The once-luxurious palace of Bangladesh’s autocratic former leader Sheikh Hasina will become a museum to honor the revolution that ousted her from power, the leader of the caretaker government said Monday.
Nobel Peace Prize laureate Muhammad Yunus, visiting the damaged Ganabhavan palace, the prime minister’s former official residence, said, “The museum should preserve the memories of his misrule and the anger of the people when he removed him from power.”
The 84-year-old microfinance pioneer was appointed the country’s “chief advisor” following the student-led rebellion that forced Sheikh Hasina to flee India by helicopter on August 5.
Sheikh Hasina’s 15-year rule witnessed widespread human rights abuses, including mass detentions and extrajudicial killings of her political opponents, and this month a Bangladeshi court issued an arrest warrant for her arrest.
Before the fall of Sheikh Hasina, more than 700 people were killed, many of them in brutal police crackdown.
As she fled, thousands of people poured into her former residence, which the government called “a symbol of repression.”
In the chaos that followed Sheikh Hasina’s escape, the palace’s walls were looted and damaged, painted with graffiti condemning her fallen regime.
The museum will include a replica of the infamous “House of Mirrors” Ayanaghar detention center run by Sheikh Hasina’s regime – so named because its detainees were never supposed to see anyone other than themselves.
Muhammad Yunus said, “The shrine should remind visitors of the torture endured by secret prisoners.”
Sheikh Hasina’s overthrow resulted in at least two days of chaos, including the looting of a museum at the home of her father, Bangladesh’s first president Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.
Apurba Jahangir, a press officer at Muhammad Yunus’ office, said construction would begin by December.
“Construction of the museum has not started yet, but it will start soon,” Apoorva told AFP.
Sheikh Hasina has not been seen in public since fleeing Bangladesh.
The 77-year-old man’s last official location was a military air base near the Indian capital New Delhi.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
