Indomitable March: The battle of Kushtia
At 4:00am on March 30, 1971, Bangladeshi forces, comprising East Pakistan Rifles (EPR), police and civilians under the leadership of Abu Osman Chowdhury, then a major and commander of the fourth wing of EPR, attacked the Pakistan occupation army in Kushtia from three sides. The Pakistani soldiers apparently panicked at the thought of being engulfed by so many thousands of furious Bangalees. They started fleeing the outposts and, subsequently, took shelter at the district headquarters.
The Pakistan army suffered heavy casualties in their retreat. By the end of the day Bangladeshi forces took control of the whole of Kushtia except district headquarters and its adjacent areas. The war continued next day. Bangalee forces reclaimed Kushtia, and only a few Pakistan army men managed to escape the district town alive. A detailed report on this furious resistance was published in the Time magazine on April 19, 1971.
TAJUDDIN ENTERS INDIA
Tajuddin Ahmad and Amirul Islam crossed over to India in the early hours of March 30, 1971. They met senior Border Security Force (BSF) officer in West Bengal, Golok Majumdar, at the border post. Tajuddin briefed on the situation in Bangladesh and handed over a list of Awami League leaders and members of the National Assembly. Later they were driven to the airport in Kolkata where they met Director General of BSF KF Rustamji, who had arrived posthaste from Delhi.
BLOOD TELEGRAM
On March 30, 1971, American Consul General Archer K Blood in Dhaka, sent a telegram to the US State Department. After providing gory details of the Pakistan army's brutality in Dhaka University, the telegram read: Question of whether university professors subject of pre-planned purge still unanswered although actively being looked into. Academics met since military crackdown fearful for safety and in hiding. They believe they [are] subject to elimination. Systematic destruction of academic records at university suggests campaign underway to erase all traces [of] current "trouble making" generation at Dacca university. Figure of thousand dead at university nonetheless strikes us as exaggerated, although nothing these days is inconceivable.