Why India’s Spy Chief Went To Dhaka

Research and Analysis Wing chief Parag Jain’s brief visit to Dhaka this week was officially low-key. But the timing was anything but.

Jain and a delegation of Indian intelligence officials arrived at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport on Sunday afternoon, August 9, from New Delhi on an Air India flight. After two days of meetings with senior Bangladeshi security officials, they returned to Delhi on Monday afternoon.

Jain’s delegation met Bangladesh’s Directorate General of Forces Intelligence (DGFI), Prime Minister Tarique Rahman’s Defence Affairs Adviser Brig Gen (retd) Dr AKM Shamsul Islam, Home Minister Salahuddin Ahmed and other security officials. The Indian team reportedly included Ashwin Mukund Kotnis, Rahul Negi, also referred to as Rahul Neri in some Bangladeshi reporting, and Shaibal Roy Chowdhury.

India and Bangladesh are trying to rebuild a relationship badly damaged by the fall of Sheikh Hasina in August 2024, and the security channel is one of the few areas where both sides have an immediate reason to cooperate.

During Hasina’s long tenure, New Delhi and Dhaka developed close security ties. Her government worked with India against insurgent groups, strengthened border cooperation and facilitated connectivity between mainland India and the Northeast. Her removal and flight to India changed that equation, followed by a prolonged period of mistrust during the interim government of Muhammad Yunus.

Tarique Rahman’s rise to power in 2026 has given India a new government to deal with, but not a return to the old relationship. New Delhi now has to establish working ties with a BNP government whose political history and approach towards India are very different from those of the Awami League.

The intelligence relationship, however, had already begun to thaw. In March, Major General Mohammad Kaiser Rashid Chowdhury, the new DGFI chief, travelled to New Delhi and met Jain and India’s Director General of Military Intelligence, Lt Gen R.S. Raman. The meetings were an early indication that Dhaka was prepared to restore high-level security contacts with India and discuss preventing either country’s territory from being used by hostile elements.

Jain’s visit is the reciprocal move. Bangladesh’s military intelligence chief went to Delhi in March; India’s external intelligence chief went to Dhaka five months later. That points to a deliberate effort to restore direct communication between the two security establishments while the political relationship remains difficult.

The most obvious issue is Sheikh Hasina.

Hasina remains in India, while Dhaka wants her returned to face legal proceedings linked to the 2024 uprising. For the Tarique Rahman government, her return is closely tied to its political legitimacy. For India, the question involves the extradition process, the charges against her and the implications of surrendering a former prime minister who was once one of New Delhi’s closest partners in the region.

The dispute intensified on August 5, when Hasina addressed a virtual gathering in New Delhi, described the uprising as a planned regime-change operation and indicated that she intended to return to Bangladesh in December. Dhaka had raised concerns with India before the event and subsequently condemned it as an affront to its sovereignty. India said the event had been organised by a private entity and that the government had neither organised nor endorsed her remarks.

There is no public evidence that Jain went to Dhaka specifically to discuss Hasina’s return. But the timing is significant because a possible return could become a security problem as well as a political one. Hasina’s arrival could trigger demonstrations and counter-demonstrations, with the possibility of violence. Dhaka would want to contain any unrest, while India would have an interest in preventing instability from reaching its border.

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The security agenda is broader. India remains concerned about militant networks, cross-border crime, trafficking and the possibility of hostile organisations operating from Bangladeshi territory. There are also concerns about residual facilitation networks and alleged infrastructure linked to Pakistan-backed Lashkar-e-Taiba and other terrorist groups.

At the political level, Rahman is signalling that he does not want relations with India to remain frozen. On Monday, as Jain’s delegation prepared to leave Dhaka, Rahman met India’s new High Commissioner Dinesh Trivedi and said a “conducive environment” was needed to advance bilateral relations. It was their first meeting.

Trivedi returned to Delhi immediately afterwards to brief Prime Minister Narendra Modi on his discussions with Rahman.

The two engagements illustrate the two tracks India now has to manage. The political track covers the contentious issues: Hasina’s extradition, trade, connectivity, water sharing and the mistrust that has accumulated since 2024. The security track has to deal with immediate threats along the border and the wider region.

That does not mean Bangladesh’s military or intelligence establishment has displaced the elected government, as some commentary has suggested. The evidence supports a more limited conclusion: the security establishment remains influential, and India sees value in maintaining direct contact with it during a political transition.

For New Delhi, there is a larger lesson.

The collapse of Hasina’s government showed the risks of building too much of a neighbourhood relationship around a single political partner. India benefited enormously from its security and connectivity partnership with Hasina, but her sudden departure left it having to rebuild its political presence in Dhaka almost from scratch.

That means dealing with Tarique Rahman’s government while maintaining working relationships with Bangladesh’s military, intelligence agencies and home-security establishment. India must do both without appearing to take sides in Bangladesh’s internal political contest.

That is what makes Jain’s short visit important. It was not a ceremonial trip and produced no dramatic breakthrough. But coming after Kaiser Rashid Chowdhury’s March visit to Delhi and days after the latest flare-up over Hasina, it shows that the two countries are quietly restoring a security relationship that neither can afford to let collapse.

The old India-Bangladesh equation built around Hasina is over.

New Delhi is now trying to build something more pragmatic: political engagement with the BNP government, backed by a functioning security relationship with the institutions that protect Bangladesh’s borders and internal security.