Dated 12-Aug-2013 By Dr. Subhash Kapila Introductory Observations Bangladesh next General Elections could be held in 2013 at the year- end but since January 20 2014 is the outside limit as per the Constitution, they are being termed as General Elections2014. Therefore Bangladesh at the outside limit is only five months away from General Elections 2014 which could turn out as probably the most significant elections held so far. Bangladesh stands today at crucial political cross-roads where the nation was engulfed in 2013 with incessant violence centred on the politics of national identity on one hand and opposed on the other side by political groupings banking on the religion of Islam in electoral politics, desperately bent on pushing Bangladesh towards an Islamist Caliphate. The Shahbagh Protests that erupted in early 2013 were an expression, going by the large-scale participation of Bangladesh youth of both sexes and women protestors of all ages, as exp