The harassment of women is nothing alien in Bangladesh, but when it comes to politics, the hostility is sharpened and deliberate. Women candidates, and anyone who dares to support them, are unfairly attacked, judged, and harassed. The recent student council elections in our biggest universities made this painfully clear. The misogyny, the character assassination, the filth in the comment sections of social media platforms, it is all meant to remind women of one thing: Politics is not your field.
I am no fan of BNP politician Rumin Farhana. But it stuck in my head when I scrolled through a news post about her; the comments were filled with bigotry, obscenity, and misogyny. This is the norm, but when the subject is a woman in politics, the ugliness multiplies. She is not attacked for her politics, but for her personal choices, for being unmarried, for simply existing as a woman in public life. The cruelty is staggering.
This cruelty is not just reserved for national figures. At Dhaka University, female candidates contesting the Ducsu elections have faced waves of online abuse. Obscene comments under campaign posts, sexually explicit inbox messages, doctored videos, even rape threats -- this is the reality of student politics for women.
One incident was so severe it reached the High Court: After a left alliance candidate filed a petition, a student posted a call for her “gang rape” on Facebook. The offender was suspended, but almost every woman candidate reported cyberbullying. As one described, social media had become a “weapon to bring down opponents.” Misogyny here is not about ideology. It is about punishing women for daring to get involved in politics at all.
At Rucsu, where elections are being held after 35 years, women’s participation tells another story. Out of 258 central candidates, only 30 are women, just 11.6%. For senate positions, only eight women are running out of 60 candidates. This is despite women’s visible, frontline role in the July uprising that shook the country.
Some former coordinators of major student protests, women who led crowds in the streets only months ago, decided not to contest at all. Why? Relentless cyberbullying, lack of safety, and a university administration that looks the other way.
One VP candidate, Tasin Khan, put it bluntly: “Security for women candidates is a major issue. Women voters also feel unsafe.” Another candidate said: “In July, women fought harder than men, and our brothers supported us. But once July ended, their encouragement also came to an end. Now men say, “Wild animals belong in the forest, women belong at home.”” These words cut deep. They show how quickly solidarity collapses, how easily women are pushed back into silence.
The same culture repeats itself nationally. Policy tables remain male-only, and when women demand change, the excuses given are laughable: There aren’t “enough qualified women.”
Qualified? Women make up 51% percent of the country and are at every level of education, labour, and activism. The exclusion is not about qualification; it is about power.
Just last week, the Women’s Political Forum, a coalition of 12 organizations, called out this deliberate exclusion. They demanded reserved seats in parliament be raised from 50 to 100, and crucially, that these seats be filled through direct elections. They demanded that women be nominated for at least 33% of general seats. They reminded us that women from Teknaf to Tetulia want not only the right to vote but also the right to lead.
Women activists and countless student leaders have made it clear: Women will not wait politely. If the parties refuse to take their voices seriously, women will chart their own course at the ballot box
And yet, the July National Charter ignored them. Political parties decided to keep the same old system: 50 nominated seats and a token 5% of general seats for women. They even promised to “gradually” increase this number, like women should be grateful for crumbs. The insult was doubled when parties justified this by claiming there weren’t enough women candidates. As if half the population is invisible.
This is not symbolic. It is structural. From policy-making issues to student elections, the message is consistent: Women are not welcome in politics. And if they try, they will be punished, through obscene comments, through character assassination, through exclusion from the ballot.
And yet, women persist. Women activists and countless student leaders have made it clear: Women will not wait politely. If the parties refuse to take their voices seriously, women will chart their own course at the ballot box.
The truth is, politics in Bangladesh is a “beta manush” club, men in power chairs congratulating themselves while women are mocked, shamed, and shut out. But democracy without women is not democracy.
If women are silenced in policymaking, attacked in student politics, and humiliated in the media, then what we have is not representation. It is exclusion dressed up as politics.
Tanveer Anoy is an activist, author, and currently a PhD student in Feminist Studies at the University of Minnesota. They can be reached at [email protected].
