Strategic Analysis

From 7 March to Independence (Sat-e-March Theke Swadhinata) (In Bengali)

Independence is a man’s birthright that helps people to express themselves within the contours of family, state and society. The lack of freedom leads to the insecurity that he strives to escape from. The paucity of political freedom is largely associated with the independence of a state in which people usually live in a state of captivity, in mass deprivation and persecution. To tackle these issues of dispossession and exploitation, revolutionaries emerge on the scene with charismatic words, values and acts, with the motive of emancipating people.

Interview: Liberation War Through the Cinematic Lens

Question: 01: How relevant was 1971 for you, both in political and cultural sense?

The Liberation War of 1971 and India

India’s role in the liberation war is often seen through the geopolitical prism. Its response to developments in East Pakistan was complex and evolved over a period of time. Before taking recourse to military action, India exhausted its diplomatic initiatives to draw the attention of the international community to the refugee crisis which arose due to the Pakistan Army-perpetuated genocide – a term first used by India in the Parliament Resolution of 31 March.

Waging War Through Humour: Political Cartoons and the War of 1971 as Depicted in Calcutta-Based Print Media

The article takes up the political cartoons printed in newspapers, particularly in Bengali from West Bengal to highlight the popular opinion-base they built in support for Bangladesh and the War of 1971 which perhaps brought a new age in Indian foreign policy where military intervention was upheld as a tool for maintaining peace and security in the region.

Histories and Memories of the Liberation War: Saranarthis in Tripura

In the twentieth century, South Asia experienced mass migrations of millions of insecure homeless people twice: it witnessed the Partition-refugees from 1947 and saranarthis during the liberation war of 1971. The Indian State treated the first category as ‘citizen-refugees’, whereas the saranarthis were like temporary shelter-seekers. Among the Northeastern states, Tripura played the most crucial role in providing them with all essential supports.

Historicising the Birangona: Interrogating the Politics of Commemorating the Wartime Rape of 1971 in the Context of the 50th Anniversary of Bangladesh

Two decades ago, ‘1971’ was deemed to not have a market within Indian publishing houses and media outlets. Yet, one is struck by the contemporary Indian focus on the iconic figure of the Birangona – brave women, a title given by the State of Bangladesh to women raped by the Pakistani army and their Bengali and non-Bengali collaborators during the Bangladesh war of 1971.

Bangladesh: A Half Century into Freedom

The article is an observation of the fifty years that have gone by since the liberation of Bangladesh through a guerrilla war against Pakistan in 1971. It spells out the causes behind the military and political collapse of the Pakistan state in Bangladesh, formerly the eastern province of Pakistan. Furthermore, the article is a brief study of the conditions confronting Bangladesh at birth, which at a certain point pushed the country into reverse gear through the rise of illegitimate regimes in the mid-1970s and early 1980s.

Opportunity of the Century

The year 1971’s geostrategic significance for the Indian subcontinent rivals that of 1947 when British India was divided into India and Pakistan. While the roots of Bangladesh's secession from Pakistan lay firmly within the Pakistani polity, India's political support for the Bangladesh freedom movement and its military intervention were crucial for the liberation of Bangladesh. The Indian campaign for the liberation of Bangladesh was brilliantly conceived and deftly executed.

Bangladesh–India Relations: Strengthening Historical Ties

In a fast-emerging multipolar Asia, and in the fast-shifting geopolitics of the area where ostensive national interests are being pursued with growing military-driven intensity, enhancing strategic ties between close and historic neighbours like Bangladesh and India has assumed greater urgency. The region also faces major socio-economic challenges, which were exposed brutally by the Coronavirus pandemic and its effects on lives and livelihood.

India–Bangladesh Ties: Half Century of Consolidation

Bangladesh’s emergence, as a new nation at the height of the Cold War, in 1971, re-drew political borders in the Indian subcontinent. It was one of the most significant geopolitical events of the latter half of the 20th century. India’s ties with Bangladesh have taken great strides in the last decade in comparison to the first 40 years, expanding and strengthening across a wide template of sectors.

1971: Memories, Facts and Words Overheard

It was hot and muggy on 25 March 1971, with nothing to suggest that the day would turn into an ghastly night. The usual no-work gang were lounging around; my brother was washing the family car and the rest were just doing nothing. This included my banker-father who had been transferred to Karachi on the ground that he had given unsecured loans—small ones—to the wretchedly poor, affected by the cyclone of 1970. He had refused to go and taken leave instead.

Working with the Refugees, 1971

In March 1971, I was working on an Oxfam-UK supported Gandhian village development project in Bihar, India, where I had been for almost three years. Through the BBC and some sketchy Indian newspaper reports, I learnt about the unrest in Dacca in the early part of March 1971. Sheikh Mujib’s speech of 7 March was well reported by The Statesman newspaper which always reached Gaya from Calcutta one day late. However, nobody was prepared for what would unfold later that month.

Interrogating the Spirit of 1971: Beyond Historicisms

The tale of Bangladesh’s liberation war of 1971 cannot be told without the ‘before’ and a bit of the ‘after’ of that year, as it would then turn into a futile exercise in historicism,2 merely, ‘capturing’ that instant of extensive explosion which ascended like the phoenix, while ignoring the intensive seedbed of creative ‘becoming’ from which it arose.

Lubna Marium |
November 2021 |
Strategic Analysis

The Road to Victory Day 1971: An Insider’s Account

‘Isn’t it wonderful to be witness to the birth of your country?’ These words were shouted out to my mother and myself by David Vanzant, an international aid worker, just outside the ‘neutral zone’ that was set up in the Hotel Intercontinental in Shahbagh, Dhaka. Crowds were milling around him, and truck-loads of Indian soldiers who had fought their way into Dhaka, alongside troops of Mukti Bahinis (Bangladeshi freedom fighters), shouting ‘Joy Bangla’ at the top of their voices in sheer ecstasy!

My Days at the Swadhin Bangla Betar Kendro: The Radio Broadcasting Centre During Bangladesh Liberation War in 1971

The War of Liberation 1971, or the (Muktijuddho), or just Ekkator er Juddho as it is popularly known in Bangladesh, was a People’s War in which all Bengalis participated, sans a few thousands of the country’s seven and a half crores. This was a peoples’ struggle against the undemocratic Government of Pakistan and its oppressive Army. It was a war where ordinary people from all strata of life ? who knew nothing about waging a war ? took up arms against a trained and fully armed Pakistan Army, while many others ? men and women ? contributed in various other ways.

Nasreen Ahmad |
November 2021 |
Strategic Analysis

The Saga of Sylhet

The attack by the Pakistan Air Force on Indian airfields at Srinagar, Avantipur, Pathankot, Uttarlai, Jodhpur, Ambala and Agra at 1745 hours on 3 December 1971, was an act of war that set the stage for the Indo–Pakistan War of 1971. Unlike the earlier two wars of 1947–48 and 1965, Pakistan found to its detriment that this time the Indian armed forces were well prepared and ready.

Ian Cardozo |
November 2021 |
Strategic Analysis

Operation Kilo Flight: Night Attack By Otter Aircraft – A First-Hand Account

Operation Kilo Flight was inaugurated on 28 September 1971 by Air Chief Marshal P. C. Lal in the presence of Group Captain A. K. Khondker, who was our second-in-command with the Armed Forces/Mukti Bahini during the liberation war of 1971, Sqn. Ldr. Sultan Mahmood, Flt. Lt. Shamsul Alam, Flt. Lt. Badrul Alam, Capt. Khaleque (Ex-PIA), Capt. Sattar (Ex-PIA), Capt. Muqueet (Ex-PIA), Capt. Shahab (Ex-PIA), Capt. Akram (Ex-Plant Protection Pilot), Capt. Sharfuddin (Ex-Plant Protection Pilot) plus 58 airmen of various technical trades of the PAF.

Shamsul Alam |
November 2021 |
Strategic Analysis

Making of the Bangladesh State: Shaheed Dhirendranath Datta, Bengali Language Movement and Birth of a Nation

Any history of the Bengalis’ fight for their linguistic heritage and cultural rights cannot be told without a reference to Shaheed Dhirendranath Datta, who played a pioneering role in the formative phase of the Bengali Language Movement. On 25 February 1948 for the first time he demanded recognition of Bengali as one of the state languages of the new nation of Pakistan. He had remained an ardent defender of the Bengali language, both in the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan (CAP) and in the East Bengal Legislative Assembly (EBLA).

Aroma Dutta |
November 2021 |
Strategic Analysis

Guest Editor’s Introduction

At the turn of the 21st century, the world entered a new period of development. The customary bipolar system that prevailed after World War II had collapsed following the self-destruction of one of its poles. Russia’s refusal to follow the Western course is only the first poignant sign of confrontation between the West’s united world project and the emerging multipolar world.

Editor’s Note

This year, Bangladesh is celebrating 50 years of the War of Liberation. The struggle for freedom, which started soon after the creation of Pakistan in 1947, culminated in signing the Instrument of Surrender on 16 December 1971. On that fateful day, Pakistan’s Gen. A.A.K. Niazi, along with 93,000 Pakistani forces, publicly surrendered to the joint forces or the Mitra Bahini that comprised the Indian Army and the Mukti Bahini. It was the largest military surrender after World War II. Bangladesh was born as an independent nation-state and reclaimed its identity.