] Mujib's government faced growing political agitation from left-wing groups, especially the National Socialist Party. Chakma politician M. N. Larma protested the lack of recognition for indigenous Chittagong Hill Tracts minorities in the new constitution. Mujib briefly declared a state of emergency to maintain law and order.
India, Pakistan and Bangladesh signed tripartite agreement in 1973 calling for peace and stability in the subcontinent. A nationwide famine occurred in 1974. In early 1975, Mujib initiated one party socialist rule. On 15 August 1975, Mujib and most of his family members were assassinated by mid-level army officers during a military coup. Vice President Khandaker Mushtaq Ahmed was sworn in as President, with most of Mujib's cabinet intact. Bangladesh was placed under martial law.
Mushtaq interned four prominent associates of Mujib, including Bangladesh's first prime minister Tajuddin Ahmad. Two Army uprisings on 3 and 7 November 1975 led to a reorganised structure of power. Between the two coups, the four interned Awami League leaders were assassinated by army men in Dhaka Central Jail. Mushtaq was replaced by Justice Abu Sayem as President, while the three chiefs of the armed services become martial law administrators. A technocrat cabinet was formed with Moudud Ahmed as Deputy Prime Minister. Bangladesh was one of the first countries to recognize the provisional revolutionary government of South Vietnam after the withdrawal of U.S. forces.

Dhaka grew into a metropolitan area with a population of more than 15 million and the world's 3rd most densely populated city

Lieutenant General Ziaur Rahman took over the presidency in 1977 when Justice Sayem resigned. In 1979, President Zia reinstated multi-party politics and restored civilian rule. He promoted free markets and founded the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP). Zia reoriented Bangladesh's foreign policy, moving away from the Awami League's strong ties with India and Soviet Union, and pursued closer relations with the West. He opposed the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. Domestically, Zia faced as many as 21 coup attempts.
An insurgency began in the Chittagong Hill Tracts, due to demands by the region's indigenous people for autonomy. The Bangladesh Army was accused of persecuting the area's diverse ethnic minorities. Zia also advocated the idea of a South Asian regional community, inspired by the formation of ASEAN. A military crackdown on Rohingyas in neighboring Burma led to an exodus of several hundred thousand refugees into southeastern Bangladesh. Zia's rule ended when he was assassinated by elements of the military in 1981.^[116] He was succeeded by Abdus Sattar, who served in office for less than a year.
Bangladesh's next major ruler was Lieutenant General Hussain Muhammad Ershad. As President, Ershad pursued administrative reforms, including a devolution scheme which divided the country into 64 districts and 5 divisions. Ershad hosted the founding summit of SAARC in Dhaka in 1985, which brought together 7 South Asian countries, including India, Pakistan, Nepal, Sri Lanka, the Maldives, Bhutan and Bangladesh, into a landmark regional union. He also expanded the country's road network and started important projects like the Jamuna Bridge. In 1986, Ershad restored civilian rule and founded the Jatiya Party. Elections were held in 1986 and 1988. Ershad sent Bangladeshi troops to join the US-led coalition in the Persian Gulf War after a request from King Fahd. Ershad faced a revolt by opposition parties and the public in 1990, which coupled with pressure from Western donors for democratic reforms, forced him to resign on 6 December that year. He handed over power to Justice Shahabuddin Ahmed. Ershad was later indicted and convicted on corruption charges. In 1991, Bangladesh reverted to parliamentary democracy. Former first lady Khaleda Zia led the Bangladesh Nationalist Party to victory at the general election in 1991 and became the first female Prime Minister in Bangladeshi history. Zia's finance minister Saifur Rahman launched a series of economic reforms aimed at liberalizing the Bangladeshi economy, mirroring similar initiatives by Manmohan Singh in India in 1991. Prime Minister Zia was forced to implement the caretaker government provision in the constitution in 1996 by the opposition.
At the next election in 1996, the Awami League, headed by Sheikh Hasina, one of Mujib's surviving daughters, returned to power after 21 years. Hasina ended the Chittagong Hill Tracts insurgency after a peace accord with PCJSS rebels. She also secured a treaty with India on sharing the water of the Ganges. Hasina held a trilateral economic summit between India, Pakistan and Bangladesh in 1999 and helped establish the D8 grouping with Turkey. The economy took a downturn with a depletion of foreign exchange reserves. Hasina also refused to export Bangladesh's natural gas, despite major investment offers from international oil companies. The Awami League lost again to the Bangladesh Nationalist Party in the 2001 election. In her second term as Prime Minister, Khaleda Zia signed a Defence Cooperation Agreement with China.
The economy picked up steam from 2003, with a GDP growth rate of 6% in spite of the 2005 floods. Zia faced criticism for her alliance with the Jamaat-e-Islami, which was accused of war crimes in 1971, and accusations against her son Tarique Rahman of corruption. The Awami League waged a series of strikes against the government after an assassination attempt on former premier Sheikh Hasina. Widespread political unrest followed the end of the BNP's tenure in late October 2006. A caretaker government led by the pro-BNP President Iajuddin Ahmed worked to bring the parties to election within the required ninety days, but was accused by opposition parties of being biased. At the last minute, the Awami League announced an election boycott.
On 11 January 2007, the Bangladesh Armed Forces intervened to support both a state of emergency and a continuing but neutral caretaker government under a newly appointed Chief Advisor Fakhruddin Ahmed, the former governor of the Bangladesh Bank. Ahmed strengthened the Anti Corruption Commission and launched an anti-graft drive, detaining more than 160 people, including politicians, civil servants, businessmen and two sons of Khaleda Zia. The Awami League won a landslide majority in the 2008 general election. The BNP boycotted the general election in 2014 due to Sheikh Hasina's cancellation of the caretaker government system.
Bangladesh has significantly reduced poverty since it gained independence, with the poverty rate coming down from 57% in 1990 to 25.6% in 2014. Per-capita incomes have more than doubled from 1975 levels.^{[citation needed]} Bangladesh has also achieved successes in human development, including greater life expectancy than India. The country continues to face challenges of unstable politics, climate change, religious extremism and inequality.

Courtesy to Wikipedia.org