DECEMBER 16 – A RED LETTER DAY FOR TWO NATIONS

December 16 is a red letter day for two countries Bangladesh, which won its hard fought freedom from Pakistan on that day and India which won a decisive war in 1971 with the humiliating surrender of 93,000 Pakistani soldiers and officers. We celebrate this day every year but this year it is special as it marks the golden jubilee of that epic victory. Fifty years ago, on 16 December 1971, Lieutenant-General Amir Abdullah Khan Niazi, the Commander of the Pakistan Eastern Command, was made to sign the Instrument of Surrender at Ramna Race Course in Dacca, and the surrender was accepted by Lieutenant General Jagjit Singh Aurora, the General Officer Commanding-in-Chief of India’s Eastern Command. Pakistan lost more than half of its population and about 15 percent of its territory. However, 61 percent of the 54,500 square miles (1,41,154 sq km) of land lost in the East was arable, in contrast to a meager 21 percent of the 310,000 square miles (8,02,896 sq km) it retained.

So what went wrong? Why was Pakistan Army, a far superior fighting force than the rag tag Mukti Bahini, defeated within a fortnight? With the United States led by Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger by its side and promise of help from all weather friend China why did they surrender on the 13^th day of the war? The problem was with the two nation theory and the idea of Pakistan. The idea that religion alone can hold two widely separated land masses, separated by distance, by language, by culture and by civilization together was preposterous to start with. The entire West Asia and North Africa minus Israel is Muslim and if Islam could hold them together they should have been one homogeneous nation, but they are not! The truth is that they have repeatedly fought wars among themselves and don’t see eye to eye on many issues.

 

The language war

It all started way back in 1952 when Bengalis began mobilising to force the State to recognise Bengali as a national language. On 21-22 February that year, the Pakistani armed forces murdered several students as well as numerous others in indiscriminate firing. Bengalis are proud of their language, of Rabindranath Thakur and of Kazi Nazrul Islam. Pakistan wanted to force Urdu as their state language. The Bengali speaking population resented. Even in West Pakistan only 7.57% people of Pakistan speak Urdu as the first language. The rest speak Pashto, Punjabi and Sindhi. Even if you go by religious language Arabic should have been a state language. But they chose Urdu. Urdu is a mixture of various languages 75% of Urdu has Sanskrit and Prakrit roots. Persian, Turkic, Arabic contribute another 25% of the language. Probably Jinnah wanted to choose a language with an Islamic touch at the same time indigenous to India. But it was certainly alien to the Bengalis.

 

Cyclone Bhola

Though East Pakistan was earning a substantial part of revenue for Pakistan it always received step brotherly treatment from the central establishment in the West which was dominated by the feudal Punjabi clan. Not only the Bengalis but even the Sindhis, the Baluchis and the Pashtus had the same grievance. Before the December 1970 general elections in Pakistan, East Pakistan was ravaged by one of the deadliest cyclones – Cyclone Bhola. Many lives were lost and homes and livelihood disrupted, bringing despair and anguish in the lives of 3 to 5,00,000 Bengalis. The establishment in West Pakistan was slow to respond and India was the first country to offer support. The Awami League, the political face of the Bengalis was livid because of this obvious neglect. The election campaign that followed had anti-federation speeches and slogans and eventually there was a land-slide victory for the Awami League led by Sheikh Mujibur Rehman. Even though things were slipping out of the hands of West Pakistan much before this Cyclone Bhola was the last nail in the coffin of East Pakistan. Things were so bad that even if Pakistan had delayed election for 6 month or a year, Awami League’s victory and subsequent fission of Pakistan was certain.

 

Murder of democracy

Sheikh Mujib got the majority in the Pakistan parliament and not just in East Pakistan alone. Legally and logically he should have been asked to take oath as the Prime Minister. The Pakistan military establishment, which was far friendlier with the Punjabi ruling class than the Bengalis did not go by the logic of democracy. General Yahya Khan refused to convene Parliament and accept Sheikh Mujib as the Prime Minister even though the East Pakistan-based Awami League, led by Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, had decisively defeated Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto’s Pakistan Peoples’ Party.

Sheikh Mujibur Rahman’s party, under the banner of the Six Point Agenda, had long advocated for greater federalism; separate convertible currencies; fiscal responsibility to be delegated to the federating units; as well as the right to maintain a separate militia. Each of these demands came in response to the west’s cultural, economic, and linguistic oppression; exclusion from the military and bureaucracy; as well as consistent and calibrated efforts to deprive Bengalis of their legitimate share of political power. The political elites in the West, spearheaded by General Yahya and Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, wanted a strong federal government and found the Awami League’s Six-Point Agenda to be a thinly veiled demand for outright cessation.

There were fears in the military establishment that since Sheikh Mujeeb won election on the agenda of Independence of Bangladesh it will not be wise move to handover power to him. Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto meanwhile had massive support in Rawalpindi and he was trying to do everything in order to become next PM of Pakistan. Despite winning too few seats to veto any constitution offered by the Awami League, Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto refused to let his party participate in any convening of Parliament and made absurd demands for a power-sharing agreement. After Mujibur Rahman refused to cede and insisted upon the Awami League’s right to form the government, General Yahya Khan commenced Operation Searchlight, which was a brutal and thuggish military operation to disarm the Bengalis.

 

Operation Searchlight

To say that Pakistan’s army was caught between tug of war between Sheikh Mujibur Rehaman and Zulfiquar Ail Bhutto and hence, Bangladesh fiasco happened is patently wrong, as most of the oppression and killing was done by the army and not civilians. As usual, whatever narrative Pakistan builds, in the end Pakistani army is defended or projected blemish free. All the faults are assigned to politicians or conspiracies. This time however they were the villains. Their intelligence agency told them that Awami League was in touch with India and a war may break out in the Eastern frontier. 5 lakh (5,00,000) Bihari razakhars were given military uniform to give impression to India that there were more than 8 lakh active Pakistani soldiers. This was a huge blunder. They were given free hand by Pakistani military establishment. These razakhars committed untold atrocities – killings, lootings, rape and genocide of the local Bengalis which further deteriorated the situation. Pakistan also worked through a number of Islamist militant organizations, including the notoriously violent student wing of Jamaat-e-Islami to carry out atrocities against the Bengali Hindu minorities selectively. Pakistani army had expertly exploited religion and political divisions within the country to entrench themselves in supreme positions of power and some of them under Genl. Tikka Khan had gone rogue and actively aided and supported and even participated in these atrocities. What is most shameful is that though a commission of inquiry, Hamood ur Rehman Commission was set up, its report was never published in Pakistan and people never came to know what had actually happened!

 

The politics of war

Sheikh Mujeeb was arrested and soon Independence of Bangladesh was announced in Dhaka. Pakistani leadership was also under the wrong impression that they will stop the Independence of Bangladesh through International powers however they weren’t aware that they morally lost Bangladesh many months before decisive battle in December 1971. Meanwhile India was being flooded with refugees crossing the porous border in order to avoid the atrocities of the Army. In the subsequent months approximately 9.7 million people left their homes, jobs and livelihood in East Pakistan and became refugees in India.

The atrocities committed on the people of East Pakistan was horrifying and beyond what the world saw in Second World War but the west would not report it as they were supporting the wrong side. The Nixon administration was unconcerned about the mounting atrocities because it was commencing an unprecedented diplomatic overture to China, and it chose Genl. Yahya Khan to be its mediator. The American President, who had a personal, visceral, and deeply misogynistic hatred for India’s Prime Minister, Indira Gandhi refused to see the barbarism committed by the Pakistanis and even threatened India with active military intervention with their Seventh Fleet in case of a war. He even beseeched China to feign intervention in the hopes of deterring Indian involvement in the war.

 

The war

As if the proxy war of 9.7 million refugees was not enough on December 3, 1971 Pakistan’s Air Force conducted preemptive strikes on forward Indian airbases and radar installations. This declaration of war too was a formality given the growing intensity of the proxy war before the official onset of the bilateral confrontation. The Indian Army had been training the Mukti Bahini and assisting them with arms and intelligence. The timing suited India as the monsoon was over in Bengal and the Himalayan passes were all blocked with snow to prevent any Chinese military movement southwards. Mrs. Indira Gandhi meanwhile convinced the world that the ongoing genocide was inhuman, far worse than the Second World War, and they cannot look the other way. She had a trusted friend in U.S.S.R standing steadfastly behind her and there were Soviet war ships all around the Indian peninsula.

Though smaller Maoist style paramilitary bands started emerging from all parts of East Pakistan, the Mukti Bahini (freedom fighters) became increasingly visible. Headed by Colonel Muhammad Ataul Gani Osmani, a retired Pakistan Army officer, this band was raised as Mujib's action arm and security force before assuming the character of a conventional guerrilla force. 

The Indian Army, far superior in numbers and equipment to that of Pakistan, executed a three-pronged pincer movement on Dhaka launched from West Bengal, Assam, and Tripura. In all these places the Mukti Bahini and the local Bengalis played a vital role in aiding the Indian Army. Many soldiers were ferried in the night by the locals across rivers and valuable information on the location and whereabouts of different military strongholds were gleaned. It was backed up by the Indian Air Force which achieved near air supremacy towards the end of the war as the entire East Pakistan airbase with all the flights was destroyed. The Indian Navy also annihilated the eastern wing of the Pakistan Navy and blockaded the East Pakistan ports, thereby cutting off any escape routes for the stranded Pakistani warriors. The fledgling Bangladesh Navy (comprising officers and sailors who defected from Pakistan Navy) aided the Indians in the marine warfare, carrying out attacks, most notably Operation Jackpot.

As expected the Pakistanis activated the Western front too but met with stiff resistance. On December 16, within just 12 days, the capital Dhaka fell to the Mitro Bahini—the allied forces. Lt. Gen. Niazi surrendered to the combined forces headed by its commander Lt. Gen. Jagjit Singh Aurora by signing the Instrument of Surrender at Ramna Racecourse, and at 16:31 Indian Standard Time. Bangladesh became liberated.

 

Reaction in Pakistan

Reaction to the defeat and dismemberment of half the nation was a shocking loss to top military and layman alike. No one had expected that they would lose the formal war in under a fortnight and were also very angry at the meek surrender of the army in East Pakistan. The myth of the Pakistan Army's might was shattered and the leadership stood exposed. General A. A. K. Niazi, who surrendered along with 93,000 troops, was viewed with suspicion and hatred upon his return to Pakistan. He was shunned and branded a traitor. Genl. Yahya Khan's dictatorship collapsed and gave way to the wily Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto who took the opportunity to rise to power.

 

Why is the ’71 War unique?

The 1971 war was unique for India because of harmony that was seen between the political and the military establishment and because of the nobility of its cause. Mrs. Gandhi prepared the grounds for a legitimate military intervention and prepared the world opinion for the same. The Army under the legendary General S.H.F.J. Manekshaw got the timing right, the execution perfect and despite being the victor didn’t overstay by a single day or bring inconvenience to anybody. Not only this but on humanitarian scale too, the vanquished Pakistanis should appreciate the Indian Army role for the respectful treatment of their soldiers (POWs). Had they been left at the mercy of the Mukti Bahini, beyond doubt yet another genocide would have ensued. Their purpose was clear - to liberate the Bengalis from a barbaric rule, and once the mission was accomplished they went back to their barracks. Can you say the same thing about the U.S. military operations in Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan?