As a result of the 1992 Demolition of the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya, India, the Majlis organised a march from Dhaka to Ayodhya on 2 January 1993 and demanded its restoration. The protestors, led by Azizul Haque, reached the border near Khulna, where the Government of Bangladesh blocked off the boundaries and suppressed the march. In the same year, Azizul Haque declared on behalf of the Majlis that India's prime minister Narasimha Rao should not visit India and gave orders to besiege the national airport. Haque was coincidentally arrested for this reason on 9 April 1993, though he was later released on 8 May.[2]
In 2005, the party split into two as Azizul Haque did not agree with joining the BNP-led Four Party Alliance. On 22 May 2005, the Central Majlis-ash-Shura session was held at the Hotel Ruposhi Bangla in Paltan, where the Naib-e-AmirMd. Ishaq was elected as the party's amir, and Ahmad Abdul Qadir as the general-secretary. Azizul Haque's party was registered as Bangladesh Khelafat Majlish, and took on the rickshaw as its symbol.
In conjunction with other Islamist parties, Khilafat Majlis held street protests in the capital, Dhaka condemning Israel for its role in the 2006 Lebanon War.[3] In February 2010, Police in Khulnabaton-charged Khilafat Majlis activists who were holding street protests, and arrested five. Khilafat Majlis activists were reportedly protesting the arrest of a central party leader Maulana Shakhawat, who had been arrested by the government.[4] In 2021, the Majlis officially quit the BNP Alliance.
The Khelafat Majlis seeks the establishment of an Islamic state,[5] modelled on the Caliphate, a multi-national religious supranational state.[citation needed] The party seeks the full enforcement of the Sha'riah.
Pact with Awami League
On 22 January 2006, Sheikh Hasina Wajed, the president of the reputedly secularBangladesh Awami League and the former Prime Minister of Bangladesh, signed a controversial memorandum of understanding with Khelafat Majlish to form a political alliance for the then scheduled 2006 general election.[5][6][7] The terms of the pact were reportedly to be designed to give the Awami League, one of the two main political parties in Bangladesh, a share in the vote bank of religious Muslim voters, who formed an important bloc of voters in Muslim-majority Bangladesh.[5] In turn, an Awami League-led government would enact the Majlish agenda of declaring the Ahmadiyya community as non-Muslim, passing a blasphemy law (outlawing expressions of criticism of Islam) and make fatwas (decrees from Muslim clerics) legally binding.[5] However, Sheikh Hasina later claimed that the Khelafat had approached her about forming an alliance, and had promised to support a secular policy.[6][7]
The pact was severely criticized within Bangladesh and by various leaders of the Awami League, including presidium member Amir Hossain Amu, who criticized Sheikh Hasina for signing the pact without discussing it with other party leaders.[6][7] By 2007, the pact had been scrapped after Sheikh Hasina returned to Bangladesh from the exile imposed by the interim government (2006–2008).[6][7] Defending her actions, Sheikh Hasina said that the pact was signed for a "certain period" to resist the "communal-fundamentalist forces" led by the Jamaat-e-Islami Bangladesh.[6][7] Hasina claimed she was authorised by party leaders to make any decisions to ensure election victory for the Awami League.[6][7]