Victory Day Special 2017
Editor's Note
Bangladesh stands at forty six today and while we celebrate it, we need to take time to introspect as we observe our Victory Day. The winds of freedom blew across the land, across the villages and towns, but we paid a very dear price. There was bloodletting,
1971 And After: A Participant-observer's Frayed Recollections
It has neither been possible, nor even desirable, for me to write about 1971. The reasons are fairly simple. First, while my engagement in the war was early and sincere, my actual contribution to it was rather flimsy and dull.
THE WAR OF FOOTAGE
The footages, along with transcripts of ABC, CBS and NBC prime time news from March 25 to December 25, 1971, perhaps characterise the then US administration's stance on the Liberation War of Bangladesh, and show the response of the powers involved in the war and US media. However, the focus of this short write-up is how these three US television news channels represented the Liberation War in 1971.
GENOCIDE
Like thousands of other people in East Bengal, he had made the mistake, the fatal mistake of running within sight of a Pakistani army patrol. He was 24 years old, a slight man surrounded by soldiers. He was trembling, because he was about to be shot.
BATTLES OF BELONIA BULGE
Feni-Belonia is an enclave of Bangladesh that penetrates the Indian territory, a narrow finger-like strip about 16km-long and 4-6km wide in area. A metre gauge railway track connects Belonia Border Outpost with Feni and two semi-
Escape to Freedom
It was March 1970. My husband, Aminul Islam, came to Islamabad on a posting to Pakistan Central Secretariat. I accompanied him with our two sons aged 15 and 13 and daughter aged 10. It was a comfortable living in Islamabad and we were all happy. But little did we know then that we had to be literally smuggled out of Pakistan to freedom in less than three years' time.