Genocide Coolly planned, carried out

The Pakistanis had a secret plan -- to fake a political dialogue with Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman while its military prepared to mow down the Bangalis, to terrorise them, to exterminate the Hindus who they viewed as Indian agents, to let loose a genocide campaign and teach the "treacherous" Bangalis a lesson.

Accordingly, president Gen Yahya Khan and Pakistan People's Party leader Zulfikar Ali Bhutto arrived from the west wing of Pakistan to start the dialogue on power transfer from March 15. Bangalis were elated at the beginning thinking Mujib was finally coming to power as his party, the Awami League, had overwhelmingly won the 1970 election.

Under the cover of dialogue, soldiers and weapons started pouring in for butchering the Bangalis.

GW Choudhury, Yahya's minister, has clearly explained in his book "The Last Days of United Pakistan" (UPL, 1993) that in the name of Operation Searchlight this genocide had begun on the night of March 25.

"The Pakistan Army's brutal actions, which began on the midnight of March 25, 1971, can never be condoned or justified in any way. The army's murderous campaign in which many thousands of innocent people including women, the old and sick, and even children, were brutally murdered … constituted a measureless tragedy … The results in human suffering were beyond description," says an excerpt from the book.

"The exact figures of death and destruction will probably never be known accurately … but Mujib (Bangabandhu) was right when he said that few nations had had to make such colossal sacrifices in human life and suffering as the Bengalis … Could there be any justification or rationale for the killing of thousands of innocent villagers …? Villages were burnt wholesale as a part of what was termed by the military Governor Tikka Khan ... a policy of collective punitive measures," says another excerpt.

The beginning of the massacre that now Pakistan denies has been elaborated in another book by Brigadier General Siddiq Salik who was a major in 1971 and who worked closely with Niazi as the Pakistan army's public relations officer.

As tanks and armoured cars were getting ready to catch the sleeping Bangalis in Dhaka unawares, the Pakistani generals sat on sofas and easy chairs laid out on the lawn of Second Capital (now the MP Hostels of Sangsad Bhaban) and made arrangements for tea and coffee to last the night.

In his book "Witness to Surrender" (UPL, 1997), Salik aptly writes: "The city wrapped in starlight, was in deep slumber. The night was as pleasant as a spring night in Dacca could be. The setting was perfect for anything but a bloody holocaust."

According to the book, "Major General Farman Ali, with 57 Brigade under Brigadier Arbab, was responsible for operations in Dacca city and its suburbs while Major General Khadim was to look after the rest of the province. In addition, Lieutenant General Tikka Khan and his staff were to spend the night at the Martial Law Headquarters in the Second Capital to watch the progress of action in and outside Dacca."

At around 11:00pm, "the local commander [Dacca] asked permission to advance … Everybody looked at his watch." The Operation Searchlight began "with great cunningness, surprise, deception and speed combined with shock action… The gates of hells had been cast open".

The action started with the arrest of Bangabandhu. The message came on the wireless: "BIG BIRD IN THE CAGE -- OTHERS NOT IN THEIR NESTS -- OVER …"

And then the whole of Dhaka city was ravaged and burned.

Salik writes: "… the city of Dacca was in the throes of a civil war. I watched the harrowing sight from the verandah for four hours. The prominent feature of this gory night was the flames of shooting to the sky. At times, mournful clouds of smoke accompanied the blaze but soon they were overwhelmed by the flaming fire trying to lick at the stars. The light of the moon and the glow of the stars paled before this man-made furnace. The tallest columns of smoke and fire emerged from the university campus…."

An army captain reported on the wireless that he was facing resistance from Iqbal Hall and Jagannath Hall of Dhaka University.

"A senior staff officer snatched the hand-set from me and shouted into the mouth piece: 'How long will you take to neutralize the target? -- Four hours! -- Nonsense -- What weapons have you got? -- Rocket launcher, recoilless riffles, mortars and -- O. K., use all of them and ensure complete capture of the area in two hours'."

After day break, Bhutto left Dhaka for Karachi. He was satisfied that the Bangalis had been crushed.

Salik writes: "Before boarding the plane, he made a general remark of appreciation for the Army action on the previous night and said to his chief escort, Brigadier Arbab, 'Thank God, Pakistan has been saved.' He repeated this statement on his arrival at Karachi.

"When Bhutto was making this optimistic remark, I was surveying mass graves in the university area where I found three pits -- of five to fifteen metres diameter each. They were filled with fresh earth. But no officer was prepared to disclose the exact number of causalities."

But as Salik was visiting the university, more students were being mowed down on the campus on the morning of March 26. A professor of engineering videoed with a portable tape machine hidden on the roof of a building 300 yards from the place where the Pakistani soldiers herded students, teachers and employees of the university. The footage was kept hidden for nine months before it made its way to NBC News. Ron Nessen, reporter of NBC News, reported on this massacre at Dhaka University.

"From the university area, I drove on the principle roads of Dacca city and saw odd corpses lying on the footpaths or near corner of a winding street," Salik mentions.

This was how the genocide in Dhaka city had begun. On the very first night, the Americans estimated that around four to six thousand civilians were killed in the capital. But this was only a small beginning of what Pakistan perpetrated and now denies.