Empowering Democracy in Bangladesh: A Roadmap for Enhancing Voter Engagement

Democracy is a form of government in which the people or the general populace of a state have the power of the state, where fundamental freedoms and human rights are respected, and where they freely express their will is carried out. Bangladesh is a democratic country but from the beginning, this state faced several military regimes and tried to get back in a democratic environment. The authors attempt to find out the objectives of why people are not going to cast their votes, why they are not satisfied with the electoral process, and why people do not have trust in elections. To scrutinize the evolution of Bangladesh’s political situation, we have analyzed a total of 11 (from 1973 to 2018) general elections and followed up a municipality election. This study reveals that people are scared about unexpected situations, and threats but expect free, fair, peaceful, transparent, and participatory elections. To solve the problems the authors formulated a framework to engage people's participation in elections. Finally, the authors encourage the policymakers and election commission to take effective stepsfor the proposed solution to implement the upcoming national election to be more acceptable and uncontroversial which will be held in 2024.