Hussain Muhammad Ershad

Lt. Gen. Hussain Muhammad Ershad (Bengali: হুসেইন মুহাম্মদ এরশাদ; 1 February 1930 – 14 July 2019) was a Bangladeshi Army Chief politician who served as the President of Bangladesh from 1983 to 1990, a time many consider to have been a military dictatorship.

Quotes

 * Though General Ershad was looked [upon] as usurper, and his regime was termed as undemocratic and autocratic by both Khaleda Zia led Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and Shiekh Hasina led Awami League, yet none of these parties even after assuming power [...] would be able to retrench the Islamisation measures taken by Ershad"... The Constitution of Bangladesh, despite Awami League [...] remains an Islamic one.
 * Dr. Amena Mohsin, in The Journal of Social Studies in Saleem Samad, State of Minorities in Bangladesh,  quoted in Y Rosser, Indoctrinating Minds: Politics of Education in Bangladesh. 2004 page 70ff
 * Dr. Amena Mohsin, in The Journal of Social Studies October 1997, pp. 98,


 * Between 1982 and 1990, Ershad made systematic efforts to continue the policy of Zia, rehabilitating anti liberation elements and the parallel Islamisation culminating in the disputable Eighth amendment to the Constitution declaring 'Islam' as a state religion. Earlier short-lived government of Mustaque Ahmed (August 1975 - November 1975) brought to power at a behest of young military officers, declared Peoples Republic of Bangladesh as 'Islamic Republic of Bangladesh' over the state radio, which, however, fetched recognition of Saudi Arabia, Libya and China.
 * Saleem Samad quoted in   Y Rosser, Indoctrinating Minds: Politics of Education in Bangladesh. 2004 page 75
 * State of Minorities in Bangladesh: From Secular to Islamic Hegemony by Saleem Samad Country Paper presented at "Regional Consultation on Minority Rights in South Asia", 20-22 August 1998, Kathmandu, Nepal. Organised by South Asian Forum for Human Rights (SAFHR), Kathmandu.