Introduction:-
New states may
come into existence either by the peaceable or violent division of an existing
state, or by the union of two or more small states to form a larger one. An
illustration of the first method is found in the recent separation of Norway and Sweden;
of the second in the securing of the independence of the United States;
and of the third in the consolidation of the various German states into the
German Empire.
A new state
does not come fully within the protection of the principles of International
Law until it has been recognized by the previously existing states.
The time and method of according recognition to a new state is left to each
existing state to determine for it.
Bangladesh is a
recognized state by various existing states after its independency in 1971.
Meaning of
Recognition:-
The confirmation or Acknowledgment
of the existence of an act performed,
of an event that transpired, or of a person who is authorized by another to act
in a particular manner.
In tax law, a capital gain is recognized when a taxpayer has
actually received payment. Such gain must then be reported on Income Tax
forms, and capital gains tax must be paid on it.
In International
Law, the term recognition
refers to the formal acknowledgment by one state that another state exists as a
separate and independent government. Recognition is not a mere technicality. A
state has no status among nations until it is recognized by other states, in
spite of the fact that it might possess all other attributes of a state,
including a definable territory and population, a recognizable government, and
a certain amount of continuity or stability.
The decision to recognize a new
national government is a political act that is in the discretion of the
officials who are responsible for foreign policy. In the United States,
the president makes the decision to recognize a country and can do so by making
a formal announcement or by having another official, such as the Secretary of
State, make the announcement for him. Recognition can also be
informal, such as by opening negotiations with a new state or exchanging
diplomats with it.
A nation is not truly sovereign
and independent unless other nations recognize its sovereignty. Formal
recognition operates to assure a new state that it will be permitted to hold
its place and rank as an independent political body among the nations.
Recognition takes effect from
the time it is given as if the state had always existed, and a new government
can carry forward international projects initiated by the old government it
replaces.
Many difficulties come into play
when a government is not recognized. For example, an unrecognized government is
not entitled to participate in diplomatic negotiations or to have its laws
applied in lawsuits or in jurisdictions.
The term recognition is also used in relation to armed conflicts. If a
state of belligerency is recognized, then the law of war applies with all of
its protections for prisoners of war and noncombatants. Recognition of a state
of belligerency ordinarily comes from an uninvolved state that declares itself
neutral. A neutral country is able to recognize a state of belligerency and
carry on trade and diplomatic relations with both sides of the conflict.
Recognition of states
and governments:-
Diplomatic
recognition must be distinguished from recognition of states and their
governments.
The fact that
states do not maintain bilateral diplomatic relations does not mean that they
do not recognize or treat one another as states. A state is not required to
accord formal recognition to any other state, but it is required to treat as a
state an entity that meets the requirements. A state has a responsibility not
to recognize as a state any entity that has attained the qualifications for statehood
in violation of the prohibition against the threat or use of force contained in
the UN Charter. States can exercise their recognition powers either explicitly
or implicitly.
The recognition
of a government implies recognition of the state it governs, but not vice
versa. De facto
recognition of states, rather than de jure,
is rare. De jure recognition is stronger, while de facto recognition is more
tentative and relates more to recognizing that a government exercises control
over a territory. An example of the difference is when the United
Kingdom recognised the Soviet Union
de facto in 1921, but de jure only in 1924. Another example is the state of Israel in 1948,
whose government was immediately recognised de facto by the United States
(and later Britain),
and "one-upped" 3 days later by Soviet
de jure recognition.
Renewing
recognition of a government is not necessary when it changes in a normal,
constitutional way (such as an election or referendum), but is necessary in the case of a coup d'etat
or revolution.
Recognition of the new government by other states can be important for its long
term survival. For instance, the Taliban government of the Islamic State of Afghanistan, which lasted
from 1996 to 2001, was recognised by only Pakistan,
the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia,
while far more had recognised the government of ousted President Burhanuddin Rabbani. The Disputed territories of Jammu and
Kashmir and Arunachal Pradesh as "Integral Parts"
of the Republic of India are not recognised by either Pakistan
or the People's Republic of China but recognised
by Russia
Recognition can
be implied by other acts, like the visit of the head of state,
or the signing of a bilateral treaty. If implicit recognition is possible, a
state may feel the need to explicitly proclaim that its acts do not constitute
diplomatic recognition, as when the United States commenced its
dialogue with the Palestine Liberation Organization
in 1988.
The doctrine of
non-recognition of illegal or immoral factual situations (e.g. territorial
gains achieved by the use of force) is called the Stimson
Doctrine, and has become more important since the Second World
War, especially in the United
Nations as a method of ensuring compliance with international
law - for instance, in the case of Rhodesia
in 1965. Withdrawal of recognition is an even more severe act of disapproval of
another state than the breaking of diplomatic relations.
Unrecognized state:-
Several of the
world's geo-political entities lack general
international recognition, but wish to be recognized as sovereign
states. The degree of de facto control these entities exert over the
territories they claim varies.
Most are
subnational regions
with an ethnic
or national identity of their own that have
"broken off" (i.e. separated themselves) from their original parent state,
and hence they are commonly referred to as "break-away" states. Some
of these entities are in effect internally self-governing
protectorates
that enjoy military protection and informal diplomatic representation abroad
through another state to prevent forced reincorporation into their original
states.
Note that the
word "control" in this list refers to control over the area occupied,
not occupation of the area claimed. Unrecognized countries can be separated
into those which have full control over their occupied territory and those with
only partial control (such as Western
Sahara). The main difference is that in the former, the de jure
governments of the areas in question have no (or nearly no) influence in the
areas under question, whereas in the latter they can have varying degrees of
control, and may provide essential services to people living in the areas
Other types of recognition:-
Other things
which can be recognised include the occupation or annexation
of territory, or belligerent rights of a party in a conflict.
The last does not mean that the recognizing party considers the recognized a
state.
Examples of
recognition of belligerent status include:
The United
Kingdom recognized the Confederate States of America as
belligerents in the first month of the American Civil War.[citation needed] Bolivia,
Colombia,
Ecuador,
Peru and Venezuela
recognized the Sandinista National Liberation Front
as a belligerent in Nicaragua's civil war in June, 1979. France and Mexico
recognized the FMLN as a belligerent in
the civil war in El Salvador on August 28. 1981.
History of Recognition of Bangladesh:-
The Bangladesh
Liberation War(i)
(Bengali: মুক্তিযুদ্ধ Muktijuddho) was an
armed conflict pitting East Pakistan and India against West Pakistan.
The war resulted in the secession of East Pakistan, which became the independent
nation of Bangladesh.
The war broke
out on 26 March 1971 as army units directed by West Pakistan launched a
military operation in East Pakistan against Bengali
civilians, students, intelligentsia, and armed personnel who were demanding
separation of the East from West Pakistan.
Bengali military, paramilitary, and civilians formed the Mukti Bahini
(Bengali: মুক্তি বাহিনী
"Liberation Army") and used guerrilla
warfare tactics to fight against the West Pakistan army. India
provided economic, military and diplomatic support to the Mukti Bahini rebels,
leading Pakistan to launch Operation Chengiz Khan, a pre-emptive attack on the western border of
India which started the Indo-Pakistani War of 1971.
On 16 December
1971, the allied forces of the Indian army and the Mukti Bahini defeated the
West Pakistani forces deployed in the East. The resulting surrender was the largest
in number of prisoners of war since World War II.
In August 1947,
the Partition of British India gave birth to two
new states; a secular state named India
and an Islamic state named Pakistan. But Pakistan comprised two geographically and
culturally separate areas to the east and the west of India. The western zone
was popularly (and for a period of time, also officially) termed West Pakistan
and the eastern zone (modern-day Bangladesh)
was initially termed East Bengal and later, East Pakistan.
Although the population of the two zones was close to equal, political power
was concentrated in West Pakistan and it was widely perceived that East Pakistan was being exploited economically, leading
to many grievances.
On 25 March
1971, rising political discontent and cultural nationalism in East Pakistan was met
by brutal suppressive force from the ruling elite of the West
Pakistan establishment in what came to be termed Operation Searchlight.
The violent
crackdown by West Pakistan forces led to East Pakistan
declaring its independence as the state of Bangladesh and to the start of
civil war. The war led to a sea of refugees (estimated at the time to be about
10 million) flooding into the eastern provinces of India. Facing a mounting
humanitarian and economic crisis, India started actively aiding and
organizing the Bangladeshi resistance army known as the Mukti Bahini.
East Pakistani
grievances
Economic
disparities
Although East
Pakistan had a larger population, West Pakistan
dominated the divided country politically and received more money from the
common budget.
|
Year
|
Spending on West
Pakistan (in crores of Pakistani
rupees)
|
Spending on East
Pakistan (in crores of Pakistani rupees)
|
Amount spent on East as
percentage of West
|
|
1950–55
|
1,129
|
524
|
46.4
|
|
1955–60
|
1,655
|
524
|
31.7
|
|
1960–65
|
3,355
|
1,404
|
41.8
|
|
1965–70
|
5,195
|
2,141
|
41.2
|
|
Total
|
11,334
|
4,593
|
40.5
|
|
Source:
Reports of the Advisory Panels for the Fourth Five Year Plan 1970-75, Vol. I,
published by the planning commission of Pakistan (Quick reference: crore
= 107, or 10 million)
|
|||
Political differences
Although East Pakistan accounted for a slight majority of the
country's population, political power remained firmly in the hands of West
Pakistanis. Since a straightforward system of representation based on
population would have concentrated political power in East Pakistan, the West
Pakistani establishment came up with the "One Unit"
scheme, where all of West Pakistan was
considered one province. This was solely to counterbalance the East wing's
votes. After the East broke away to form Bangladesh,
the Punjab province insisted that politics in West
Pakistan now be decided on the basis of a straightforward vote,
since Punjabis were more numerous than the other groups, such as Sindhis,
Pashtuns, or Balochs.
After the
assassination of Liaquat Ali Khan, Pakistan's first prime minister, in
1951, political power began to be concentrated in the President of Pakistan, and eventually, the
military. The nominal elected chief executive, the Prime Minister, was
frequently sacked by the establishment, acting through the President.
East Pakistanis
noticed that whenever one of them, such as Khawaja Nazimuddin, Muhammad Ali Bogra, or Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy were elected
Prime Minister of Pakistan, they were swiftly deposed by the largely West
Pakistani establishment. The military dictatorships of Ayub Khan
(27 October 1958 – 25 March 1969) and Yahya Khan
(25 March 1969 – 20 December 1971), both West Pakistanis, only heightened such
feelings.
The situation
reached a climax when in 1970 the Awami League,
the largest East Pakistani political party, led by Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, won a landslide
victory in the national elections. The party won 167 of the 169 seats allotted
to East Pakistan, and thus a majority of the
313 seats in the National Assembly. This gave the Awami League the
constitutional right to form a government. However, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto (a Sindhi), the leader of
the Pakistan Peoples Party, refused to allow
Rahman to become the Prime Minister of Pakistan. Instead, he proposed the idea
of having two Prime Ministers, one for each wing. The proposal elicited outrage
in the east wing, already chafing under the other constitutional innovation, the
"one unit scheme". Bhutto also refused to accept Rahman's Six Points.
On 3 March 1971, the two leaders of the two wings along with the President
General Yahya Khan met in Dhaka to decide the fate of the country. Talks failed. Sheikh
Mujibur Rahman called for a nation-wide strike.
On 7 March 1971,
Sheikh Mujibur Rahman (soon to be the prime minister) delivered a speech at the
Racecourse Ground (now called the Suhrawardy
Udyan). In this speech he mentioned a further four-point condition
to consider the National Assembly Meeting on 25 March:
The immediate
lifting of martial law.
Immediate
withdrawal of all military personnel to their barracks.
An inquiry into
the loss of life.
Immediate
transfer of power to the elected representative of the people before the
assembly meeting 25 March.
He urged
"his people" to turn every house into a fort of resistance. He closed
his speech saying, "Our struggle is for our freedom. Our struggle is for
our independence." This speech is considered the main event that inspired
the nation to fight for their independence. General Tikka Khan
was flown in to Dhaka to become Governor of
East Bengal. East-Pakistani judges, including Justice Siddique, refused to
swear him in.
Between 10 and
13 March, Pakistan International Airlines
cancelled all their international routes to urgently fly "Government
Passengers" to Dhaka. These
"Government Passengers" were almost all Pakistani soldiers in
civilian dress. MV Swat, a ship of the Pakistani Navy, carrying ammunition and
soldiers, was harboured in Chittagong Port and
the Bengali workers and sailors at the port refused to unload the ship. A unit
of East Pakistan Rifles refused to obey
commands to fire on Bengali demonstrators, beginning a mutiny of Bengali
soldiers.
Military imbalance
Bengalis were
under-represented in the Pakistan
military. Officers of Bengali origin in the different wings of the armed forces
made up just 5% of overall force by 1965; of these, only a few were in command
positions, with the majority in technical or administrative posts. West
Pakistanis believed that Bengalis were not "martially inclined"
unlike Pashtuns
and Punjabis;
the "martial races" notion was dismissed as ridiculous
and humiliating by Bengalis. Moreover, despite huge defence spending, East Pakistan received none of the benefits, such as
contracts, purchasing and military support jobs. The Indo-Pakistani War of 1965 over Kashmir
also highlighted the sense of military insecurity among Bengalis as only an
under-strength infantry
division and 15 combat aircraft without tank support were in
East Pakistan to thwart any Indian retaliations during the conflict.
Language controversy
In 1948, Mohammad Ali Jinnah, Pakistan's
first Governor-General, declared in Dhaka (then usually spelled Dacca in English) that "Urdu, and only Urdu"
would be the sole official language for all of Pakistan. This proved highly
controversial, since Urdu was a language that was only spoken in the West by Muhajirs
and in the East by Biharis. The majority groups in West
Pakistan spoke Punjabi, while the Bengali
language was spoken by the vast majority of East Pakistanis. The
language controversy eventually reached a point where East
Pakistan revolted. Several students and civilians lost their lives
in a police crackdown on 21 February 1952. The day is revered in Bangladesh and in West Bengal
as the Language Martyrs' Day. Later, in memory of
the 1952 killings, UNESCO
declared 21 February as the International Mother Language Day
in 1999.
In West
Pakistan, the movement was seen as a sectional uprising against Pakistani
national interests and the founding ideology of Pakistan, the Two-Nation
Theory. West Pakistani politicians considered Urdu a product of
Indian Islamic culture, as Ayub Khan said, as late as in 1967, "East Bengalis... still are under considerable Hindu
culture and influence." But, the deaths led to bitter feelings among East
Pakistanis, and they were a major factor in the push for independence.
Response to the 1970 cyclone
The 1970 Bhola cyclone made landfall on the East
Pakistan coastline during the evening of 12 November, around the
same time as a local high tide, killing an estimated 300,000 to
500,000 people. Though the exact death toll is not known, it is considered the
deadliest tropical cyclone on record. A week after the
landfall, President Khan conceded that his government had made
"slips" and "mistakes" in its handling of the relief
efforts for a lack of understanding of the magnitude of the disaster.
A statement
released by eleven political leaders in East Pakistan ten days after the
cyclone hit charged the government with "gross neglect, callous
indifference and utter indifference". They also accused the president of
playing down the magnitude of the problem in news coverage. On 19 November,
students held a march in Dhaka protesting the
slowness of the government response. Maulana Abdul Hamid Khan Bhashani
addressed a rally of 50,000 people on 24 November, where he accused the
president of inefficiency and demanded his resignation.
As the conflict
between East and West Pakistan developed in March, the Dhaka offices of the two
government organisations directly involved in relief efforts were closed for at
least two weeks, first by a general
strike and then by a ban on government work in East Pakistan by the Awami League.
With this increase in tension, foreign personnel were evacuated due to fears of
violence. Relief work continued in the field, but long-term planning was
curtailed. This conflict widened into the Bangladesh Liberation War in December
and concluded with the creation of Bangladesh. This is one of the
first times in modern history that a natural event helped to trigger a civil
war.
Operation Searchlight
A planned
military pacification carried out by the Pakistan Army
— codenamed Operation Searchlight — started on 25 March to curb the Bengali
nationalist movementby taking control of the major cities on 26 March, and then
eliminating all opposition, political or military, within one month. Before the
beginning of the operation, all foreign journalists were systematically
deported from East Pakistan.
The main phase
of Operation Searchlight ended with the fall of the last major town in Bengali
hands in mid-May. The operation also began the 1971 Bangladesh atrocities. These
systematic killings served only to enrage the Bengalis, which ultimately
resulted in the secession of East Pakistan
later in the same year. The international media and reference books in English
have published casualty figures which vary greatly, from 5,000–35,000 in Dhaka,
and 200,000–3,000,000 for Bangladesh
as a whole.
According to the
Asia Times, At a meeting of the military top brass, Yahya Khan
declared: "Kill 3 million of them and the rest will eat out of our
hands." Accordingly, on the night of 25 March, the Pakistani Army launched
Operation Searchlight to "crush" Bengali resistance in which Bengali
members of military services were disarmed and killed, students and the
intelligentsia systematically liquidated and able-bodied Bengali males just
picked up and gunned down. Although the violence focused on the provincial
capital, Dhaka,
it also affected all parts of East Pakistan.
Residential halls of the University of Dhaka were particularly targeted.
The only Hindu residential hall — the Jagannath Hall — was destroyed by the
Pakistani armed forces, and an estimated 600 to 700 of its residents were
murdered. The Pakistani army denies any cold blooded killings at the
university, though the Hamood-ur-Rehman commission in Pakistan concluded
that overwhelming force was used at the university. This fact and the massacre
at Jagannath Hall and nearby student dormitories of Dhaka
University are corroborated by a
videotape secretly filmed by Prof. Nurul Ullah of the East Pakistan Engineering University,
whose residence was directly opposite the student dormitories.
Hindu areas
suffered particularly heavy blows. By midnight, Dhaka
was literally burning,[citation needed] especially the Hindu
dominated eastern part of the city. Time magazine reported on 2 August 1971,
"The Hindus, who account for three-fourths of the refugees and a majority
of the dead, have borne the brunt of the Pakistani military hatred."
Sheikh Mujibur
Rahman was arrested by the Pakistani Army. Yahya Khan appointed Brigadier
(later General) Rahimuddin Khan to preside over a special
tribunal prosecuting Mujib with multiple charges. The tribunal's sentence was
never made public, but Yahya caused the verdict to be held in abeyance in any
case.[citation needed] Other Awami League
leaders were arrested as well, while a few fled Dhaka
to avoid arrest. The Awami League was banned by General Yahya Khan.
Declaration of independence
The violence
unleashed by the Pakistani forces on 25 March 1971, proved the last straw to
the efforts to negotiate a settlement. Following these outrages, Sheikh Mujibur
Rahman signed an official declaration that read:
Today Bangladesh is a
sovereign and independent country. On Thursday night, West Pakistani armed
forces suddenly attacked the police barracks at Razarbagh and the EPR
headquarters at Pilkhana in Dhaka. Many
innocent and unarmed have been killed in Dhaka city and other places of Bangladesh.
Violent clashes between E.P.R. and Police on the one hand and the armed forces
of Pakistan
on the other are going on. The Bengalis are fighting the enemy with great
courage for an independent Bangladesh.
May Allah aid us in our fight for freedom?
Sheikh Mujib
also called upon the people to resist the occupation forces through a radio
message. Mujib was arrested on the night of 25–26 March 1971 at about 1:30 a.m.
(as per Radio Pakistan’s
news on 29 March 1971).
A telegram
containing the text of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman's declaration reached some
students in Chittagong.
The message was translated to Bangla
by Dr. Manjula Anwar. The students failed to secure
permission from higher authorities to broadcast the message from the nearby
Agrabad Station of Radio Pakistan. They crossed Kalurghat Bridge
into an area controlled by an East Bengal Regiment under Major Ziaur Rahman.
Bengali soldiers guarded the station as engineers prepared for transmission. At
19:45 hrs on 27 March 1971, Major Ziaur Rahman broadcast announcement of the
declaration of independence on behalf of Sheikh Mujibur. On 28 March Major
Ziaur Rahman made another announcement,which is as follows:
This is Shadhin
Bangla Betar Kendro. I, Major Ziaur Rahman, at the direction of Bangobondhu
sheikh Mujibur Rahman, hereby declare that the independent People's Republic of
Bangladesh
has been established. At his direction, I have taken command as the temporary
Head of the Republic. In the name of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, I call upon all
Bengalis to rise against the attack by the West Pakistani Army. We shall fight
to the last to free our Motherland. By the grace of Allah, victory is ours. Joy
Bangla. Audio of Zia's
announcement (interview - Belal Mohammed)
The Kalurghat
Radio Station's transmission capability was limited. The message was picked up
by a Japanese ship in Bay of Bengal. It was then re-transmitted by Radio
Australia and later by the British Broadcasting Corporation.
M A Hannan,
an Awami League leader from Chittagong, is said to have made the first announcement of the
declaration of independence over the radio on 26 March 1971. There is
controversy now as to when Major Zia gave his speech. BNP sources maintain that
it was 26 March, and there was no message regarding declaration of independence
from Mujibur Rahman. Pakistani sources, like Siddiq Salik in Witness to
Surrender had written that he heard about Mujibor Rahman's message on the Radio
while Operation Searchlight was going on, and Maj. Gen. Hakeem A. Qureshi in
his book The 1971 Indo-Pak War: A Soldier's Narrative, gives the date of Zia's
speech as 27 March 1971.
26 March 1971 is
considered the official Independence Day of Bangladesh,
and the name Bangladesh
was in effect henceforth. In July 1971, Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi
openly referred to the former East Pakistan as Bangladesh. Some Pakistani and
Indian officials continued to use the name "East
Pakistan" until 16 December 1971.
At first
resistance was spontaneous and disorganized, and was not expected to be
prolonged. But when the Pakistani Army cracked down upon the population,
resistance grew. The Mukti Bahini became increasingly active. The
Pakistani military sought to quell them, but increasing numbers of Bengali
soldiers defected to the underground "Bangladesh army". These
Bengali units slowly merged into the Mukti Bahini and bolstered their weaponry
with supplies from India.
Pakistan
responded by airlifting in two infantry divisions and reorganizing their
forces. They also raised paramilitary forces of Razakars, Al-Badrs and Al-Shams
(who were mostly members of Muslim League, the then government party and other
Islamist groups), as well as other Bengalis who opposed independence, and Bihari Muslims who had
settled during the time of partition.
On April 17,
1971, a provisional government was formed in Meherpur district in western Bangladesh bordering India
with Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, who was in prison in Pakistan, as President, Syed Nazrul
Islam as Acting President, and Tajuddin Ahmed as Prime Minister. As fighting
grew between the army and the Bengali Mukti Bahini an estimated 10 million
Bengalis, mainly Hindus, sought refuge in the Indian states of Assam and West Bengal.
June – September
Bangladesh
forces command was set up on 11 July, with Col. M A G Osmani
as commander in chief, Lt. Col. Abdur Rab as chief of Army Staff and Group
Captain A K Khandker as Deputy Chief of Army Staff and Chief of Air Force. Bangladesh was divided into Eleven Sectors each with a
commander chosen from defected officers of Pakistan army who joined the Mukti Bahini
to conduct guerrilla operations and train fighters. Most of their training
camps were situated near the border area and were operated with assistance from
India.
The 10th Sector was directly placed under Commander in Chief (C-in-C) and
included the Naval Commandos and C-in-C’s special force. Three brigades (11
Battalions) were raised for conventional warfare; a large guerrilla force
(estimated 100,000) was trained.
Guerrilla
operations, which slackened during the training phase, picked up after August.
Economic and military targets in Dhaka were
attacked. The major success story was Operation
Jackpot, in which naval commandos mined and blew up berthed ships in
Chittagong
on 16 August 1971. Pakistani reprisals claimed lives of thousands of civilians.
The Indian army took over supplying the Mukti Bahini from the BSF. They
organised six sectors for supplying the Bangladesh forces.
October – December
Evolution of Pakistan Eastern Command
plan, Bangladesh 1971: Opposing Plans,
Pakistan Army Order of Battle
December 1971 and Mitro Bahini Order of Battle December
1971.
Bangladesh
conventional forces attacked border outposts. Kamalpur, Belonia and Battle of
Boyra are a few examples. 90 out of 370 BOPs fell to Bengali forces.
Guerrilla attacks intensified, as did Pakistani and Razakar reprisals on
civilian populations. Pakistani forces were reinforced by eight battalions from
West Pakistan. The Bangladeshi independence
fighters even managed to temporarily capture airstrips
at Lalmonirhat and Shalutikar. Both of these
were used for flying in supplies and arms from India. Pakistan
sent 5 battalions from West Pakistan as
reinforcements.
Indian involvement
Wary of the
growing involvement of India,
the Pakistan Air Force (PAF) launched a pre-emptive strike on India. The attack
was modelled on the Israeli Air Force's Operation
Focus during the Six-Day War. However, the plan failed to
achieve the desired success and was seen as an open act of unprovoked
aggression against the Indians.
Indian prime
minister Indira Gandhi declared war on Pakistan and in aid of the Mukti
Bahini, then ordered the immediate mobilisation of troops and launched the
full-scale invasion. This marked the official start of the Indo-Pakistani War.
Three Indian corps were involved in the
invasion of East Pakistan. They were supported
by nearly three brigades
of Mukti Bahini fighting alongside them, and many more fighting irregularly.
This was far superior to the Pakistani army of three divisions. The Indians quickly overran the
country, bypassing heavily defended strongholds. Pakistani forces were unable
to effectively counter the Indian attack, as they had been deployed in small
units around the border to counter guerrilla attacks by the Mukti Bahini.[50]
Unable to defend Dhaka, the Pakistanis
surrendered on 16 December 1971.
The speed of the
Indian strategy can be gauged by the fact that one of the regiments of Indian
army (7 Punjab now 8 Mechanised Inf Regiment) fought the liberation war along
the Jessore and Khulna
axis. They were newly converted to a mechanised regiment and it took them just
1 week to reach Khulna
after capturing Jessore. Their losses were limited to just 2 newly acquired APCs (SKOT) from the Russians. Indian Army's T-55 tanks on their way to Dhaka.
India's
military intervention played a crucial role in turning the tide in favour of
the Bangladeshi rebels.
India's
external intelligence agency, the RAW, played a crucial role in providing
logistic support to the Mukti Bahini during the initial stages of the war.
RAW's operations, in then-East Pakistan,
was the largest covert operation in the history of South
Asia.
Pakistani response
Pakistan launched a number of armoured thrusts
along India's western front
in attempts to force Indian troops away from East Pakistan.
Pakistan
tried to fight back and boost the sagging morale by incorporating the Special Services Group commandos in sabotage
and rescue missions.
The air and naval war
The Indian Air
Force carried out several sorties against Pakistan,
and within a week, IAF aircraft dominated the skies of East
Pakistan. It achieved near-total air supremacy
by the end of the first week as the entire Pakistani air contingent in the
east, PAF No.14 Squadron, was grounded due to Indian airstrikes at Tejgaon,
Kurmitolla, Lal Munir Hat and Shamsher Nagar. Sea Hawks
from INS Vikrant
also struck Chittagong,
Barisal,
Cox's Bazar,
destroying the eastern wing of the Pakistan Navy
and effectively blockading the East Pakistan ports, thereby cutting off any
escape routes for the stranded Pakistani soldiers. The nascent Bangladesh
Navy (comprising officers and sailors who defected from Pakistani
Navy) aided the Indians in the marine warfare, carrying out attacks, most
notably Operation Jackpot.
Surrender and aftermath
Indian Lt. Gen J.S. Aurora and Pakistani Lt. Gen A.A.K.
Niazi's signatures on the Instrument of Surrender.
On 16 December
1971, Lt. Gen A. A. K. Niazi, CO of Pakistan Army forces located in East Pakistan signed the instrument of surrender. At the
time of surrender only a few countries had provided diplomatic recognition to the new nation.
Over 90,000 Pakistani troops surrendered to the Indian forces making it largest
surrender since World War II. Bangladesh
sought admission in the UN with most voting in its favor, but China vetoed this as Pakistan was its key ally. The United States, also a key ally of Pakistan, was one of the last nations to accord Bangladesh
recognition. To ensure a smooth transition, in 1972 the Simla
Agreement was signed between India
and Pakistan.
The treaty ensured that Pakistan
recognized the independence of Bangladesh
in exchange for the return of the Pakistani PoWs. India treated all the PoWs in
strict accordance with the Geneva Convention, rule 1925[53].
It released more than 90,000 Pakistani PoWs in five months.
Further, as a
gesture of goodwill, nearly 200 soldiers who were sought for war crimes
by Bengalis were also pardoned by India. The accord also gave back
more than 13,000 km² of land that Indian troops had seized in West
Pakistan during the war, though India retained a few strategic areas; most notably
Kargil
(which would in turn again be the focal point for a war
between the two nations in 1999). This was done as a measure of promoting
"lasting peace" and was acknowledged by many observers as a sign of
maturity by India.
But some in India felt that
the treaty had been too lenient to Bhutto, who had pleaded for leniency,
arguing that the fragile democracy in Pakistan would crumble if the
accord was perceived as being overly harsh by Pakistanis.
Reaction in West Pakistan to the war
Reaction to the
defeat and dismemberment of half the nation was a shocking loss to top military
and civilians alike. No one had expected that they would lose the formal war in
under a fortnight and there was also anger at what was perceived as a meek
surrender of the army in East Pakistan. Yahya Khan's
dictatorship collapsed and gave way to Bhutto who took the opportunity to rise
to power. General 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. The war also exposed the shortcoming of Pakistan's declared strategic doctrine that the
"defence of East Pakistan lay in West Pakistan".
Pakistan also failed to
gather international support, and were found fighting a lone battle with only
the USA
providing any external help. This further embittered the Pakistanis who had
faced the worst military defeat of an army in decades.
The debacle
immediately prompted an enquiry headed by Justice Hamdoor Rahman. Called the Hamoodur
Rahman Commission, it was initially suppressed by Bhutto as it put
the military in poor light. When it was declassified, it showed many failings
from the strategic to the tactical levels. It also condemned the atrocities and
the war crimes
committed by the armed forces. It confirmed the looting, rapes and the killings
by the Pakistan Army and their local agents although the figures are far lower
than the ones quoted by Bangladesh.
According to Bangladeshi sources, 200,000 women were raped and over 3 million
people were killed, while the Rahman Commission report in Pakistan claimed 26,000 died and
the rapes were in the hundreds. However, the army’s role in splintering Pakistan after
its greatest military debacle was largely ignored by successive Pakistani
governments.
Atrocities
During the war
there were widespread killings and other atrocities – including the
displacement of civilians in Bangladesh
(East Pakistan at the time) and widespread
violations of human rights – carried out by the Pakistan Army with support from
political and religious militias began with the start of Operation Searchlight on 25 March 1971.
Bangladeshi
authorities claim that three million people were killed, while the Hamoodur Rahman Commission, an official
Pakistan Government investigation, put the figure as low as 26,000 civilian
casualties. The international media and reference books in English have also
published figures which vary greatly from 200,000 to 3,000,000 for Bangladesh as a
whole. A further eight to ten million people fled the country to seek safety in
India.
Rayerbazar
killing field photographed immediately after the war, showing dead bodies of
intellectuals (Image courtesy: Rashid Talukdar, 1971)
A large section
of the intellectual community of Bangladesh were murdered, mostly by
the Al-Shams
and Al-Badr forces, at the instruction of the
Pakistani Army. Just 2 days before the surrender, on 14 December 1971, Pakistan
Army and Razakar militia (local collaborators) picked up at least 100
physicians, professors, writers and engineers in Dhaka,
and executed them, leaving the dead bodies in a mass grave.. There are many
mass graves in Bangladesh, and as years pass, more are being discovered (such
as one in an old well near a mosque in Dhaka, located in the
non-Bengali region of the city, which was discovered in August 1999). The first
night of war on Bengalis, which is documented in telegrams from the American
Consulate in Dhaka to the United States State Department, saw indiscriminate
killings of students of Dhaka
University and other
civilians.
Numerous women
were tortured, raped and killed during the war; the exact numbers are not known
and are a subject of debate. Bangladeshi sources cite a figure of 200,000 women
raped, giving birth to thousands of war babies.
The Pakistan Army also kept numerous Bengali women as sex-slaves inside the
Dhaka Cantonment. Most of the girls were captured from Dhaka
University and private homes. There was significant sectarian
violence not only perpetrated and encouraged by the Pakistani army, but also by
Bengali nationalists against non-Bengali minorities, especially Biharis.
On 16 December
2002, the George Washington University's National Security Archive published a
collection of declassified documents, consisting mostly of communications
between US embassy officials and United States Information Service
centers in Dhaka and India, and officials in Washington DC. These documents
show that US officials
working in diplomatic institutions within Bangladesh used the terms selective
genocide and genocide (see The Blood Telegram) to describe events they had
knowledge of at the time. Genocide is the term that is still used to describe the event
in almost every major publication and newspaper in Bangladesh,
although elsewhere, particularly in Pakistan, the actual death toll,
motives, extent, and destructive impact of the actions of the Pakistani forces
are disputed.
Foreign reaction
USA and USSR
The United States supported Pakistan both
politically and materially. U.S. President Richard Nixon
denied getting involved in the situation, saying that it was an internal matter
of Pakistan.
But when Pakistan's defeat
seemed certain, Nixon sent the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise to the Bay of Bengal,
a move deemed by the Indians as a nuclear threat. Enterprise arrived on station on 11 December
1971. On 6 December and 13 December, the Soviet Navy
dispatched two groups of ships, armed with nuclear missiles, from Vladivostok;
they trailed U.S. Task Force 74 in the Indian Ocean
from 18 December until 7 January 1972.The
Nixon administration provided support to Pakistan President Yahya Khan
during the turmoil.
Nixon and Henry
Kissinger feared Soviet expansion into South and Southeast
Asia. Pakistan
was a close ally of the People's Republic of China, with whom
Nixon had been negotiating a rapprochement and where he intended to
visit in February 1972. Nixon feared that an Indian invasion of West Pakistan
would mean total Soviet domination of the region, and that it would seriously
undermine the global position of the United
States and the regional position of America's new tacit ally, China. In order
to demonstrate to China the bona fides of the United States as an ally, and in
direct violation of the US Congress-imposed sanctions on Pakistan, Nixon sent
military supplies to Pakistan and routed them through Jordan and Iran, while
also encouraging China to increase its arms supplies to Pakistan.The Nixon
administration also ignored reports it received of the genocidal activities of
the Pakistani Army in East Pakistan, most notably the Blood
telegram.
The Soviet Union
supported Bangladesh and
Indian armies, as well as the Mukti Bahini
during the war, recognizing that the independence of Bangladesh
would weaken the position of its rivals - the United
States and China. It gave assurances to India that if a confrontation with the United States or China
developed, the USSR
would take counter-measures. This was enshrined in the Indo-Soviet friendship
treaty signed in August 1971. The Soviets also sent a nuclear submarine to ward
off the threat posed by USS Enterprise in the Indian Ocean.
China
As a
long-standing ally of Pakistan,
the People's Republic of China reacted with
alarm to the evolving situation in East Pakistan and the prospect of India invading West Pakistan and
Pakistani-controlled Kashmir. Believing that just such an Indian attack was
imminent, Nixon encouraged China
to mobilize its armed forces along its border with India to discourage such an
eventuality; the Chinese did not, however, respond in this manner and instead
threw their weight behind demands for an immediate ceasefire, due to its heavy
losses during the 1962 Sino-Indian War despite its victory. China did, however, continue to supply Pakistan with
arms and aid. It is believed that had China
taken action against India
to protect West Pakistan then the Soviet Union would have taken military action
against China.
One Pakistani writer has speculated that China
chose not to attack India
because Himalayan
passes were snowbound in the wintry months of November and December.
United
Nations
Though the United
Nations condemned the human rights violations, it failed to defuse
the situation politically before the start of the war. The Security Council
assembled on 4 December to discuss the volatile situation in South Asia.
USSR
vetoed the resolution twice. After lengthy discussions on 7 December, the
General Assembly promptly adopted by a majority resolution calling for an
"immediate cease-fire and withdrawal of troops." The United States
on 12 December requested that the Security Council be reconvened. However, by
the time it was reconvened and proposals were finalised, the war had ended,
making the measures merely academic.
The inaction of
the United Nations in face of the East Pakistan
crisis was widely criticized. The conflict also exposed the delay in decision
making that failed to address the underlying issues in time.
Nomenclature
This conflict is
referred to by many different names, some of which carry political
connotations:
"Bangladesh
War" is a common name for this conflict, but this term is also used for
the eastern front of the Indo-Pakistani War of 1971 war, and is generally
understood to be coterminous with The Indo-Pakistani War of 1971.
"Bangladesh
War of Independence" is the most commonly used name outside of the Indian
subcontinent. It is a common name formally used to describe many other
successful secessionist wars
"Bangladesh
Liberation War" (Mukti Judhho in Bangla) is
officially used in Bangladesh
by all sources and by Indian official sources. The proponents claim that having
won 167 out of 169 seats of East Pakistan, the Awami League had a popular
mandate to form a democratic government, and this gave Sheikh Mujibur Rahman,
as the leader of the party, the right to declare independence of the country.
In Bangladeshi eyes, since Major Ziaur Rahman claimed independence on behalf of
Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, an independent Bangladeshi government was in existence
as early as 26 March 1971, and therefore the war was fought by this government
for the liberation of its territory.This nomenclature is politically preferred
by both India and Bangladesh for
a few reasons:
It gave India the right to enter the war in support of Bangladesh
without breaching United Nations laws that prevent countries from interfering
with other countries' internal affairs.
Members of East
Bengal Regiment were able to fight Pakistan Army without being treated as
mutineers since they were fighting under command of a Bangladeshi Government.
It eased Indian diplomatic efforts to gain support for the recognition of Bangladesh as a
country.
"Pakistani
Civil War" describes either the period of 26 March 1971 to 16 December
1971 or the period of 26 March 1971 to 3 December 1971. However, it is rejected
by Bangladeshis who dislike the association with an internal struggle of the
state of Pakistan.
"Indo-Pakistani War of 1971" is most
commonly used to describe the period between 3 December 1971 and 16 December
1971. The Indian Army does not explicitly use the term to describe the war in
their Eastern Front at any point. Instead, India only refers to the war on the
Western Front as the Indo-Pakistani War. (Note that the Indian
Parliament recognized the People's Republic of Bangladesh as an
independent country on the 6 December 1971.)
Meet calls for
UN recognition of 1971 'genocide' in Bangladesh:-
Amid efforts in Bangladesh to kickstart the trial of the 1971
"war criminals", the government has been asked to take diplomatic
steps for UN recognition of the "genocide" by the Pakistan
military.
An international
conference in the capital called for a campaign for United Nations' recognition
of the mass killings during the 1971 Liberation War as genocide.
Historians,
academics and international legal experts told the conference, which ended
yesterday, that the government should make necessary preparations for trying
the "war criminals" and pursue diplomatic efforts to drum up
international support in favour of the move, The Daily Star newspaper said
today.
"The conference calls upon the media and the civil society at home and abroad to focus on the genocide in Bangladesh, and launch a campaign so that this is recognised in the UN as Genocide," said the declaration of the two-day 'Second International Conference on Genocide, Truth and Justice' organised by the Liberation War Museum.
Legal experts and academics from Germany, Vietnam, Hong Kong, UK and Canada were also present.
Bangladesh's Jamaat-e-Islami party chief Motiur Rahman Nizami and Secretary General Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mojahid led the so-called Al-Badr forces, which is widely believed to have been involved in genocide, rape and murder of frontline intellectuals in an effort to cripple the emerging nation in 1971. AB Tazul Islam, Bangladesh State Minister for Liberation War Affairs, said the government is doing everything possible to ensure fair trial for war criminals.
"The trial
process can begin anytime," he underlined. Earlier, Pakistan had cautioned Bangladesh that efforts to push
ahead with the controversial trial may cast a shadow on bilateral ties. The
ruling Awami League, which has vowed to punish the criminals during the
'independence war', has demanded an apology from Pakistan for the killing of
three million Bangladeshis and rape of lakhs of women by the Pakistan army
during the bloody nine-month war. However, Pakistan does not acknowledge the
killings.
Jamaat-e-Islami, a crucial ally of opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and several other rightwing groups have been accused of helping the Pakistani military during the 'Liberation War'. The Islamist party's description of the event as a "civil war" has intensified public outrage in the country.
The Parliament
in its third sitting earlier this year adopted a resolution for the trial of
the war criminals in line with the election pledge of the Awami League.
Bangladesh & India
friendship Treaty:-
This paper seeks to discuss Bangladesh-India
relations from a strategic perspective with special focus on the 1972
Bangladesh-India Friendship treaty. It delves into the origins of the alliance
between the two countries and their motivations for signing it. It looks at how
the treaty has fared in practice and why subsequent regimes did not abrogate
it. This author believes that the treaty resulted from the circumstances of Bangladesh’s independence war and the role that India played in
it. The Cold War and the global alliance system also had a role. Now that the
Cold War is over and Bangladesh
is no longer a newly emergent nation, is there any need for the continuation of
the treaty?
Personal Observations:-
To be a
recognized state, there are some conditions i.e,
- Statehood;
- Right to Self-determination of citizen;
- Political consideration;
- Peaceful, stable Govt.Constitutional Govt. etc;
- The attitude of mother state;
- The attitude of neibouring states;
- The attitude of regional organizations.
Bangladesh as a
new state, all the conditions was fulfilled in 1971. So today Bangladesh is a
recognized state.
Conclusion:-
Bangladesh or East Bengal
is a historical reality. In 1971 it has been curved out of political boundaries
of what was East Pakistan
after a bloody civil war by the nationalists, and of course the secular forces.
The reign of terror unleashed in 1971, and the consequent persecution of the
Bangalee masses in the name of defending Islam and the Islamic bond between the
two provinces of Pakistan had already made the future of Islam as a basis of
state-policy uncertain in the new state brought into being by the secular
forces in the teeth of the fiercest opposition by the obscurantist elements.
Now Bangladesh is a
recognized & independent & sovereign state.
☼
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