Muragala | Centre for Progressive Politics and Policy’s (CPPP) Executive Director Harindra B. Dassanayake, Board Member Professor Prabha Manuratne and Research Adviser Dr Rajni Gamage were speakers at the Bengal Delta Conference 2025 “Bangladesh at the Crossroads”, held in Dhaka, Bangladesh during 29-31 August 2025. The conference was organized by a youth-led research organization in Dhaka, called the Dacca Institute of Research and Analytics (daira). The dialogue brought together a wide spectrum of academics, policy specialists, and political actors.
Mr Harindra B. Dassanayake spoke on the challenges of political finance and political parties during a panel titled “New Political Dialogue: Transformation in South Asian Politics”. The panel discussed issues such as the role of oligarchies in politics and how entrenched rent-seeking practices have distorted party–society relations, intensifying elite capture and patronage.
Professor Manuratne and Dr Gamage were part of a panel on “Cross-country Experience: Uprising and the Aftermath”, and provided insights on the Sri Lankan context. The panel also included Dr. Mirza Hasan from BRAC University, who spoke on Bangladesh; Dr. Dipak Gyawali, Former Water Minister of Nepal; and Professor Alex Taek-Gwang Lee from Kyung Hee University, Korea. The session was moderated by Prof. Asif Shahan from the University of Dhaka. The panel compared popular protests in countries such as Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, and reflected on how effectively the post-uprising periods addressed and fulfilled the demands that had emerged during the protests.
