Jatiya Rakkhi Bahini
Bangladeshi para-military force
The Jatiya Rakkhi Bahini (Bengali: জাতীয় রক্ষী বাহিনী, lit. 'National Security Force') was a Bangladeshi paramilitary force formed in 1972 by the Sheikh Mujibur Rahman government. Initially formed to curb an insurgency and maintain law and order, the force became involved in numerous charges of human rights abuses, including political killings, shooting by death squads, and rape. It was seen as the armed wing of the ruling Awami League and it swore an oath of loyalty to Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.
The Rakkhi Bahini has been condemned by many academics and journalists, including Ghulam Murshid who compared it with the Gestapo, and Anthony Mascarenhas who said that it was a "gang of hoodlums little different from the Nazi Brown shirts." Human Rights Watch states that the institutionalized violence committed by the Jatiya Rakkhi Bahini, established the culture of impunity with which security forces in independent Bangladesh continue to abuse human rights. Pro Awami League commentators dismiss the charges as "myths".
History
Background
After the end of the Bangladesh Liberation War, there was a violent insurgency led by Jatiya Samajtantrik Dal to replace the elected revolutionary government of the newly independent country with a "scientific socialist" system of government inspired by Soviet Union and the People's Republic of China through the uses of private militias formed by left-wing army commanders who fought in the war, such as Colonel Abu Taher.
During the Liberation War of Bangladesh, numerous civilians joined the war after being trained by the Indian forces. Tajuddin Ahmad felt these people should come under national service as they had arms and training. Tajuddin Ahmad asked Sheikh Mujibur Rahman to form a para-military force for them.
Sheikh Mujibur Rahman primarily rejected the proposal but soon realized the necessity of an elite force, because many police officers died in the Bangladesh Liberation War.
“Jatiya Rakkhi Bahini” enters the record as bangladeshi para-military force. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Jatiya, Rakkhi and Bahini can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 30, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q18737138. None of the 1 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1972.
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This entry incorporates text from “Jatiya Rakkhi Bahini” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.