Bangladesh Nationalist Party (Bengali: বাংলাদেশ জাতীয়তাবাদী দল, romanized: Bangladesh Jatiotabadi Dal,[23] abbreviated as BNP or Nationalist Party)[23] is a major political party in Bangladesh. Founded on 1 September 1978 by the late Bangladeshi president Ziaur Rahman, with a view of uniting people with a nationalist ideology, BNP later came out as one of the two most dominant parties in Bangladesh, along with its archrival Awami League. Initially being a big tentcentrist party, it moved towards more right-wing politics later.[24]
Known as the "Party of the Freedom Fighters of the Battlefield",[24] BNP was founded by Ziaur Rahman after the presidential election of 1978 and remained in its leadership until his assassination in 1981. Following Rahman's assassination, his widow, Khaleda Zia, took over leadership of the party and presided as chairperson until her imprisonment, in 2018. Since then, Tarique Rahman, the son of Rahman and Zia, has served as acting chairperson and has run the affairs of the party from London.[25]
Since its creation, the BNP has won the 1979 and 1981 presidential elections as well as the 1991,[26]1996,[27] and 2001[28] general elections, respectively. Ziaur Rahman, led governments formed under the semi-presidential system and the parliamentary republics were led by Khaleda Zia, who served as prime minister.[29] The party holds the record of being the largest opposition in the history of parliamentary elections of the country, with 116 seats in the seventh national election of June 1996.[30] It currently has 7 MPs in parliament following the 2018 general election.[31]
The BNP's student wing was a driving force in the 1990 uprising against the autocratic Ershad rule that culminated in the fall of the regime and the restoration of democracy in Bangladesh.[32]Begum Khaleda Zia, who served as the party's chairperson from 1983, was elected as the first woman Prime Minister of Bangladesh and the second female prime minister of a Muslim majority country after Pakistan's Benazir Bhutto.
^ ab"Why BNP's tirade against PM Hasina's India visit sounds hollow". The Daily Star: Bangladesh's Islamist opposition too seems to be on an overdrive to belittle Hasina whenever she is on a visit to India. But these high-pitch allegations ring hollow. 9 September 2022. Archived from the original on 9 September 2022. Retrieved 9 September 2022.
^Riaz, Ali (2003). ""God Willing": The Politics and Ideology of Islamism in Bangladesh". Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East. 23 (1–2): 301–320. doi:10.1215/1089201X-23-1-2-301.