Many myths have been formed around the creation of Bangladesh. Among them is the fiction that the defeated Pakistan Army savagely killed three million people and raped three hundred thousand women during their less than nine months unsuccessful fight to preserve the integrity of a united Pakistan. Recalling this heinous Pakistani crime with suave moral indignation was made into a national ritual. Not only the beaten Pakistan Army but also the subverted Pakistan came to be portrayed as inherently evil and her dismemberment a triumph of civilized values over barbarism. No less a figure than the Father of the Nation was made to consecrate the lore. With his stamp of authority behind it, his grateful children were implicitly compelled into faithfully repeating it. Not to accept it as the whole truth, nothing but the truth with unquestioning faith was to fall short of being a Bengali patriot. In those hallucinatory days of liberated Bangladesh, the premium for such a terrible shortcoming was not merely dear, but potentially fatal. The permanent disappearance of Zahir Raihan, the celebrated writer and film director, who showed the audacity of forming and heading The Buddhijibi Nidhan Tayithanusandhan Committee (The Fact Finding Committee on the Killing of Intellectuals), in January 1972 [1] was a calculated warning to all doubting Bangladeshis. Understandably, the skeptics kept quiet and the scoundrels and the credulous joined the chorus masters in singing the saga of three million ‘martyrs’ and three hundred thousand heroines. Once the ‘Father of the Nation’ had fallen into disrepute and even came to be accused of treachery to the Bangladeshi nation’, some of the deified artefacts adorning the liberationist altar came to be seen as mendacious. But not this nor any other Pakistani crime; at least not officially. The successive masters of Bangladesh have shown no interest in exonerating Pakistan from any charges, however undeserved they might have been. Instead, by keeping them alive they skilfully played politics by veering on the sides of the accused and the accuser all at once. Alongside the dubious opportunism of the occupants of power, the dwindling band of the conscious keepers of the Bengali spirit of liberation have continued their efforts to keep the myth alive through a more vociferous recital. Yet, over the years, questioning voices were heard. These were not from the much maligned pro-Pakistanis alone, but also from among the unimpeachable liberationists and their Indian comrades, including the highest Indian most generals who gave Bangladesh its Cesarean birth. Some of the latter have, of course, their own fiction to sell. Curiously, those in Pakistan have remained indolent. There was no attempt to refute any of the vile accusations, including this very loathsome charge. Instead, there appeared to be a misplaced hope that apologetic smile to any and every charge would help in taking the heat out and once sobriety was restored and goodwill regenerated, the time would arrive for the truth to come out. Despite its many attractions, such a stand back posture has helped in perpetuating the falsehood and possibly retarding the restoration of the brotherly relationship between the peoples of Pakistan and Bangladesh. [2] For the intention of the mythmakers was to harbour hatred. In order to create a healthy relationship between the two peoples it is essential to admit, and where possible to take measures to amend, all past mistakes committed by either people and their leaders. However, it is imperative that such steps should be taken on both sides with fidelity to truth and not on opportunism or contrived facts and unfounded myths. . Like many other myths of its kind, the fiction of three million dead and three hundred thousand women raped was not politically innocent; and it is time to recognise this both in Pakistan and in Bangladesh. Not to do so would be a disservice to truth and damaging to the interest of the people of both countries, especially the people of Bangladesh. This would be so, for any further credence to such a poisonous myth would perpetuate the psychic isolation and the splintered Muslim self-view of the people of Bangladesh in their geopolitically island-like setting. This would not serve their enlightened national self-interest, nor their independence. Instead, this would help those in and outside their country who wish to do away with their very existence as a Muslim nation. BEHIND THE MYTH OF THREE MILLION is a re-examination of a sad chapter in the relationship of the people of Pakistan and Bangladesh and exposes its utterly contrived nature as well as the motive behind such inventiveness. I am one of those whose family were reported among the casualties of Pakistan Armys action in Dhaka on the night of 26 March 1971. Some of my personal friends within the liberationist camp even had a condolence meeting for me in their Indian safe heaven! I am not alone in having been counted as dead. Countless other people could tell a similar story of their own. Some have even found their names engraved in the commemorative plaques solemnly dedicated in memory of the fallen heroes of the Bangladesh War. [3] Being one of many such reincarnated beings, I feel duty bound to help remove the myth which is of no service either to my fellow countrymen or to history. Yet, mindful of the requirement of objectivity I have chosen to confine myself to published works and recorded sources and have analysed them with the utmost fidelity to the truth. The ultimate judgement lies with the reader and it is my hope that they would find the pages that follow both interesting and informative. In putting facts over fiction, I risk ruffling the feathers of those who for all manner of reasons have allowed themselves to be beguiled. Even if a few of them start considering the facts and begin rethinking their position, I shall consider my efforts worth-while. For those who in their blinkered disposition refuse to distinguish facts from fiction and continue to follow the pied pipers of the spirit of liberation fame, who have - to my mind and I hope many would agree with me - no better function other than leading the Muslim Nation of Bangladesh towards its national suicide, I can only pray for divine guidance. A friend has helped me with source materials and other friends have joined him in encouraging me for a quick completion of the work. All of them have done so, I am sure, out of friendship and not for credit. The friend who helped me with source materials particularly wanted to remain anonymous. In deference to his wish, I refrain from naming him and other friends. However, saliently and sincerely I acknowledge their debt and pray for their continued well-being. February, 1996 (Dr. M. Abdul Mu’min Chowdhury) NOTES AND REFERENCES 1. Zahir Raihan was a Marxist who was said to have been disillusioned while in Calcutta and did not believe that the intellectuals found murdered in Dhaka on the eve of 16 December 1971- who included his elder brother Shahidullah Kaiser- could have been killed at the behest of the Pakistan Army as has been alleged. The rumour has it that he also had incriminatory photographs of questionable activities of the Awami League leaders in India. While gathering information about the killing he was kidnapped in Dhaka in broad day light and was never seen again. There is no doubt that he was killed by either those who were at risk of being exposed or those who did not like the truth behind the killing of the intellectuals to come out. 2. For a cogent argument on this point cf. Syed Sajjad Husain, The Wastes of Time: Reflections on the Decline and Fall of East Pakistan, Notun Safar Prokashani, 44 Purana Paltan, Dhaka -1000, 1995: 265-84 3. Jauhuri, Tirish Lakher Telesmat (The Riddle of Thirty Lakh), Asha Prokashan, 435 Elephant Road, Dhaka -1217,1994: 74 1.1. A Belated Bust-up: In May 1973, Abdul Gaffar Choudhury, a well known newspaper columnist and close associate of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, said: ‘We are now saying three million Bengali’s have been martyred. Without any survey we are telling three million Bengali’s have died.’ [1] After openly raising doubts about the alleged figure, Choudhury left Bangladesh for good for Britain. It took another twenty years for the question to be raised again. Participating in a debate in the National Assembly of Bangladesh on 15 June 1993, Col. Akbar Hussain, a decorated ‘Mukti Juddha’ and a Cabinet Minister under both General Ziaur Rahman and Mrs Khaleda Zia, returned to the question. Making a pointed attack on the Awami League for its propensity to falsify history, he said that the Awami League had created the myth of three million killed, whereas in reality it was closer to a tenth of that figure. On the following day Shudhangshu Shekar Haldar, a Hindu member of Awami League, challenged Col. Hussain to substantiate his assertion with ‘recorded proof’. Responding to the challenge, the Minister told the National Assembly that after the creation of Bangladesh an announcement was made to pay Tk. 2,000 to every family that suffered loss of life where upon only three hundred thousand families had claimed such compensation. Had there been three million individuals dead, their families would have claimed for compensation. Poignantly, Haldar could not, and did not, challenge the figure of those actually claimed compensation. Nor could he give any satisfactory explanation for the missing two million seven hundred thousand. Instead, he began inquiring as to what could have prompted the Minister to question a well-known fact. The tactic was a clear one: if you cannot kill the message, kill the messenger. Having done that however, he requested the presiding Deputy Speaker to expunge Col. Hussains remarks from the proceedings of the Assembly. At this point Abdus Samad Azad, standing in for the Awami League leader, stood up and spoke in support of his party colleagues demand for the effacement of the remarks. His argument was: So far no one, including General Ziaur Rahman, has challenged the figure of three million. We had it from our leader Sheikh Mujib and it must stand as correct. [2] 1.2. Mujib’s Part in the Myth Making: Indeed, it was Mujibs stamp of approval which gave the oft quoted number both its life and respectability. On 10 January 1972, the very day of his return to Bangladesh from prison in West Pakistan, he publicly announced: ..... Three million people have been killed. I believe that there is no parallel in the history of the world of such a colossal loss of lives for the struggle for freedom. [3] He repeated the same charge before the world in a television interview given to the British broadcaster David Frost. In the same interview, which was recorded at his private residence in Dhaka and was broadcasted from New York on 18 January 1972, he also made the astounding claim that the very house in which the interview was taking place had been destroyed by the Pakistani Army! [4] A day earlier the Time Magazine quoted Mujib saying, ‘if Hitler could have been alive today he would be ashamed’ [5] During the following weeks and months, his insistence on the three million figure grew and it became his all-purpose opening song. Let me give an example. The vice-secretary asked me to sit in the corridor crowded with at least 50 persons. He then walked into the office and informed Mujib of my presence. I heard a terrible growl and the poor man reappeared shaken, asking me to wait. I waited. One hour, two hours, three hours, four hours, then at eight oclock I was still there in that damned corridor. At 8-30 a miracle occurred: Mujib was ready to receive me. I was asked to enter. I entered into a large room with a sofa and two armchairs. Mujib was sprawled all over the sofa and two fat ministers were seated in the armchairs with their bellies in the air. No one rose. No one made a greeting and no one responded to mine. There was a very long silence until Mujib gestured to me to sit down. I sat on a small corner of the sofa and opened up the tape recorder preparing the first question. But, I didnt have time for that. Mujib started to shout: Hurry up, quick, understand? I have no time to waste, is that clear? The Pakistanis have killed three million people, is that clear? Yes, three, three, three. (How he arrived at that figure, Ill never understand. The Indians speaking of the victims have never gone over the one million figure). I said: Mr Prime Minister... Mujib started to shout again: ‘They killed my women in front of their husbands and children, the husbands in front of their sons and wives, the sons in front of their fathers and mothers, the nephews before their grandfathers and grandmothers, the grandfathers and grandmothers in front of their nephews, cousins in front of cousins, aunts in front of uncles, brother-in-law in front of sister-in-law .. . ‘Mr Prime Minister, I would like .. .’ ‘Listen to her, she would like! She would like. You have no right to want anything, understand? Is that clear? This is the account of the well-known Italian journalist Oriana Fallacis interview with Mujib. [6] Yet, only on 8 January 1972 in London, on his way back to Bangladesh, the same Mujib had claimed that one million people had been killed in Bangladesh. [7] One might wonder who updated the figure for Mujib? Was it done between his journey from London to Dhaka, via New Delhi or immediately after his arrival in Dhaka? It has been claimed by one of the involved Indian organisers of the Freedom Movement that By and by he [Mujib] came to know more details and later in Dacca he put the figure at 3.5 million .[8] Since Mujib focussed on three million, rather than on his long time benefactors averred three and a half million, one might think he was still hesitant to paddle out everything his involved benefactors were handing him out. But, where did he get this figure form? 1.3. The Myth Makers at Work: However inventive Mujib was with facts and however insistent he became with the fiction of three million killed and three hundred thousand raped, as we shall see he himself did not fabricate it. He simply parroted in public, what was given to him in private. In fact, the figure which he was eventually handed out, went through several updates at the hands of a number of involved quarters. 1.4. The Swadhin Bangla Betar: Up to 10 December 1971, Mujib’s own Awami League colleagues, few of whom ever ventured out to face the Pakistan Army and most of whom had reportedly spent their Indian sojourn in enjoyment with their friends and families [9] had been circulating an estimated casualty figure of three hundred thousand, through the Swadhin Bangla Betar. [10] Even years later his party Vice President, Zahirul Qayyum, would implicitly contest the myth of three million by pointing to this estimate broadcasted by the official organ of the Bangladesh Government in exile.[II] 1.5. Indian Authorities: Yet, on 7 January 1972 the Press Trust of India, quoting Sheikh Abdul Aziz, the newly appointed Communication Minister of Bangladesh [12], reported from Calcutta a casualty figure of over one million. However, the news communicated by the Indian national news agency stressed that the casualty toll was a provisional one and disclosed that the Government of Bangladesh was going to collect statistics in order to obtain the actual figure. Apparently, to give some credibility to the Ministers newly updated estimate, he was quoted as saying that in his own village the Pakistan Army had killed 107 persons. [13] There was no explanation as to how the estimated death toll rose by three-fold in a matter of three weeks, during most of which the ‘culprit’ Pakistan Army had been under Indian custody. To be fair to the Minister, this figure of one million killed was floating around from the beginning of the insurgency. One Asad Choudhury wrote a poem, called Report 1971 at the start of the insurgency. In it he told his readers that the Pakistani Army had, by then, massacred one million Bengalis and have raped forty thousand women. [14] Likewise, on 24 June 1972 the ‘Swadhin Bangla Betar’ broadcasted a speech, supposedly written by Maulana Bhashani, which, inter alia, claimed that after sacrificing one million invaluable lives, the struggling masses of independent Bengal would not accept any thing else. Their only road is either full independence or death. [15] But, one might still want to know, why the Minister suddenly found this preferable over the Swadhin Bangla Betars hitherto ‘official’ figure of three hundred thousand? In this connection, it is to be noted that the Indian authorities, including Indias military establishment, have consistently maintained that so far as they were concerned the casualty figure stood at one million. What is more interesting, M.R.Akhtar Mukul, who as the head of the Swadhin Bangla Betar and the presenter of its best known programme Charampatra (Dire Letter) had been regularly disseminating out the three hundred thousand figure up to 10 December 1971, in his book of recollection ‘Ami Bijoy Dekhechi’ (I Have Seen Victory) he piously authenticated the one million casualty toll without ever mentioning his old vaunted death toll. [16] Those who are familiar with Mukul s professed willingness to lie for facilitating Indian cover-ups [17] would not be surprised at his volte face. Nor would they doubt that like Mukul, Sheikh Abdul Aziz was also made to endorse the figure deemed appropriate for the occasion by the Indian authorities. In his reminiscence Field Marshall Sam Manekshaw simply presented the figure as a ‘well-known fact’ and expressed utter incredulity at the figure of three million with which Mujibs name became inextricably linked. [18] Likewise, in a mass produced video interview Lt Gen. Jagjit Singh Aurora said that all of us knew that the Pakistan Army had brutally killed about a million people; yet Sheikh Mujib who was more an agitator and less an administrator decided to make it more brutish by saying that the Pakistan Army had killed three million Bengalis. He pointed out that Mujibs figure was absolutely impossible, because the Pakistan Army had simultaneously fought within the country and at the borders. [19] Earlier, Maj.Gen.D.K.Palit, who also had a hand in the birth of Bangladesh engineered by the Indian Army, gave the same one million figure as if it was an indubitable fact which required no supporting proof. [20] Despite Palits stance, one should heed the significance of the fact that neither Manekshaw nor Aurora have vouched for the authenticity of the Indian figure beyond that it was a well-known fact or some how known to us. The absolutely impossible figure of three million to which Mujib publicly tied up his own name was not absolutely his own invention. The credit for its fabrication was due to one Ehtesham Haider Choudhury, editor of the Dhaka daily Purbadesh and his Russian friend, the Pravda representative in Dhaka. 1.6. The Purbadesh/Pravda/ENA: In a signed editorial under the heading of Hang the Yahya Junta on the 22 December 1971 issue of the Purbadesh, Choudhury claimed that the enemy occupation forces have savagely killed about three million innocent people and more than two hundred intellectuals. [21] Curiously enough, only on the previous day the same daily printed an eight column red coloured banner heading, asking: How many people of Bengal have been killed? In it Ershad Majumdar, the papers senior reporter, categorically said that every where people are asking: How many people of Bangladesh have been killed? How many lakhs (unit of hundred thousand)? 10,20,30,40 or 50 lakhs? No one seems to have the answer. But the people are not likely to leave the question unanswered. Answer we must have. [22] Within days the Pravda printed a news claiming that over three million people have been killed by the Pakistan Army. The Soviet daily carried the news without mentioning the Purbadesh editorial. The report was credited to its Special Correspondent. ENA, the Bangladesh news agency, lifted the Pravda news and reproduced it in all major Dhaka dailies under the beading: Pak Army Killed Over 30 Lakh People. Now it read The Communist Party Newspaper Pravda has reported that over 30 lakh persons were killed throughout Bangladesh by the Pakistani occupation forces during the last nine months, reports ENA. Quoting its Special Correspondent stationed in Dacca, the paper said that the Pakistani military forces immediately before their surrender to Mukti Bahinis and the Allied Forces had killed about 800 intellectuals in the capital city of Bangladesh alone.[23] The change from less than three million of the Purbadesh editor into over three million is to be marked. The effortless four-fold increase in the number of intellectuals allegedly killed is also to be noticed. We may also keep in mind Jyoti Sen Guptas false claim regarding Mujibs announcement that 3.5 million people have been killed. 1.7. How Mujib Took to Parroting the Last Figure: It was reported that on his arrival in Dhaka on 10 January 1972 the lobby behind the fabrication of the ‘absolutely impossible’ figure promptly briefed the returning Bangladesh leader with the added fact of three hundred thousand women raped, who in turn immediately went on parroting it. [24] Thus, the self-serving fiction of ‘three million killed’ and ‘three hundred thousand women raped’ was created. Notes and References 1. Abdul Gaffar Choudhury, Shahosh Kare Kichu Shaythay Katha Bala Proyjan, (With Courage a Few Truth Have to be Said), The Dainik Janapad, Dhaka, 20 May 1973 2. Cf. The Proceedings of the National Assembly of Bangladesh, 15 and 16 June, 1993. 3. Ramendu Majumdar, Bangladesh My Bangladesh: Selected Speeches and Statements, Muktadhara. 74 Farashganj, Dhaka - 1, 1972: 140 4. Cf. M.R.Akhtar Mukul, Ami Vijoy Dekhechi (I Have Seen Victory), Sagar Publications, GPO Box 3057, Dhaka, Bangladesh, 1391 BS (1984): 245. 5. Time Magazine, NewYork, 17 January 1972. 6. Oriana Fallaci, An Interview with Mujibur Rahman, L Europeo, Rome, 24 February, 1972. [cf. Text in Appendix - I] 7. Jyoti Sen Gupta, History of Freedom Movement in Bangladesh, 1947-73: Some Involvement, Naya Prokash, 206 Bidhan Sarani, Calcutta - 6, 1974: 445 8. Jyoti Sen Gupta, ibid .: 445 9. Abdul Gaffar Choudhury, op cit. 10. Yahya Mirza, Interview with Mr.Abdul Muhaimin, The Tarokalok, 1 March, 1990; and Jauhuri, Tirish Lakher Telesmat (The Riddle of Thirty Lakh), Asha Prokashani, 435 Elephant Road, Dhaka - 1217, 1994: 48. 11. Jauhuri, ibid: 48-49 12. Four new ministers were added to the five-men Government which in existence in Calcutta since April, 1971. The new appointments were made on 29 December 1971 13. Jauhuri, op cit: 63-64 14. M.R.Akhtar Mukul, op cit: 95 15. ibid: 95 16. ibid: 376 17. Manzurul Karim , Betorkito Mujib (The Controversial Mujib) 18. ibid:: 19. Lt.Gen Jagjit Singh Aurora, Reminiscences of Bangladesh War (video interview), Mass Communication Research Centre, Jamia Millia Islamia, Delhi, 1994. 20. Maj.Gen. Palit, The Lightning Campaign: The Indo-Pakistan War 1971, Compton Press, Salisbury, 1972: 24 21. The Purbadesh, Dhaka, 22 December 1971. 22. The Purbadesh, Dhaka, 21 December 1971 23. The Bangladesh Observer, Dhaka, 5 January, 1972. 2.1 An Affront to Common Sense? It has already been noted that Lt Gen. Aurora has dismissed the very claim of three million killed as absolutely impossible. No firmer rejection of it could have been conceived. 2.2 Fabrication Can’t Stand for Fact Moreover, the way it had been fabricated by the Purbadesh/Pravda/ENA combined could hardly be said to be worthy of any confidence in terms of reliability and validity. Given the dislocated communication systems and the completely anarchic situation of the time, with the Bangladesh Government still waiting in Calcutta for the Indian permission to return to Dhaka [1], the editor gentleman was apparently in no position to make even a few random estimates with his correspondents outside Dhaka for producing a crude guess-work. This gentleman seemed to have simply taken the mean average of the five hypothetical figures mentioned in a plainly searching mood by his papers correspondent only twenty four hours before. 2.3 Could the Indian Figure Be Any Better? Some of the above reasons, for which no confidence could be accorded to the Purbadesh/Pravda/ENA combinations guesswork, apply equally to the figure adopted by the Indian authorities and to which Field Marshall Manekshaw, Lt. Gen. Aurora and Maj.Gen. Palit wanted us to repose our trust. One may ask, if the figure of three million was absolutely impossible, could the figure of one million be deemed within the realm of probability? 2.4 From Comparative Perspective In answering the above we may apply a number of tests. Firstly, a comparison with countries which have all seen much bitter and prolonged armed conflict. Comparative Casualty Figures War Duration* Casualty Annual average Vietnam 12 1,000,000 83,333 Algeria 7.5 100,000 13,333 Cambodia 23 1,100,000** 47,826 Afghanistan 14 2,000,000 142,857 Angola 16 300,000 18,750 Iran/Iraq 9 1,000,000 111,111 Bosnia 3 (up to March 94) 142,592 47,531 Sri Lanka 13 50,000 3,846 Bangladesh 0.75 Purbadesh/Pravda/ENA 3,000,000 4,000,000 Indian 1,000,000 1,333,333 * in year **exclude the citizen who were killed at the hands of the Pol Pot regime. In Vietnam the US waged a war of attrition of unprecedented scale for 12 years. There was barely any lethal weapon, excepting the atomic bomb, which the mighty Superpower did not use against the North Vietnamese Forces and their South Vietnamese proxies, the Viet Cong guerrillas. Thousands and thousands of tons of bombs were used for carpet bombing insurgent infested villages and valleys. Yet the total Vietnamese casualty figures during the 12 years of contest did not exceed one million or an average yearly toll of little over 83,000. From 1954 to 1962 the Algerians waged an all-out guerrilla war against French rule provoking serious attacks against them not only from the French Government but also from the Algerian-born Frenchmen. In this seven and a half year long struggle for independence, 100,000 Algerians lost their life at a yearly rate of little over 13,000. https://m.youtube/ watch?v=gt9l8Vm8W9U
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