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Books tucked under their arms, children file into a small classroom in Bangladesh’s vast refugee camps, home to more than a million Rohingya who have fled neighbouring Myanmar.”They still dream of becoming pilots, doctors or engineers,” said their teacher Mohammad Amin, standing in front of a crowded schoolroom in Cox’s Bazar.”But we don’t know if they will ever reach their goals with the limited opportunities available.”Around half a million children live in the camps housing the waves of Rohingya who have escaped Myanmar in recent years, many during a brutal military crackdown in 2017.The campaign, which saw Rohingya villages burned and civilians killed, is the subject of a genocide case at the United Nations’ top court in The Hague, where hearings opened on Monday- ‘Severe shortage’ -In the aftermath of the 2017 exodus, international aid groups and UNICEF, the UN’s children’s agency, rushed to open schools.Determined to avoid permanently settling refugees it said it lacked the resources to absorb, the Bangladeshi government consistently opposed enrolling Rohingya children in national schools and barred them from studying in Bangla, the national language.By 2024, UNICEF and its partners were running more than 6,500 learning centres across the Cox’s Bazar camps, educating up to 300,000 children.But the system is severely overstretched — a situation worsened by cuts to US aid under President Donald Trump, which slashed funding and forced sweeping closures or scale-backs.”The current system provides three hours of instruction per day for children,” said Faria Selim of UNICEF. “The daily contact hours are not enough.”Khin Maung, a member of the United Council of Rohingya which represents refugees in the camps, said the education on offer leaves students ill-prepared to re-enter Myanmar’s school system should they return.”There is a severe shortage of teachers in the camps,” he said.Hashim Ullah, 30, is the only teacher at a primary school run by an aid agency.”I teach Burmese language, mathematics, science and life skills to 65 students in two shifts. I am not an expert in all subjects,” he told AFP.Such shortcomings are not lost on parents.For them, education represents their children’s only escape from the risks that stalk camp life — malnutrition, early marriage, child labour, trafficking, abduction or forced recruitment into one of the armed groups in Myanmar’s civil war.As a result, some families supplement the aid-run schools with extra classes organised by members of their own community.”At dawn and dusk, older children go to community-based high schools,” said father-of-seven Jamil Ahmad.”They have good teachers,” and the only requirement is a modest tuition fee, which Jamil said he covered by selling part of his monthly food rations.”Bangladesh is a small country with limited opportunities,” he said. “I’m glad that they have been hosting us.”- ‘Justice and peace’ -Fifteen-year-old Hamima Begum has followed the same path, attending both an aid-run school and a community high school.”I want to go to college,” she said. “I am aiming to study human rights, justice, and peace — and someday I will help my community in their repatriation.”But such schoolsare far too few to meet demand, especially for older children.A 2024 assessment by a consortium of aid agencies and UN bodies concluded that school attendance falls from about 70 percent among children aged five to 14, to less than 20 percent among those aged 15 to 18.Girls are particularly badly affected, according to the study.Even for those who stay enrolled, academic standards remain low.”We organised a mid-year exam this year, and 75 percent of high school students failed,” Khin Maung said.Jaitun Ara, 19, is therefore an exception.Having arrived in Cox’s Bazar at the age of 12, she has now secured a place at the Asian University for Women in Chittagong on a support programme to prepare for degree studies.But she doubts many others will be able to follow her path.”Families can barely manage food,” she said. “How would they spend money on their children’s education?”

Daryl Mitchell struck an unbeaten 131 to lead New Zealand to a series-levelling seven-wicket win over India in the second one-day international on Wednesday.Chasing 285 for victory, Mitchell’s eighth ODI ton and a 162-run stand with Will Young (87) for the third wicket helped New Zealand reach their target with 15 balls to spare in Rajkot.Mitchell’s knock trumped an unbeaten 112 by KL Rahul in India’s 284-7 and forced the three-match series into a decider on Sunday in Indore.Mitchell walked in to bat with New Zealand on 46-2 and along with Young helped the Black Caps take control.Young fell to Kuldeep Yadav in the 38th over but Mitchell stood firm to bring up his hundred.He hit 11 fours and two sixes in his 117-ball innings and with Glenn Phillips, who made 32 not out, put together an unbeaten stand of 78.Indian bowlers enjoyed early success when Harshit Rana bowled Devon Conway, who made 16, and fellow quick Prasidh Krishna had Henry Nicholls inside-edge a delivery onto his stumps for 10.But Mitchell, who was dropped on 80, and Young struck regular boundaries as New Zealand completed their highest-ever ODI chase in India.Earlier, India skipper Shubman Gill made 56 before a brief collapse and a 73-run fifth-wicket partnership between Rahul and Ravindra Jadeja.Rahul raised his eighth ODI ton in 87 balls with a six off Kyle Jamieson.India started strongly courtesy of Gill and Rohit Sharma, who scored 24, as the opening pair put on 70 runs.Rohit failed to capitalise on his start and fell to Kristian Clarke, before pace spearhead Jamieson sent back Gill.Clarke kept up the charge with his medium-pace bowling to dismiss Shreyas Iyer for eight and the in-form Virat Kohli for 23.The 37-year-old Kohli, who returned to the top of the ODI batting rankings on Wednesday, walked back to stunned silence after he played on as India slipped from 99-1 to 118-4.Rahul then took centre stage to rebuild the innings along with Jadeja, who made 27.The series will be followed by five T20s, ahead of the T20 World Cup in India and Sri Lanka between February 7 and March 8.

Indian writer Amitav Ghosh has long chronicled the entangled histories of empire, trade and migration.But his recent work focuses on what he considers the most urgent concern: the accelerating unravelling of the natural world and the moral legacy left for the future.Author of “The Great Derangement”, “The Glass Palace” and the forthcoming “Ghost-Eye”, Ghosh speaks bluntly about our headlong rush towards disaster while treating the Earth as an inert resource rather than a living world.”Sadly, instead of shifting course, what we’re actually doing is accelerating towards the abyss,” he told AFP from a bookshop in New Delhi. “It’s like people have lost their minds.””We’re hurtling down that path of extractivism,” he said. “Greenwashing rhetoric has been completely adopted by politicians. And they’ve become very skilled at it.”His latest novel, a mystery about reincarnation, also touches on ecological crisis, with the “ghost-eye” of its title symbolising the ability to perceive both visible and invisible alternatives.- ‘Little joys’ -Despite his subject matter, Ghosh manages to resist writing from a place of unrelenting grief.”You can’t just write in the tone of tragic despair,” he said, calling himself “by nature, sort of a buoyant person”.”One has to try and find the little joys that the world offers,” the 69-year-old said. For Ghosh, one of those joys arrives each week, when his nine-month-old grandson comes to visit.The baby is central to Ghosh’s motivation to pen another manuscript, one that will remain sealed for nearly a century as part of the Future Library project.”I think what I’m going to end up doing is writing a letter to my grandson”, he said. “In an earlier generation, young people would ask their parents, ‘What were you doing during the war?'” he said. “I think my grandson’s generation will be asking, ‘What were you doing when the world was going up in flames?’ He’ll know that I was thinking about these things.”Ghosh will submit his manuscript this year as part of Norway’s literary time capsule, joining works by Margaret Atwood, Han Kang, Elif Shafak and others to be sealed until 2114.- Mysterious world -“It’s an astonishingly difficult challenge,” he said, knowing his book will be read when the world “will be nothing like” today.”I can’t really believe that all the structures we depend on will survive into the 22nd century,” he said.”We can see how quickly everything is unravelling around us,” he added.That change is fuelling the world’s “increasingly dysfunctional politics”, he said.The younger generations “see their horizons crashing around them,” he said. “And that’s what creates this extreme anxiety which leads, on the one hand, to these right-wing movements, where they’re filled with nostalgia for the past, and on the other hand, equally, it also fuels a certain left-wing despair.”Born in Kolkata in 1956, Ghosh rose to prominence with novels such as “The Shadow Lines” and “The Calcutta Chromosome”, and later the acclaimed Ibis Trilogy. He holds India’s highest literary honour, the Jnanpith Award, won numerous international prizes, including France’s Prix Medicis Etranger, and is regularly tipped as a possible Nobel winner.But he is wary of overstating literature’s capacity to change history.”As a writer, it would be really vainglorious to imagine that we can change things in the world,” he said, while accepting that young activists tell him they are “energised” by his books.Ghosh keeps writing, not out of faith that words can halt catastrophe, but because they can inspire different kinds of thought.His involvement with the Future Library embodies that impulse: a grandfather’s attempt to speak honestly from a burning world.”We have to restore alternative ways of thinking about the world around us, of recognising that it’s a world that’s filled with mystery,” he said. “The world is much, much stranger than we imagine.”

Indian wildlife officers are hunting a rampaging wild elephant blamed for killing at least 20 people and injuring 15 others in the forests of Jharkhand, villagers and officials said Tuesday.The elephant, a lone bull, is reported to have gone on the rampage for nine days beginning in early January, creating panic in the rural West Singhbhum district.”We are trying to trace and rescue this violent wild elephant that killed so many people,” government forest officer Aditya Narayan told AFP, confirming the toll of 20 dead.Children and the elderly are among the dead, as well as a professional elephant handler, known as a mahout.But after wreaking a trail of destruction, it had not been spotted since Friday, despite multiple patrols in the area.Officials said search teams, aided by drones, are combing dense forest tracts, including a national reserve in neighbouring Odisha state.Fear has driven residents of more than 20 villages to abandon their farms or barricade themselves indoors at night, elected village head Pratap Chachar told AFP.”A police team, or forest official vehicle, visits in the night to provide essential help to villagers,” Chachar said.Hundreds of thousands of Indians are affected each year by crop-raiding elephants.Asian elephants are now restricted to just 15 percent of their original habitat.The usually shy animals are coming into increasing contact with humans because of rapidly expanding settlements and growing forest disturbance, including mining operations.As elephant habitats shrink, conflict between humans and wild elephants has grown — 629 people were killed by elephants across India in 2023-2024, according to parliamentary figures.The elephants that pose the most danger to humans are often rogue bulls, solitary male animals enraged during “musth”, a period of heightened sexual activity when testosterone levels soar.A former forest official said the elephant was likely in musth, and may now have calmed down and rejoined its herd.India is home to the majority of the world’s remaining wild Asian elephants, a species listed as endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and increasingly threatened by shrinking habitat.The Wildlife Institute of India last year issued a new estimate, that put the country’s wild elephant population at 22,446, a report that also warned of the deepening pressures on one of India’s most iconic animals.

India and Germany are looking to boost defence industry cooperation, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said Monday after hosting Chancellor Friedrich Merz in his home state of Gujarat.Merz said Berlin also wants a closer security partnership with New Delhi, including deeper “cooperation between our defence industries” to cut India’s traditional dependence on Russia for military hardware.Merz began his two-day India visit — his first to Asia since taking office in May — two weeks ahead of an EU-India summit and as India and the European bloc are working on a free trade agreement.Both countries announced several agreements and joint declarations after the leaders’ meeting with an aim to boost their $50 billion trade.The announcements included strengthening defence industry cooperation and on semiconductors and critical minerals.The two countries “are working together on secure, trusted, and resilient supply chains and our MoUs on these issues will strengthen our partnership”, Modi said. The meeting between the Indian and German leaders comes at a time when both are facing economic and security challenges from the world’s two biggest economies, China and the United States.Merz said Berlin was “committed to an international order in which we can live freely and securely, because the world is currently undergoing a process of realignment”.”It is increasingly characterised by great power politics and thinking in terms of spheres of influence, which is why we must join forces to weather these rough winds,” he added.”That is why we also want to move closer together in terms of security policy, such as conducting joint exercises between our air forces and navies for security in the Indo-Pacific.”Recent actions and statements by US President Donald Trump including arbitrary trade tariffs have played a key role in upending global alliances and regional geopolitics, with New Delhi still negotiating a trade deal with Washington.- ‘Strategic importance’ -“It is of particular strategic importance that we deepen cooperation between our defence industries. This strengthens both sides and also helps to make India less dependent on Russia, for example,” said Merz.New Delhi, which has relied on Moscow for decades for its key military hardware, has tried to cut its dependence on Russia in recent years by diversifying imports and pushing its own domestic manufacturing base.India today counts France, Israel and the United States as its key military suppliers besides Russia.Berlin and New Delhi have also been negotiating a potential deal for Germany’s Thyssenkrupp Marine Systems to build six submarines for the Indian Navy in partnership with Indian state-run Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders.While still being negotiated, that deal would allow India to replace its ageing fleet of Russian-built submarines and likely include technology transfer provisions to help its domestic defence industry.In defence, the two sides are also exploring other areas of convergence as New Delhi pumps billions of dollars to upgrade its naval fleet and air force in the next few years.There are around 300,000 Indians and people of Indian origin in Germany, including about 60,000 students — many of them in critical science, engineering and other key technology research fields. Many Indian workers have filled a recent shortfall of qualified professionals in Germany’s IT, banking and finance sectors.Modi said that “India is honoured that he (Merz) has chosen our nation as the place of his first visit in Asia”. He said the leaders had agreed on “deeper cooperation in defence, space and other critical and emerging technologies”. Merz will wrap up his visit with a trip to the southern technology hub of Bengaluru on Tuesday.

India and Germany are looking to boost defence industry cooperation, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said Monday after hosting Chancellor Friedrich Merz in his home state of Gujarat.Merz said Berlin also wants a closer security partnership with New Delhi, including deeper “cooperation between our defence industries” to cut India’s traditional dependence on Russia for military hardware.Merz began his two-day India visit — his first to Asia since taking office in May — two weeks ahead of an EU-India summit and as India and the European bloc are working on a free trade agreement.Both countries announced several agreements and joint declarations after the leaders’ meeting with an aim to boost their $50 billion trade.The announcements included strengthening defence industry cooperation and on semiconductors and critical minerals.The two countries “are working together on secure, trusted, and resilient supply chains and our MoUs on these issues will strengthen our partnership”, Modi said. “Closer cooperation in security and defence shows mutual trust and shared views,” Modi added.”We will work on a roadmap to increase defence industrial cooperation, which will open new opportunities for co-development and co-production.”The meeting between the Indian and German leaders comes at a time when both are facing economic and security challenges from the world’s two biggest economies, China and the United States.Merz said Berlin was “committed to an international order in which we can live freely and securely, because the world is currently undergoing a process of realignment”.”It is increasingly characterised by great power politics and thinking in terms of spheres of influence, which is why we must join forces to weather these rough winds,” he added.”That is why we also want to move closer together in terms of security policy, such as conducting joint exercises between our air forces and navies for security in the Indo-Pacific.”Recent actions and statements by US President Donald Trump including arbitrary trade tariffs have played a key role in upending global alliances and regional geopolitics, with New Delhi still negotiating a trade deal with Washington.- ‘Strategic importance’ -“It is of particular strategic importance that we deepen cooperation between our defence industries. This strengthens both sides and also helps to make India less dependent on Russia, for example,” said Merz.New Delhi, which has relied on Moscow for decades for its key military hardware, has tried to cut its dependence on Russia in recent years by diversifying imports and pushing its own domestic manufacturing base.India today counts France, Israel and the United States as its key military suppliers besides Russia.Berlin and New Delhi have also been negotiating a potential deal for Germany’s Thyssenkrupp Marine Systems to build six submarines for the Indian Navy in partnership with Indian state-run Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders.While still being negotiated, that deal would allow India to replace its ageing fleet of Russian-built submarines and likely include technology transfer provisions to help its domestic defence industry.In defence, the two sides are also exploring other areas of convergence as New Delhi pumps billions of dollars to upgrade its naval fleet and air force in the next few years.Merz will wrap up his visit with a trip to the southern technology hub of Bengaluru on Tuesday.

Tens of thousands of young Nepalis have applied for temporary jobs policing upcoming elections, the first polls since a youth-led uprising spotlighted the Himalayan nation’s economic woes.Nepal estimated it suffered losses of about $586 million and that nearly 15,000 people lost their jobs after protests toppled the government in September.The youth-led demonstrations, initially triggered by anger over a brief government ban on social media, were fuelled by deeper frustration over corruption and economic hardship.After a police crackdown killed young protesters, the riots spread and parliament was set ablaze, prompting the government’s collapse. At least 77 people were killed.More than 27,000 people applied for the temporary police jobs on Friday and Saturday, the first two days of applications, Nepal police spokesman Abinarayan Kafle said.Sarika Karki, 20, said she was crossing her fingers to “earn some pocket money”. “I am also Gen-Z, but I do not have a job,” she told AFP in the capital Kathmandu on Sunday. “I hope the election will go well, and I am able to help in my own way as a temporary police officer”.Nepal plans to fill 149,090 police posts ahead of the March polls, with each recruit paid roughly $280 for 40 days of service — a princely sum where per capita gross national income in 2025 was $1,404, according to a UN monitoring report. More than 839,000 Nepalis left the country of 30 million to work abroad last year, according to government data.And 82 percent of the country’s workforce is in informal employment, the World Bank says.The temporary officers will be tasked with managing queues at polling stations, carrying ballot boxes and other logistical duties.”Sunday was a public holiday but so many people, most (of them) youths, were queueing outside police stations with great excitement,” police spokesman Kafle told AFP.There were queues across all 77 districts to fill the application form on Monday, he said.Many of the young applicants would be participating in their first election as a temporary police officers.  “I used to work in a hotel as a cook, but I am jobless now,” Nischal Poudel, 30, told AFP from an application queue in Kathmandu.”Only God knows if I will be selected, but now that I’ve applied and I am sure something good will happen”. 

Myanmar’s main pro-military party on Monday claimed victory in the parliamentary seat of sidelined democratic leader Aung San Suu Kyi in elections being derided as a ploy to prolong junta rule.The armed forces have ruled Myanmar for most of the nation’s post-independence history before a decade-long democratic thaw saw civilians assume control. But the military snatched back power with a 2021 coup, deposing and detaining Suu Kyi after claiming she won a landslide election win over pro-military party by means of massive voter fraud.The junta says the current month-long vote — which has its final phase scheduled for January 25 — will return power to the people.With Suu Kyi still held in seclusion and her hugely popular party dissolved, democracy advocates say the vote has been rigged by a crackdown on dissent and a ballot stacked with military allies.An official from the Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP), speaking anonymously because they were unauthorised to share results, said they “won in Kawhmu” — Suu Kyi’s former seat in Yangon region.”We won 15 lower house seats out of 16 places in Yangon region,” they added, after Kawhmu and dozens of other constituencies voted in the election’s second stage on Sunday.The official did not say by what margin the party claimed its win and official results of the second round have yet to be posted by the junta-stacked election commission.But the USDP — described by many analysts as the military’s prime proxy — won nearly 90 percent of lower house seats in the first phase, official results say.”It should surprise no one that the military-backed party has claimed a landslide victory,” UN rights expert Tom Andrews said in a statement last week.”The junta engineered the polls to ensure victory for its proxy, entrench military domination, and manufacture a facade of legitimacy while violence and repression continue unabated.”Regardless of the vote, a quarter of parliamentary seats will be reserved for the armed forces under a constitution drafted during a previous period of military rule.The coup plunged Myanmar into civil war and voting is not taking place in huge territories controlled by rebel factions running parallel administrations in defiance of military rule.There is no official toll for Myanmar’s civil war but monitoring group ACLED, which tallies media reports of violence, estimates that 90,000 people have been killed on all sides.The day of the election’s first phase, December 28, saw 52 incidents — more than any other day for eight months — with a total of 68 people killed, according to its figures.Meanwhile more than 330 people are being pursued under new junta-enacted laws, including clauses that punish protest or criticism of the poll with up to 10 years in prison.There are more than 22,000 political prisoners languishing alongside Suu Kyi in junta detention, according to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners advocacy group.

Bangladesh has been in political turmoil since a student-led revolt overthrew former prime minister Sheikh Hasina in August 2024, ending her 15-year autocratic rule.The Muslim-majority nation of 170 million people will hold its first elections since the uprising on February 12.Here are the key players in a vote that European Union election observers say will be the “biggest democratic process of 2026, anywhere”.- Interim government -Nobel Peace Prize winner Muhammad Yunus, 85, returned from exile in August 2024 at the behest of protesters to lead a caretaker government as “chief advisor”. He will step down after the polls.Yunus said he inherited a “completely broken” political system, and championed a reform charter he argues is vital to prevent a return to authoritarian rule.A referendum on the proposed changes will be held on the same day. He says the reforms will strengthen checks and balances between the executive, judicial and legislative branches. – Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) -The BNP, led by Tarique Rahman, 60, is widely tipped to win the election, after he returned from 17 years of self-imposed exile in December 2025.His mother, the BNP’s veteran leader and former prime minister Khaleda Zia, died aged 80, days after his return.A BNP-led alliance includes both leftist and centrist parties, as well as small Islamist groups.- Islamist-led alliance -Jamaat-e-Islami, the country’s largest and best-organised Islamist party, ideologically aligned with the Muslim Brotherhood, is seeking a return to formal politics after years of bans and crackdowns under Hasina’s 15-year rule.Jamaat is leading an alliance of more than 10 smaller parties, including the National Citizen Party (NCP), formed by student leaders who spearheaded the uprising.It also includes the small Liberal Democratic Party, as well as fringe Islamist parties, most of which held only a handful of seats in previous parliaments.Bangladesh — one of the world’s mostpopulous Muslim-majority countries after Indonesia and Pakistan– is home to diverse strands of Islamic practice, including a significant Sufi community often condemned by hardline Islamists.Bangladesh also has a small Shia community. Around 10 percent of Bangladeshis are not Muslim — the majority of those are Hindu and the country is also home to a small number of Christians. – Awami League – Hasina, 78, a fugitive in India, was sentenced to death in absentia for crimes against humanity in November.Her former ruling Awami League, once the country’s most popular party, has been outlawed.Loyalists may run as independent candidates, but it is unclear who the party’s once sizable membership will back.Human Rights Watch condemned the ban as “draconian”, while Hasina has warned that holding elections without her party would be “sowing the seeds” of further division.- Army – In a country with a long history of military coups, the army remains a pivotal force.It played a decisive factor in Hasina’s downfall, choosing not to intervene against the protests.The military continues to patrol the streets, maintaining a visible presence alongside the police.- International players -Regional powers have taken a keen interest.Bangladesh’s relations with India — once Hasina’s strongest ally — have cooled.Yunus’ first state visit was to China, signalling a strategic shift, while Dhaka has also deepened engagement with Pakistan, India’s arch-rival.

After years of repression, Bangladesh’s Islamist groups are mobilising ahead of February 12 elections, determined to gain a foothold in government as they sense their biggest opportunity in decades. The South Asian nation — home to 170 million people, the vast majority Sunni Muslims — is preparing for its first polls since the mass uprising that toppled the autocratic government of Sheikh Hasina in 2024.At the centre of this formidable push is the Jamaat-e-Islami, the country’s largest and best-organised Islamist party.Ideologically aligned with the Muslim Brotherhood, they are seeking a return to formal politics after years of bans and crackdowns.They have papered over divisions with several other Islamist groups for the election and put forward only male candidates.The Jamaat has also allied with the National Citizen Party (NCP), formed by student leaders who spearheaded the 2024 uprising — prompting some aspiring female candidates to quit.- Troubled past  -Hasina, who was blamed for extensive human rights abuses, took a tough stand against Islamist movements during her 15-year rule.Under her tenure, several top Islamist leaders were sentenced to death — and several hanged — for war crimes.They were accused of having supported Pakistan during Bangladesh’s 1971 independence war, a role that still sparks anger against Islamists from many in Bangladesh today.Hasina, a onetime ally of the United States and close to the Hindu-nationalist government of neighbouring India, also launched crackdowns against Islamist militants, killing scores and arresting hundreds.Since 2013, extremist groups inspired by Al-Qaeda or the so-called Islamic State carried out a string of attacks, including targeting writers and publishers. A 2016 attack on a Dhaka cafe killed 22 people, including 17 foreigners.Mufti Abdul Hannan, the Afghanistan-trained leader of the Bangladesh chapter of the Harkat-ul-Jihad group, was executed with two associates in 2017 for an attempt to kill Britain’s High Commissioner to Bangladesh.- Resurgence -Since Hasina fled to India, key Islamist leaders have been released from prison, and Islamist groups have grown increasingly assertive.They have demanded restrictions on cultural activities they consider “anti-Islamic”, including music and theatre festivals, women’s football matches and kite-flying celebrations.More violent elements have smashed Sufi shrines, and even exhumed a Sufi leader’s body and set it on fire.Many are inspired by the Deobandi teachings, a conservative Sunni movement rooted in 19th-century India, and the ideological source of Afghanistan’s Taliban.Hefazat-e-Islam, an influential coalition of thousands of Islamic schools and Muslim organisations, acts as a powerful grassroots pressure group in Bangladesh.Hefazat leaders travelled to Afghanistan last year, and Afghan Taliban officials visited Bangladesh in December.Other strands of Bangaldesh’s Islamist movements follow the rigid Wahabi and Salafi schools of Islam, powerful in the Arabian Peninsula, and which reject centuries-old Bengali cultural rituals.- Sufi opposition -Home to the world’s fourth-largest Muslim population, Bangladesh includes a wide range of beliefs.Bangladesh has a significant number of Sufi followers — more than a quarter of Muslims, according to one estimate by the US Pew Research Center.The country’s two traditional power brokers — the Bangladesh National Party (BNP) and the now-banned Awami League of Hasina — previously launched their election campaigns from a centuries-old Sufi shrine in the northern city of Sylhet.Sufi popularity poses a challenge to the Islamists, who condemn their mystical interpretation of the Koran as heretical. Bangladesh also has communities of the long-persecuted Ahmadiyya, as well as Shia Muslims.Around 10 percent of Bangladeshis are not Muslim — the majority of those are Hindu and the country is also home to a small number of Christians. Jamaat-e-Islami has named a Hindu candidate — but analysts are sceptical.”These efforts are to deceive the public. The reform is not coming from within,” political analyst Altaf Parvez told AFP.