Untold Facts

Bangladesh Pakistan Relation: An Appraisal Perspective from Dhaka

Pak PM’s visit
There was a news item published in a Dhaka daily that PM Hasina while she met the Pakistan P.M. Gillani sidelined on a recent visit to Cairo has invited him to visit Bangladesh. The visit might, as the report went, take place at some agreeable time in near future. The news was certainly a good one as people of both the countries would be benefited possibly in sorting out from the proposed visit many issues that still after 38 years, at times, make things unpleasant and create unreasonable acrimony.

Two Decades
It is only historical truth that both people struggled long, then founded the State of Pakistan and stayed together for little over two decades (1947-1971). The two parts or wings geographically distanced away at one thousand miles, a separate sovereign country in between, made some difficulties in many day-to-day issues of administration. Even so, the issue did not create any stumbling block in forward advancement compared to many neighboring and developing countries. The only lacuna was that the country partly failed in open democratic polity and so had some grumbling at certain quarters that absence of free democracy had had the obvious effect.

Dictatorship
In about two decades of confused dictatorship hopes for democracy was shining in the minds of the people that though a non-politician and army dictator set goals for in 1970 election in both wings of the country. Fortunately the election was held on schedule, but the result had one unfortunate feature in that the two regional or provincial parties, the Awami League in the East and the People’s Party in the West won in the polls with absolute majority in exclusion of the other party in the provinces. People in both the wings had fears of anything bad for the two main party leaders were in non-conciliatory mood. That provided a golden opportunity for the big neighbor to grind her axe against the unity and integrity of one and united Pakistan as she continued to do since the days of 1947 partition of British India.

R&AW
Here it may be worthwhile to make some in depth look into the big neighbor’s intelligence activities manned and managed by the stalwarts of the R&AW (Research and Analysis Wing). There are many published documents in the matter dating back for their activities in early 1950s to the 1971 crisis and their fuelling of the opportune crises one after another following the 1970 election. Though the R&AW was formally launched by the then Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi in 1968 to augment and strengthen further its earlier activities of the 1950s and 1960s, she had in the main three main goals then to accomplish, one, dismember Srilanka and establish Tamil Land in the north and east, occupy the small Himalayan independent country Sikkim and most importantly effect secession of East Pakistan to dismember Pakistan, her ‘Number one Enemy.’ The 1970 election result of East Pakistan, in particular, gave Delhi the best of opportunities of ‘one thousand years’. Among the published documents from the &AW operatives working during 1950s and 1960s, one may have some insight look into the works of Jyoti SenGupta (History of Freedom Movement of Bangladesh 1947-73, 1974) and Ashok Raina (Inside RAW, 1982) both of R&AW’s, intelligence operatives, and the Federation of American Scientists (FAS) findings report compiled meticulously in details since 1947 and published in an internet edition on the 24th August 2009 by David Miller Smith.

Design of Delhi
There had been no hide and seek of Delhi’s design in the region, and so aggressively for East Pakistan. But it is a pity that many top-level leaders who even had fought for Pakistan in 1947 joined the R&W operation in early 1950s (if Jyoto Sen Gupta is to be believed), no matter fully knowingly or unknowingly due to callousness.

Self Seekers
The matter did not end in the egoist hard and backward looking attitude of the politicians. Even the Army General who had the gun at his control in view of the Martial Law in force in the country had licentious evil habits so much so that an Indian R&AW spy ‘RANI’ (possibly nicknamed as mentioned in Sarder Mohammad Chowdhury’s Ultimate Crime, 1999) might have played a critical role in the 25th March (1971) suicidal ‘Operation Searchlight’ in Dhaka that obviously triggered dismemberment of Pakistan and secession of East Pakistan.

Better way out
The subsequent history of both (West) Pakistan and Bangladesh are recent and in everybody’s fresh memory. To me, both have gained something, no doubt, from the 1971 secession, but the losses are yet to be fully accounted for they would continue to hound both compressed, if not oppressed, in between the bigger arms of the much bigger neighbor.

Inequality
At popular level millions of commoners are not better off but suffer from exploitation, grinding poverty and utter frustration of minimum dignified living. Increasing rate of inequality between man and man from region to region is a harsh reality in both the countries and yet independent, and so making mockery of freedom. The big neighbor India do not fare better in terms of inequality between man and man, exploitation of one region by another, and yet the R&AW imposes threat and dominance for devouring all smaller neighbors around sooner than latter.

Two powers
In the backdrop briefly outlined above, history asks us to look long long back to rediscover that there were and are only two great and contesting powers in the subcontinent, the egalitarian Muslims for emancipation of all human beings, on the one hand, and the racist Hindus for perpetuating hatred and inequality, on the other, and that are the open options ahead for these countries to obviously move forward. Possibly, no other third way out whatever bandwagon for democracy and secularism is loudly given. Pakistan and Bangladesh, if they would contemplate afresh in this line, and pragmatically may look ahead consciously ignoring the follies and lapses of the past they may gain something positive and usefulness in dialogue in the proposed visit of the Pakistan P.M. of the second generation having no backlog liability.

Author: M.T. Hussain

Why did India help in 1971?

Unlike our other neighbours India has a special place in our history because of its help in our liberation war. When the Pakistani military was murdering hundreds of thousands of unarmed people and raping the women of the then East Pakistan, India came forward with its helping hand and contributed to arming and training the mukti bahini. Almost 10 million people took shelter in India, especially in the states adjacent to East Pakistan border. Nobody in Bangladesh questions the fact that we got help from India but many question the nature of the help. Was it selfless help or India had a strategic interest in helping Bangladesh?

With a view to find out the truth we have to analyze what India gained from our freedom struggle and its attitude toward Bangladesh after our liberation war. Let us examine the entire thing from strategic, economic, and political point of views.

Strategic point of view

India’s peculiar geographic position constituted a major threat to its national security. Due to the geographic location of then East Pakistan, the seven sisters were completely isolated from the mainland. A small corridor, popularly known as chicken neck, was the only passage that could be used for traffic movement. Militarily, India was pretty vulnerable especially due to Chinese presence along the border. The war that was fought between India and China taught India the lesson that faster troops mobility is the only way to win a war. So, India needed transit facility through East Pakistan to transport troops and logistics faster to defend its vulnerable North Eastern states. Besides that, Pakistan was playing a vital role in instigating the insurgents in Assam and elsewhere to break up the entire region. The Indian military strategists were out of options and didn’t know how the North Eastern region would be saved. The Hawkish politicians in India came to the conclusion that breaking up Pakistan is the only way to save the militarily insecure North Eastern region. By doing so,

•They could weaken Pakistan and reduce the threat level.

•Recapture the Pakistani portion of Kashmir

•Create a new state that would be militarily and economically weak and provide the much needed transit for troops and logistics transportation

•Project India as a regional superpower and warn all elements inimical to India’s security that India had the power to defend itself.

Economic point of view

India also had an economic objective to dismember Pakistan. India was a country with huge population and needed additional resources to uplift its economy. The economic cooperation with Pakistan was all but encouraging. Besides that, the water resources of the Himalayas were needed for India for irrigation and power generation. Due to Pakistan’s strong military, India was unable to use the resources unilaterally. Despite being a third world nation, Pakistan was a huge economic market that was able to absorb millions of dollars worth of Indian commodities. But the hostility between the two nations retarded the possibility of a robust economic cooperation between the two nations.

Indian policymakers thought that if they could break Pakistan and create a new and weaker Bangladesh then they would be able to gain unrestricted access to its economic market. India knew that as a new nation, Bangladesh would need cheap industrial products to revive its economy. So, there was a tremendous potential for economic cooperation between the two nations. India also wanted to get transit through Bangladesh to transport raw materials for its North Eastern states. The economically backward North Eastern region needed more investment and various products to energize its economy. So, the Indians thought Bangladesh would be much more beneficial for Indian economy than East Pakistan. The economic calculation was very accurate because India managed to sell hundreds of millions of dollars worth of cheap products to Bangladesh both legally and illegally. They destroyed the thriving jute industry of Bangladesh to build their own right after our independence.

India flooded the local Bangladeshi market with its products and offered millions of dollars more as loans to buy Indian commodities. We were reduced to a trading nation and almost destroyed the very basis of our own industry. India encouraged smuggling along the Indo-Bangla border so the government of Bangladesh had to close the border to stop the rampant smuggling to save the local traders. India never wanted an economically prosperous Bangladesh rather it wanted to use us as a market for its own products and in the process make us dependent on them.

If we look at the present situation, the lopsided trade relation between the two nations speaks volume of the Indian intention to help us in 1971. Bangladesh is an open market economy and allows duty free access for Indian products to our market. But India follows a restricted policy when it comes to importing Bangladeshi products and imposed numerous tariffs and para-tariffs on the Bangladeshi goods. The yawning trade imbalance is a testament to the fact that India never wanted an economically self-sufficient Bangladesh.

Political point of view

Former Indian foreign secretary Mr. Dixit said, “We helped in the liberation of Bangladesh in mutual interest, it was not a favour,”

His statement is clear evidence that India did not help Bangladesh on humanitarian ground. India had a long-term strategic plan to dismember Pakistan for its own gain. India had cultivated deep political relation with the disgruntled elements within the erstwhile East Pakistan. [1] As per a senior RAW intelligence officer, “Bangladesh was the result of a 10 year long promotion of dissatisfaction against the rulers of Pakistan”.

This goes to prove that helping Bangladesh was not an instantaneous decision of India rather it was a carefully designed strategic plan that was executed in pinpoint precision.

One of the top bosses of RAW, K. Sankaran Nair, was responsible for training the erstwhile East Pakistani officers in guerrilla warfare. He also established excellent relation with Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. The relation was maintained via a RAW operative Mr. Banerjee. RAW even funded the 1970s election, in which Sheikh Mujib emerged as the winner [2].

But after the liberation, things did not go the way India had planned. Mujib was assassinated and Awami League was ousted from the power. General Ziaur Rahman came to power and adopted an anti India foreign and defense policy to drag Bangladesh out of Indian sphere of influence. He established good economic and political relation with America and China. He also repaired relations with the Middle Eastern countries and created a huge opportunity for the Bangladeshi workers in the Arab nations. Money started to pour in and the economy got better. He amended the constitution to give it an Islamic flavour in a country where 90% people were Muslims. The Indian policymakers observed the political development in Bangladesh and clearly understood that things were getting worse as far as Indian interest was concerned.

In the meantime, General Ziaur Rahman took various measures to upgrade the military. A close defense relation was established between Bangladesh and China. This irked the military establishment of India. They considered it a hostile act and found it hard to digest. The disgruntled elements in Delhi decided to create a rebel group in Chittagong hill tracts to keep Bangladesh under pressure and drain as much resources of this newly born poor country as possible. Shanti bahini played havock with the lives and properties of the people in CHT. General Zia quickly decided to populate CHT with Bengalees to maintain the territorial integrity of Bangladesh. In the meantime, India forcefully occupied South Talpatty disregarding Bangladesh’s request for a joint survey to determine the ownership of the Island. [3] General Zia was assassinated in 1981 and many observers believe that RAW had a hand in the incident.

General Ershad came to power in 1982 and more or less followed the same foreign policy as General Zia. But Ershad knew he should not annoy India beyond a certain limit so a tendency to keep India in good humour was obvious in his India policy. During his tenure, he agreed to abolish the guarantee clause from the water sharing treaty signed by General Zia. It went against our national interest because after abolishment of the guarantee clause, India reduced the water supply even further and that affected our agriculture and ecology. But the fact of the matter is even General Ershad couldn’t take a fully pro-Indian stance due to public pressure. He had to continue the military modernization and amended the constitution to declare Islam as the state religion. This drew ire from the top leaders of India. Ershad didn’t even try to take any initiative to give transit to India fearing wide spread protest across the country.

Actually, the Indian leaders knew that the only party that was able to meet the Indian strategic demands was Awami League. They never stopped keeping relations with Awami League and provided all sorts of logistis support to Sheikh Hasina. According to some well-informed observers, India provided Tk. 300 crore to Awami League to win the 1996 election(Weekly Shugondha, 26th April, 1996). India’s clandestine support for a particular party is a testament to the fact that India had a strategic reason to help Bangladesh in 1971.

If India’s help was altruistic in nature, India would have tried to win the hearts and minds of the people of Bangladesh but they never felt the need to do that and continued with their policy to clandestinely help bring Awami League to power. Even today, India leaves no stone unturned to malign Bangladesh. The Indian foreign ministry spends millions of dollars to hire foreign journalists to make fictitious reports to portray Bangladesh as Taliban sympathizer. Fortunately, Bangladesh took quick action to hang a few mis-guided Mullahs who were creating some disturbances. Bangladesh even signed various treaties to help the international community to combat terrorism.

More can be written to prove that India’s help in 1971 was not an altruistic one rather it was for gaining strategic advantages. India has an ambitious vision of becoming a world power but how can they achieve their goal if they cannot convince their neighbours that their intentions are benign? Using force to subjugate the weaker neighbours is not the way to go to establish a relation based on mutual trust and respect.

References

1.RAW: Top-Secret Failures, p: 5
2.Ibid. , p: 8
3.Limits of Diplomacy: Bangladesh, Partha. S. Ghosh

Author: Shah Mohammed Saifuddin ( Maruf)
Founder of Bangladesh Strategic & Development Fourm

Wrong footed Kh. Delwar Hossain

A news item in a Dhaka Bengali daily on the 1st September coinciding incidentally with the founding day of the BNP quoted the Secretary General Kh. Delwar Hossain of the party in his Bengali verbatim that unambiguously sounded and meant that some ‘misguided’ among the serving army men had been responsible for the 15th August 1975 ‘killing’ of the top leader of the country. The comment sounded not only fantastic but also far away in many ways from the real truth. It was further a matter of pity that the very political party BNP that would not have been even born having had none of the 15th August 1975 can make such baseless remark in the matter.

Politics in Bangladesh is in the main value free or nothing to do with truth, fairness, justice, and honesty etc., much less anything of higher ideal. That is what ‘secularism’ in politics means in almost all neo-colonial developing countries.

However, BNP is not in some people’s estimation exactly what the other secular parties mean. On above this expectation the BNP was born with the promise for Islamic value system that owed its origin and clue in the revolution of the 15th August of 1975. Had there been no 15th August there would not have been either the BNP or the Islamic value system just as had been first initiated at the commencement of the revised Constitution of Bangladesh through the 5th Amendment.

The 15th August successful coup was nothing exceptional act, much less any cognizable offence, but a recognized process of change of hands of political power. The subsequent constitutional continuity after August 1975 until this day of 2009 bear clear testimony of the legitimacy of the coup. Thus they performed great national task and so must be praised as national heroes and in no way as ‘misguided’ ones both in legal and political terms.

Kh. Delwar Hossain has a serious obligation to admit his gross fault in using the inaccurate term and in addition as the BNP Secretary General must openly apologize to the people of the country.

Author: M.T. Hussain