Numbers game, here we go again

LIKE a bad penny that turns up again and again, our main opposition leader has once again mired her party and herself in her favourite controversy on the history of our Liberation War. This time the tirade is not against the founder of the nation directly or about the declaration of independence, it is about people who died during the Liberation War. She has questioned the oft-quoted number of people who died during the war; she has declared there is much debate about the number. We should be grateful that she has not questioned the number of women who were raped by the Pakistan army during that period, but perhaps she has reservations about that too. Close on the heels of her announcement came another diatribe from one of her party men, a bottom-of-the-rung leader who insulted the martyred intellectuals. He called them "fools" because they "allowed" themselves to be killed by the Pakistani army agents by staying home on the fateful night. Perhaps all of the innocent people who died in Dhaka on March 25 were also "fools" because they did not leave the city the day before! 

 The only parallel to the BNP Chairperson's proclamation and that of her minion can be found in the statements of General Yahya Khan and his flunkies when he claimed that their army never killed civilians in the then East Pakistan. They claimed to be on a mission to put out rebellions of armed political gangs and establish peace. The Pakistani leaders, including Bhutto, the man who would follow Yahya Khan as the leader of a broken Pakistan, never stood up to fact that their army massacred millions in Bangladesh. But then it was a natural thing to do for Pakistan and its leaders. Acknowledging massacre of civilians in the name of restoring peace was something that would make their country a protector of war criminals and supporter of war crimes. To them, no such thing as a massacre of innocent millions happened. Therefore, the war crimes and the trial of war criminals are a mockery for them.

The announcements and speeches of the BNP chairperson and her loyalists may appear outrageous and irrational, but there is a method in this madness. The most significant aspect of this bizarre statement is its timing. For much of this year, when the war crimes trial was in progress and several key war criminals were convicted, the chairperson or her party refrained from making any comments or register any protest. It was assumed that the passivity of the party was perhaps due to affiliation of the convicts with another political party. But the party remained largely impassive even when one of its own front ranking leaders was tried and sentenced to death for war crimes. It seemed like the party or its chairperson was not willing to stick their neck out protesting the sentences. 

So what prompted the chairperson to come out with an outlandish question on the number of deaths now?  Raising questions on the number of people who died in the war is only a distractive issue. It makes no sense to raise the issue after forty four years of independence when the person making such outlandish remarks headed the government of the country twice in the past. If this had been a concern for her, she could have formed a commission in her first term and settled the controversy a long time ago. 

It is interesting that the BNP chairperson's revival of the question on the number of war deaths comes in the wake of the recent criticism of the execution of "two politicians" for war crimes by the Pakistan government. The previous year, the Pakistan Parliament had passed a resolution condemning the first execution of a war criminal. In none of the cases, however, had the Pakistan government indicated that it was protesting because it had a political interest in the individuals, but because the trials were "not fair". It was expressing its protest against the judicial process with a subliminal question on the whole issue of war crimes. How can they be war criminals if the war crimes they are supposed to have committed never took place according to them?

This is the nub of the question. By raising the number controversy, the BNP chairperson has, in a sense, questioned the gruesome atrocities committed by Pakistan in 1971. Did the Pakistan army launch an all-out war on the Bangalees at all? Or was it just a "mercy mission" by the Pakistan Government to put out rebellions of a section of "misguided people" as claimed by General Yahya Khan? If the latter is true, the Government of Pakistan and its army were actually saving the nation! If some people helped the army in that effort, they were only doing their patriotic duties. If some innocent civilians died during that, they were only accidental deaths. There were no war crimes! 

I know this is bizarre logic, but statements that question our nationhood and beliefs can be only explained in that light. What such statements ignore is that crimes against humanity are not judged simply by numbers, these are judged by their viciousness and enormity. By questioning and debating the number of deaths, we cannot deny the enormity of civilian massacre in 1971 and the damage it caused. It is one of the fundamental memories that brought our country together. No leader is worth his or her salt if we ignore this. By reducing the number of deaths in the Holocaust, we cannot deny the enormity or devastation caused by the Holocaust. Will this knock some sense into those who deny such nassacres? 

The writer is a political analyst and commentator.