Metro53 - Dhaka (Web Desk): Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) leader and the country’s first female Prime Minister, Khaleda Zia, assumed office in 1991. She was the wife of former Bangladeshi President Ziaur Rahman.
Khaleda Zia was born on August 15, 1946, in Dinajpur. In 1960, she married army officer Ziaur Rahman when she was around 15 years old. After the 1971 War of Independence, Ziaur Rahman emerged as a national hero. He became President in 1977 and founded the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) in 1978.
Following the assassination of Ziaur Rahman during a failed military coup in 1981, Khaleda Zia entered practical politics. Over time, she took over the leadership of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party.
The 1991 general elections are considered the first truly free elections in Bangladesh’s history. In a surprising outcome, Khaleda Zia defeated Sheikh Hasina, with the support of the country’s largest Islamist party, Jamaat-e-Islami, and became Prime Minister.
She lost the 1996 elections, but made a strong comeback in 2001, returning to power with a clear majority. In October 2006, she stepped down ahead of general elections. During her political career, she faced several corruption allegations, and in 2018, she was sentenced to five years in prison.
In 2018, Khaleda Zia, her son Tarique Rahman, and others were convicted over alleged corruption involving approximately $250,000 in foreign donations received for an orphanage.
Khaleda Zia rejected the charges, calling them political victimization. Due to her deteriorating health, she was released from prison on humanitarian grounds and placed under house arrest in March 2020.
In 2025, the Supreme Court of Bangladesh acquitted Khaleda Zia and Tarique Rahman in the corruption case that had led to their 2018 convictions.
She had a long-standing political rivalry with Awami League leader Sheikh Hasina Wajed, who was eventually forced to step down from government last year.
It is worth recalling that Khaleda Zia’s son Tarique Rahman returned to Bangladesh a few days ago after spending 17 years in exile.
