First came the rain, bringing relief on a sultry afternoon in Dhaka, the capital. Banana vendor Mohammad Solaiman noticed three tanks, led by foot soldiers, rolling toward the office of Bangladesh's President. In a country that has endured three coups and 18 unsuccessful military takeovers since its formation in 1971, Solaiman reached the obvious conclusion: the army was seizing power, ending the nation's five-year fling with democracy.

Solaiman was wrong; the tanks had been dispatched to protect the government from a minor military rebellion. The uprising, in which 100 soldiers were reported injured, fizzled out by midweek. But it heightened the tension hanging over Dhaka in the weeks before a crucial general election scheduled for June 12.

Despite the guns and heavy hardware, last week's incident had more to do with pre-election politicking than with military coupmaking. When Prime Minister Khaleda Zia was forced to resign in March, after completing a scant eight days of her second term, she appointed a caretaker Prime Minister, Mohammad Habibur Rahman, to oversee the new election. That was a longtime demand of Khaleda's political nemesis, Sheik Hasina Wazed, who led the two-year popular agitation that drove the Prime Minister from office. But Khaleda had a trick up her sleeve: when her parliament passed a constitutional amendment requiring all future elections to be held under neutral caretaker governments, she also transferred control of the Defense Ministry to the country's figurehead President, Abdur Rahman Biswas, one of her supporters. That administrative machination was not disclosed until a week after the order was signed.

Biswas, 70, touched off last week's brouhaha by using his new powers to demand the resignation of two senior military commanders who were seen as Hasina supporters and, according to Biswas, were playing politics from the barracks. Army Chief Lieut. General Abu Saleh Mohammad Nasim refused to carry out the order. Instead he removed four commanders believed to be loyal to Biswas from their stations. The President then relieved Nasim of his job. Who did what next is disputed, but troops poured out of garrisons in northern and western Bangladesh and took positions along the Padma and Jamuna rivers.

Ferry service was halted to keep the rebel troops on their side of the rivers. By Tuesday night, Biswas had enough soldierly support to protect the caretaker government. Nasim, a hero of Bangladesh's 1971 war of independence who is admired for political neutrality as head of the army, was put under house arrest along with at least six other commanders. Caretaker Prime Minister Rahman kept a low profile during the week, although he did say on TV that Biswas had "taken certain steps on his own consideration and decision." Khaleda was also silent. Not so Hasina, who led 5,000 members of her Awami League into downtown Dhaka to accuse the President of siding with Khaleda's Bangladesh Nationalist Party. "It was a deep-rooted ploy to foil the upcoming election," she thundered. Elections come on Bangladesh like summer storms, and the rumblings have already begun.

--By Anthony Spaeth. Reported by Farid Hossain/Dhaka