1971: War and the Loss of East Pakistan
After the army cracks down on Bengali demands for autonomy, a brutal war ends with India's intervention, the surrender at Dhaka and the birth of Bangladesh.
- 1971: A Global History of the Creation of Bangladesh — Srinath Raghavan, Harvard University Press (2013)
- The Struggle for Pakistan: A Muslim Homeland and Global Politics — Ayesha Jalal, Belknap Press of Harvard University Press (2014)
- Pakistan: A New History — Ian Talbot, Hurst (2012)
- Report of the Hamoodur Rahman Commission of Inquiry into the 1971 War — Hamoodur Rahman Commission, Government of Pakistan (1974)
- Dead Reckoning: Memories of the 1971 Bangladesh War — Sarmila Bose, Hurst (2011)
Two wings, one country
From the start, Pakistan’s two halves were separated by India, and by more than distance. East Pakistan held more than half the population, but power lay with the West: in the army, the civil service and the capital. In 1948 Jinnah declared in Dhaka that Urdu alone would be the state language. Bengali students protested, and on 21 February 1952 police fired on them, killing several. That day, remembered for the Language Movement’s martyrs, is now UNESCO’s International Mother Language Day.
- The Struggle for Pakistan: A Muslim Homeland and Global Politics — Ayesha Jalal, Belknap Press of Harvard University Press (2014)
- Pakistan: A New History — Ian Talbot, Hurst (2012)
Through the 1950s and 1960s many Bengalis came to feel their jute exports were paying for development in the West. In 1966 Sheikh Mujibur Rahman of the Awami League put forward Six Points demanding sweeping autonomy.
- 1971: A Global History of the Creation of Bangladesh — Srinath Raghavan, Harvard University Press (2013)
- Pakistan: A New History — Ian Talbot, Hurst (2012)
The election and the crackdown
In December 1970 Pakistan held its first general election under universal adult franchise. The Awami League won almost every seat in the East and an outright majority in the national assembly; Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s Pakistan Peoples Party won the most seats in the West. Bhutto and the military regime of General Yahya Khan would not let Mujib form a government on his terms, and the assembly was postponed.
- 1971: A Global History of the Creation of Bangladesh — Srinath Raghavan, Harvard University Press (2013)
- The Struggle for Pakistan: A Muslim Homeland and Global Politics — Ayesha Jalal, Belknap Press of Harvard University Press (2014)
On the night of 25 March 1971 the army launched Operation Searchlight in Dhaka, attacking the university, police and Hindu neighbourhoods, and arresting Mujib. Bengali soldiers and students formed the Mukti Bahini resistance. Over the following months the army and allied militias carried out mass killings and rapes; around ten million refugees, most of them Hindus, fled to India.
- 1971: A Global History of the Creation of Bangladesh — Srinath Raghavan, Harvard University Press (2013)
- Dead Reckoning: Memories of the 1971 Bangladesh War — Sarmila Bose, Hurst (2011)
War and surrender
India backed the guerrillas, and after Pakistani air strikes on Indian bases on 3 December, full war broke out on both fronts. Thirteen days later, on 16 December, General A. A. K. Niazi surrendered in Dhaka. Over 90,000 Pakistani soldiers and civilians became prisoners of war. Yahya Khan resigned and Bhutto took over what remained of Pakistan.
- 1971: A Global History of the Creation of Bangladesh — Srinath Raghavan, Harvard University Press (2013)
- Pakistan: A New History — Ian Talbot, Hurst (2012)
The numbers and the silence
How many died is fiercely disputed. Bangladesh’s official figure is three million. Pakistan’s Hamoodur Rahman Commission, whose report was kept secret until parts leaked in 2000, put the number killed by the army at about 26,000, while condemning the generals’ conduct. Many independent historians suggest figures in the hundreds of thousands.
- Report of the Hamoodur Rahman Commission of Inquiry into the 1971 War — Hamoodur Rahman Commission, Government of Pakistan (1974)
- 1971: A Global History of the Creation of Bangladesh — Srinath Raghavan, Harvard University Press (2013)
- Dead Reckoning: Memories of the 1971 Bangladesh War — Sarmila Bose, Hurst (2011)
In Pakistan, 1971 was for decades barely taught; some younger Pakistanis learn the fuller story only as adults. Pakistan recognised Bangladesh in 1974, but Bangladeshi calls for a formal apology are still a sore point. For many Urdu-speaking “Biharis” who had sided with Pakistan, the war left decades in camps in Bangladesh.
- Pakistan: A New History — Ian Talbot, Hurst (2012)
- The Struggle for Pakistan: A Muslim Homeland and Global Politics — Ayesha Jalal, Belknap Press of Harvard University Press (2014)
Why it still matters
Losing half the country convinced the army that India sought to break Pakistan, deepening its search for security, including a nuclear bomb. It also pushed the remaining state to emphasise Islam ever more as the glue of national identity.
- The Idea of Pakistan — Stephen P. Cohen, Brookings Institution Press (2004)
- The Struggle for Pakistan: A Muslim Homeland and Global Politics — Ayesha Jalal, Belknap Press of Harvard University Press (2014)
The Liberation War: a people who had been economically exploited and denied power after winning an election rose for freedom and suffered genocide, with an official figure of three million dead and hundreds of thousands of women raped. Bangladesh marks 25 March as Genocide Day and 16 December as Victory Day.
- 1971: A Global History of the Creation of Bangladesh — Srinath Raghavan, Harvard University Press (2013)
- Dead Reckoning: Memories of the 1971 Bangladesh War — Sarmila Bose, Hurst (2011)
The "Fall of Dhaka": a tragedy caused by political failure and Indian intervention, which armed the Bengali rebels and invaded. Textbooks long said little about army atrocities, though the government's own Hamoodur Rahman Commission criticised the generals and estimated about 26,000 deaths from army action. Many Pakistanis also remember the killings of non-Bengalis, especially Urdu-speaking "Biharis", by Bengali militants.
- Report of the Hamoodur Rahman Commission of Inquiry into the 1971 War — Hamoodur Rahman Commission, Government of Pakistan (1974)
- Pakistan: A New History — Ian Talbot, Hurst (2012)
A just war and one of India's greatest military victories: India took in about ten million refugees and intervened to stop mass killing, and the surrender of over 90,000 Pakistani soldiers and civilians was the largest since the Second World War.
- 1971: A Global History of the Creation of Bangladesh — Srinath Raghavan, Harvard University Press (2013)
Independent scholars broadly accept that the Pakistani army and its local allies carried out mass killings, targeting Hindus and Bengali intellectuals in particular, and that there was also violence against non-Bengalis. The death toll is debated: estimates range from tens of thousands to the official Bangladeshi three million, with many scholars favouring figures in the hundreds of thousands. Sarmila Bose's lower estimates have been strongly criticised.
- 1971: A Global History of the Creation of Bangladesh — Srinath Raghavan, Harvard University Press (2013)
- Dead Reckoning: Memories of the 1971 Bangladesh War — Sarmila Bose, Hurst (2011)
- The Struggle for Pakistan: A Muslim Homeland and Global Politics — Ayesha Jalal, Belknap Press of Harvard University Press (2014)
Why it matters today
1971 is Pakistan's most painful and least discussed memory. It broke the idea that religion alone could hold a nation together, and it still shapes Pakistani fears of India, of ethnic separatism in Balochistan and elsewhere, and debates about the army. Bangladesh's demand for an apology remains unresolved.