Awami League leader Sheikh Hasina Wajed has no plans to seek revenge against the military-backed caretaker government that tried to keep her from returning to Bangladesh.

In an exclusive interview with The Tribune from London, the former prime minister said she knows some people in Bangladesh "are playing games," but she firmly believes that "the law will take its own course”.

"I don't think about taking revenge. Even my father's killers were brought to book," she said, referring to those found guilty of assassinating her father, Sheikh Mujibur Rehman in 1975. But she accused the caretaker government of not fulfilling its promise to hold elections. "There was a mass movement when the caretaker government took over. Their first job was to hold elections. They haven't done that yet," she said.

The interim government in Dhaka this week reversed its decision to ban Sheikh Hasina from returning from London to Bangladesh. She now plans to travel to her homeland in the first week of May. While she has not been officially informed of the government's decision, she said she had heard about it from a Press release issued in Dhaka.

In London, Sheikh Hasina had contacted friends in the British Parliament to help ensure her safe passage home. She now wants to finish meetings, including one on May 3 with Commonwealth Secretary-General Don McKinnon, and with the Bengali community in Britain, before she heads home.

Sheikh Hasina was visiting family in the United States when the caretaker government filed murder and extortion charges against her and other members of her Awami League. She was charged with playing a role in the deaths of a number of activists during riots in late October. She accused the Jamaat-e-Islami of belatedly adding her name to the lawsuit, saying, "I know I haven't done anything wrong. I have not killed anyone." On hearing about the charges Sheikh Hasina said she decided to cut short her trip and return to Dhaka. But, she said, the caretaker government showed “double standards” by preventing her return. “When I said I would return to fight the charges they leveled against me, they banned me from traveling back. They thought I would be afraid to face these charges. They thought I would not return,” she said, adding, “Who are they to decide whether we stay in the country or go abroad? That is for our people to decide.”

Reports from Dhaka have suggested that some disgruntled members of the Awami League had backed the caretaker government’s effort to keep her from returning. Sheikh Hasina said she didn’t believe this could be true. “I don’t believe anyone in the Awami League was opposed to me during this crisis or that they collaborated with the caretaker government to keep me out of the country,” she said.

“The party elected me its president in absentia. I never said I wanted to be its president. They picked me, the party workers — all 2,800 councilors - voluntarily elected me. So then why would they try and keep me out? I am not only the daughter of Sheikh Mujibur Rehman, I am a leader, a mother, a sister to these people.” However, she conceded, “There are some people who have no support and who are ambitious to come to power. Perhaps they instigated these rumours.

The interim administration had promised to clean up politics, crack down on crime and corruption and introduce electoral and economic reforms before organising new elections by the end of 2008. It declared a state of emergency on Jan. 11 and postponed a general election planned for Jan. 22 after clashes between supporters of the Awami League and the Bangladesh Nationalist Party, led by Begum Khaleda Zia.

Besides preventing Sheikh Hasina from returning, the government also tried to force Mrs. Zia into exile with the belief that the presence of the political rivals was holding back the country.

Sheikh Hasina denied the bitter and bloody history that exists between her and Mrs. Zia’s family was to blame for the sharp differences between the two women. “The differences between me and [Mrs. Zia] are ideological. Our party is devoted to the people; it was established to further people’s rights. Her party was organised by a military dictator,” she said.

She also dismissed outright any suggestion that the crisis may have helped unite the two women against a common foe. “I don’t know why some people have bracketed [Mrs. Zia] and my party together through this crisis. In opposition, the BNP created trouble, while we developed our country,” she said. Pointing out that her Awami League had opposed the BNP because of Mrs. Zia’s “corrupt ways” and her alliance with the Jamaat-e-Islami, she said, “The people rejected them, so how can we join hands with them?

Because of the BNP’s corruption the country hasn’t moved forward in five years. Things have deteriorated under them. Why should I take on this burden of an alliance with them?”

Reports from Bangladesh say both the ladies have amassed huge quantities of wealth. Denying the accusations, Sheikh Hasina said the money was her family’s and had been put in a trust fund after her father’s assassination. She said she still lived in the home of her husband, a nuclear scientist who has been “very disturbed” by the recent harassment she has suffered. “When the army went to my house he was very upset. He was taken to hospital - but he has family there to take care of him,” she said.

Denying her administration had been corrupt Sheikh Hasina listed its achievements - from increasing literacy, reducing poverty and the mortality rates among mothers and children, to making Bangladesh self-sufficient in food production. “The fruits of our economy reached the poor people,” she said, adding, “Had there been corruption how could we have improved our country so much?”

By Sheikh Hasina’s count, there have been 19 attempts on her life. “I survived all of them because Allah saved me. Why should I be worried now?” she said, when asked if she was concerned about her safety on her return to Bangladesh. “Allah has given me a life to do some work for the people of Bangladesh. I will work for my people. I am ready to die for them.”

Sheikh Hasina, who as a young woman was known as Hasina Sheikh, got her name when supporters at a political rally in 1981 repeatedly chanted ‘Sheikh Hasina’. “That name stuck,” she said laughing at the recollection.

Despite the heavy toll a life in politics has taken on her family Sheikh Hasina has no regrets. “I was born in a political family. I was brought up in a political family. We learnt to support our distressed people. We learnt to sacrifice for them,” she said. “My father had a dream to build a Golden Bengal. I plan to fulfill that dream.”