Muhammad Yunus, a senior adviser to Bangladesh’s interim government, has sparked fresh controversy with a gift he gave a senior member of the Pakistani military when the duo met in Dhaka.
Yunus handed Pakistan’s Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Sahir Shamshad Mirza, a distorted map of Bangladesh showing India’s northeastern states as part of the country.
The photo was featured on the cover of a book titled Art of Triumph: Bangladesh’s New Dawn.
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The book celebrates the student movement that swept across the country in 2024 and led to the ouster of then Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.
What did the two leaders discuss?
According to a social media post, Yunus’ office “discussed a wide range of issues related to Bangladesh-Pakistan relations, including the growing importance of bilateral trade, investment and defense cooperation.”
“General Mirza highlighted the shared historical, cultural and people-to-people ties between the two countries and expressed Pakistan’s desire to strengthen cooperation in multiple sectors. He highlighted the huge potential for expanding trade, connectivity and investment between Bangladesh and Pakistan,” he added.
The distorted map on the book’s cover has sparked controversy because it aligns with the idea of a so-called “Greater Bangladesh” as promoted by Sultanat-e-Bangla, an Islamist group based in Dhaka.
One user X said: “Mosquitoes are very annoying with biting or noise, but they can’t hurt.”
Another said, “Bangladesh’s chief adviser is living the dream of North East India becoming a part of Bangladesh.”
Sultanat-e-Bangla has a version of the map that shows West Bengal and the northeastern states along with parts of Odisha, Bihar and Jharkhand as part of Bangladesh.
This map was first displayed to the public during the Bengali New Year Exhibition held at the University of Dhaka earlier this year. In August 2025, MP and senior Congress leader Randeep Singh Surjewala raised the issue in the Rajya Sabha.
In a written statement in response to Surjewala, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar then said that Saltanat-e-Bangla is supported by a Turkey-based NGO called the Turkish Youth Federation. The statement also said that organizers of the Dhaka University event denied any association with a foreign political body.
Yunus himself had previously commented on India’s northeastern region during a visit to China, where he said, “The seven states of India, the eastern part of India…they are a landlocked country. They have no way to reach the ocean.”
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Jaishankar, following Yunus’s remark, said that India’s northeast functioned as a “hub” for the BIMSTEC (Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation) countries, which include India along with Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Myanmar.
Strained Indo-Bangladesh relations
Relations between India and Bangladesh have been strained since Sheikh Hasina fled the country following an agitation in August 2024 and took refuge in India. In addition, Yunus is seeking to strengthen Dhaka’s ties with Islamabad and Beijing, a move that has angered New Delhi.
