Jamaat-e-Islami activists carrying the party’s election symbol at a rally in Dhaka in July 2025. The most debated development ahead of Bangladesh’s upcoming general election is the formation of an alliance between the Jamaat and the National Citizen Party (NCP), a youth-led political force born out of the July 2024 uprising.

30 Jan 2026

An alliance with the student-led National Citizen Party gives the Jamaat-e-Islami a chance to rebrand ahead of Bangladesh’s first election since the July Revolution

Culture

Fact and fable in Anup Mathew Thomas’s photographic Kerala

Shubhra Dixit

05 Feb 2026

In early and medieval India, identities were deeply local and fragmented along the lines of region, caste, tribe, language and kinship. Even widely shared cultural practices and texts suggest commonality only among elites, not the broader population.

Politics

Romila Thapar on the emergence of a common Indian identity

Romila Thapar

28 Jan 2026

Graphic of prisoners, military, and prominent political prisoners in Myanmar and a photo of Insein prison, for a story on political prisoners in Myanmar during the 2025-2026 general election won by USDP

Politics

Myanmar’s political prisoners belie the junta’s talk of democratic transition

Bo Kyi

26 Jan 2026

Politics

Himal Interviews: The plight of Bengali Muslims in Assam

The Editors

05 Feb 2026

Bangladesh After Hasina

Student activists at Dhaka University mark one month since the fall of Sheikh Hasina. ‘India’s Near East: A New History’ takes us inside an Indian worldview that came to see Hasina as the only acceptable ruler in Bangladesh – just as her overthrow has made a mockery of its underlying assumptions.

Why New Delhi backed Sheikh Hasina – and botched its Bangladesh policy

Cyrus Naji

24 Sep 2024

13 min read

Police stand in front of the torched offices of the newspaper Prothom Alo in Dhaka

The Muhammad Yunus government played with fire, now Bangladesh burns again

Cyrus Naji

24 Dec 2025

10 min read

Students take part in a protest in Dhaka in March against the rape of an eight-year-old girl, demanding severe punishment for the rapist.

Samina Luthfa on the battles of women in a new Bangladesh: State of Southasia #27

The Editors

07 Jul 2025

2 min read

A group of Hindu protesters wearing red, carrying torches and placards, protesting anti-Hindu violence in Bangladesh

India’s warped narrative of an “anti-Hindu” Bangladesh imperils its own future standing

Zia Hassan

20 Dec 2024

9 min read

Saffron Siege: a podcast with Harsh Mander

Harsh Mander hosts conversations on the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh’s corrosion of India over 100 years

Himal Southasian

The rebranding of Islamist politics in Bangladesh

Fact and fable in Anup Mathew Thomas’s photographic Kerala

Romila Thapar on the emergence of a common Indian identity

Myanmar’s political prisoners belie the junta’s talk of democratic transition

Himal Interviews: The plight of Bengali Muslims in Assam

Bangladesh After Hasina

Why New Delhi backed Sheikh Hasina – and botched its Bangladesh policy

The Muhammad Yunus government played with fire, now Bangladesh burns again

Samina Luthfa on the battles of women in a new Bangladesh: State of Southasia #27

India’s warped narrative of an “anti-Hindu” Bangladesh imperils its own future standing

Saffron Siege: a podcast with Harsh Mander

Podcasts

Podcast: Felix Pal, Christophe Jaffrelot, Tanika Sarkar & Harsh Mander on the RSS’s hidden network

Year in review: Ten great podcast episodes on Southasia of 2025

Ayesha Jalal on Pakistan’s 27th constitutional amendment: State of Southasia #37

Nirvana Bhandary on what it means to be a feminist in Nepal today: Southasia Review of Books podcast #38

Podcast: Ram Puniyani & Harsh Mander on the RSS’s entrenched influence on India’s polity

Podcast: Purushottam Agrawal & Harsh Mander on why the RSS hates Nehru, and more