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was depleting foreign exchange reserves. At one point, the central bank’s dollar pile reduced to half of what it was two years ago before edging closer to a relatively comfortable level.

The year saw heightened political tensions, with concerns over fair elections, mass arrests of leaders and activists of the opposition camp, and shrinking democratic space dominating the public discourse.

For the BNP, which was struggling to even gather enough resolve to be on the streets in the first half of 2022, the bygone year was a comeback of sorts. The year also saw a revival of hartal and blockade enforced by the BNP and its like-minded parties.

The party that started the movement in the later part of 2022 over the price hike of fuel and daily essentials, and power outage carried it forward throughout the most part of 2023, holding rallies and demonstrations across the country despite arrests of its leaders and activists. As the movement was gaining momentum, the BNP wanted to hold a grand rally to stage a massive demonstration on October 28. But the event ended in clashes between the BNP activists and police accompanied by the ruling party men.

Since then, many of their party colleagues have been arrested, jailed, or went into hiding as law enforcers launched a crackdown. BNP and its like-minded parties enforced hartal and blockades to press home their one-point demand of election under a nonpartisan interim government.

As a result, the country entered a spiral of violence which further intensified after the Election Commission on November 15 announced the national polls would be held on January 7, 2024. Although the spectre of hartals and blockades failed to cripple normal life, the unrest put the economy under pressure with the transport sector facing a serious setback.

For the ruling Awami League, the year has been challenging as it had to face opposition movement and the pressure from the international community for holding a free and fair election. The party successfully cornered the opposition after the October 28 rally was foiled and took the country towards the election dismissing the call for dialogue among major parties. The AL started the election campaign to form the next government.

As the BNP boycotted the election, the main challenge of the AL is to make the election competitive. That’s why the ruling party allowed its leaders to participate as independents. Violence has already marred the campaign as the incidents of attacks and clashes between the supporters of AL nominees and the so-called AL independents are reported in various parts of the country almost every day.

“2023 was the year of hope and despair at once. The hope was that this would be the year when the democratic backsliding would be reversed, as people of the country began to break the culture of fear and stand up for their rights,” said Ali Riaz, a distinguished professor of political science at Illinois State University.

But it is ending with despair because the ruling regime has “chosen not to heed the people’s aspirations. It rather doubled down the path of authoritarianism, the path of coercion”, he told this newspaper.

Bangladesh is standing “at the edge of a precipice. The coming days and weeks may not only decide the trajectory of politics, but also the nature of the republic.”

As we start 2024, it is likely that Bangladesh will experience a period of economic turbulence. How the country deals with the challenges of balancing economic growth with social development and ensures political stability will determine its future.