Let’s begin with the obvious: Chhatra Dal has lost. That is reality. And reality must be accepted. What cannot be accepted, however, is the easy fiction that Islami Chhatra Shibir has won outright.

What triumphed was a united student alliance, not Shibir alone.

The distinction may seem semantic. It isn’t. In the frenzy of victory, and in the despair of defeat, both sides have blurred that line. But this confusion matters. False hype and political fanaticism have always been enemies of clarity, and they are doing damage here too.

To conflate a tactical win with a political mandate is to misread the terrain–and to repeat old mistakes.

Consider the context. Not long ago, beating suspected Shibir or their sympathizers to death was normalized on campuses. Even now, Shibir cannot operate under its own name without stigma.

If this were truly a political victory for Shibir, why must it hide behind the umbrella of an alliance? Why can’t it defend its ideology openly, without camouflage? Why does its name remain untouchable, its identity still shadowed by stigma?

The answer lies partly in the dominance of a Delhi-scripted Islamophobic narrative, reinforced by Calcuttan cultural hegemony. That narrative still shapes the mainstream.

And so, to call this election a straightforward victory for Shibir’s politics is to ignore the difference between a tactical foothold and genuine ideological acceptance.

The inability–or unwillingness–to make that distinction is breeding mistrust, suspicion, and paranoia. Students whisper about each other’s loyalties, trust erodes, and political potential shrinks.

I know this firsthand. I have often been introduced to BNP leaders as “a Shibir man,” not because I was one, but because it guaranteed they would at least listen. During the Awami League era, this label was hurled as an insult. Today, I find myself attacked by Shibir sympathizers for criticizing their politics.

Senior Jamaat leaders themselves admitted to me they could not control the vitriol: “Don’t mind it,” they said. “Carry on.”

This is the tragedy. Instead of asking why Shibir cannot stand in its own name, or why it needs to borrow the legitimacy of an alliance, too many are celebrating a tactical alliance as if it were a political breakthrough.

They are confusing strategy with substance, tactics with ideology. And in doing so, they are not breaking the politics of naming–they are entrenching it.

Political process and dogmatism

Victory is never just about the result. It is about the process by which it is won. And when the process disguises identity rather than confronting stigma, when a name must still be hidden, then the politics in question has not truly won.

It is only borrowing space–without changing the terms of the game.

There is no glory in advancing by bending yourself into the mold of “uneducated secularism,” while leaving intact the elitism and Brahmanic hierarchy of Dhaka University and pushing the Shibir identity into the shadows.

Real political glory would lie in making your anti-secular stance mainstream, in openly and directly challenging the Indian hegemonic narrative, and in forcing Islamism to claim space in Bangladesh’s political center. If that battle doesn’t begin after this election, when will it?

Chhatra Dal, for all its flaws, at least had the clarity to move under its own name. If the BNP cannot explain to young voters in 2025 why they should cast a ballot for them, then they will fail–plain and simple.

And what does that mean for Shibir’s politics? If your only capital is the BNP’s inefficiency, just as theirs was once the League’s incompetence, then you may win tactically but you will not have won politically.

Bangladesh is no longer a country that can be swayed by narrative alone. I said long ago that we were entering a post-narrative era. Yet the left continues to prove otherwise. They still mobilize thousands of votes on the promise of sacrifice for “progress.”

Their so-called beastly politics may be bedridden, but it still breathes. You may celebrate your victory, but I do not call it political.

Worse, your treatment of critics mirrors the Awami League’s. You slap labels on them, frame them, shame them, attack them with vulgarity until they bend to your line. You presume your side is righteous, theirs corrupted, and thus you justify silencing dissent.

That is not the practice of democracy. It is not tolerance. And a politics without tolerance cannot sustain a democratic system, even if the system were right-wing.

The irony is cruel. When secularists use the same tactics of suppression, it is hailed as “progressivism.” When you use them, it is branded “extremism.” That is the reality of Bengal’s political discourse.

And it is why you remain culturally trapped in a Delhi-centric mindset, unable to establish yourself as socially mainstream. You have no institutions. You have passion, yes, and arrogance–more than enough to doom you.

On Dhaka University’s campus, you are isolated. The “beast” world opposes you in unison. Resist as you may, they will emerge as heroes while you are marked as militants.

And if you fail to grasp this asymmetry, you will only end up strengthening Indian influence in Bangladesh under the guise of opposing it.

Entrenched and misguided battle

The Chhatra Dal fell not to you but to the Shahbagh-aligned faction of the BNP. You merely inherited some of their votes. And you will lose those, too–because, like Shahbagh’s camp, you cannot tolerate criticism.

You have no space for dissenting voices. Only those who echo you are welcome.

It’s worth remembering what has already been forgotten. Khaleda Zia once branded Shahbagh “a destroyer of religion” and called for platforms across the country to resist it. What emerged instead was a marketplace for extortion.

Yet the BNP endured. For all its weaknesses, it is anchored in a “Bangladesh-first” posture that no tactical maneuver has broken. The Awami League has outsmarted it many times, trapping it with tricks and procedural snares, but the BNP has not merged with the League.

It persists. And the people continue to wait and watch.

Meanwhile, India has poured millions into shaping the narrative, presenting Bangladesh’s student politics as a dangerous swing toward the far right. Even now, I am asked by Indian media to confirm that Shibir’s victory is evidence of extremism. I did not.

I said instead that general students won, that their preparation and organization carried the day, and that this victory was a rejection of the “Razakar” slur–not an embrace of militancy. I said India must rethink its assumptions. The smear campaign against Islam and Muslims must end.

But what do you do in response? You personalize politics. You insult, deflect, and posture. Sometimes, doing nothing is political. Misfire often enough and you only make yourself smaller.

And then there is the cult-making–the endless hype around individuals. This is toxic. Leaders are not born in the clouds; they must grow by engaging people directly. Elevate them too quickly and they burn out.

Sultan Mansur was a VP. Aman was a VP. Nur was a VP. Did Bangladesh advance because of them? Titles are not transformation.

Pointers for the post-narrative era

Your arrogance risks reviving the [Awami] League’s old narrative. You imagine yourself tacticians by multiplying enemies, but in truth you are reciting the BNP’s “funeral sermon” all over again. This is self-defeat instead of politics.

There is, in fact, a natural basis for BNP–Jamaat unity. Those who understand this also know who benefits from disunity. Those who don’t will continue to delude themselves with tactical victories.

And here lies the larger point: power cannot be taken–or held–alone. Bangladesh’s politics exists under the gaze of a global deep state. National interest must come before narrow partisanship.

The Awami League remains the mainstream current in this country. To dislodge it, you cannot rely on reactionary spasms. You must create a counter-culture, a politics that is both anti-secular and mainstream.

Without that, you will remain marginal, your victories tactical at best, your politics empty at worst.

If Islamism is to become mainstream in Bangladesh, it cannot be done through arrogance or shortcuts. It requires a disciplined front, anchored in moderation. Instead, you are counting chickens before they hatch.

You mistake the BNP’s organizational failures for evidence of public endorsement of your cause. That is delusion. You are still two decades behind in building the kind of mass-level political engagement required for real legitimacy.

Do you really believe you have defeated the Chhatra Dal?

There is only one path forward: the creation of a new political current strong enough to dislodge the Awami League’s dominance. The Awami League still defines the mainstream. Breaking from it demands patient work of constructing a counter-culture–one that allows anti-secular politics to stand openly within the mainstream, not on its margins.

Without that, your victories will remain tactical, not transformative.

I say this with no interest in pitting one faction against another. Among both the victors and the defeated I count close younger brothers. They are not rivals to me; they are our emotions, our brave sons.

Their emergence as leaders of Bangladesh–not of one party or another, but of the nation itself–is cause for hope.

May Allah protect Bangladesh.

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Rezaul Karim Rony is a writer and thinker. He is the editor of Joban magazine

(Translated from Bangla by Faisal Mahmud)