On 3rd December 1971, Pakistan launched the operation Chengiz khan against India. Under this operation, Pakistan bombed eleven Indian airfields including Amritsar, Pathankot, Jodhpur, Ambala, Agra, and Srinagar. In response, Indian Airforce retaliates against Pakistan forces and this led to the emergence of an independent country “Bangladesh”.
But what was the reason behind this war? What caused Pakistan to launch this operation against India?
Earlier in the Indian subcontinent, there existed a fear by the Muslim community that if India continues to be one country than, with time, Muslim community may become minority and their interests may not be protected or they will have to live with constant fear and under the dominance of Hindu community. Also they hoped that having a separate Muslim country would provide them with a better standard of living. Therefore the Muslim community at that time was determined to secure their political, social and cultural interests and later in future, this mind-set caused a division of the Indian subcontinent into two different countries that were Pakistan and India. Though Pakistan was further divided into two different parts, these were referred to as East Pakistan and West Pakistan. Despite being one country there was a difference of around 1500km between East Pakistan and West Pakistan and in the middle lies the Indian continent. In east Pakistan, more than half of the population was Bengali speaking community while West Pakistan had Punjabi, Pakhtun, Sindhu and Baloch. Even though majority in Pakistan as a whole were Bengali speaking community but despite this powerful positions of the country were still held with people in West Pakistan specifically by Punjabi and Mohajir. Between the period of 1947-71, Pakistan underwent multiple phases of military rule. Bengali speaking community of East Pakistan did not even got the opportunity to politically represent themselves. In addition, around 75% of the national budget was spent on West Pakistan even though 62% of revenue came from East Pakistan and because of this per capita income of West Pakistan was 61% higher than East Pakistan and military in West Pakistan was 25 times stronger than East Pakistan. This initiated tension between the two parts of the country. Mohammad Ali Jinnah (former governor-general of Pakistan) and his advisors believed that these two parts of the country could be united only if they spoke one language which according to them should have been Urdu even though 56% of the population spoke Bengali and hence it was highly opposed by the Bengali speaking community of East Pakistan. All these incidents had a great impact on the coming years and increased cultural and political differences between East Pakistan and West Pakistan. With time the economical imbalance between the two parts became significantly visible and this led to a 6-point demand for the economic development of East Pakistan led by Sheikh Mujibur Rahman but the demand was later rejected stating such demand was against the interests of the country. This caused protests and non-cooperation from people in East Pakistan. To handle the worsening situation the current prime minister of Pakistan at that time had to resign and in his place, he appointed his successor General Yahya Khan who promised to conduct the first general elections in Pakistan.
The elections were held in 1970 and the results shocked everyone as the East Pakistani political party Awami League won the elections but since the election results were not in favour of the West Pakistan national assembly were cancelled. This caused an uproar in East Pakistan. People started questioning how it could happen in a democracy. This instigated the people of East Pakistan and once again raised the demand for an independent nation for Bengali speaking community. They were of the view that if Pakistan does not respect their views and did not want them to participate in any of the national matters then why be in one country? This time the demand was more aggressive, several people came onto the streets demanding their freedom, they raised the slogan “Our struggle is for freedom; our struggles is for independence. This was the foundation of the Bangladeshi liberation war.
By this time people in East Pakistan did not recognise Islam as a unifying factor as their Bengali ethnicity was of higher importance to them. They wanted to create a secular state which respected and protected their Bengali culture. This was the origin of the name Bangladesh that is land of Bengali people. With time opposition and non-cooperation from East Pakistan were getting stronger. On 25th march, the Pakistan government planned a heinous genocide “operation searchlight”. The agenda behind this operation was to target the popular people who were demanding Bangladesh’s independence and kill them. On the night of the 25th march, thousands of troops of the Pakistani army marched in Dhaka to contrive the operation. Sheikh Mujibur Rehman was arrested and taken to West Pakistan but before the arrest, he managed to declare East Pakistan as an independent country. He said we East Pakistani are no longer a part of Pakistan but a different nation named Bangladesh. This declaration was transmitted via transmitter over midnight. During operation searchlight around 7000 innocent students were mercilessly killed and more than 30,000 innocent Bengalis were massacred within a week. Half of the people living in Dhaka fled out into neighbouring regions to protect themselves. All foreign journalists were deported and radio operations were shut down. One journalist successfully ran out to the United Nations and published an article stating things that were going on in East Pakistan. It was through this article that the entire world got to know about the heinous genocide planned by West Pakistan. Prime Minister Indira Gandhi after reading the article got motivated and decides to take some action. Also during the operation searchlight around 10 million people from East Pakistan ran to India to protect their lives. Indira Gandhi evaluated the alternatives she had at that time and concluded that it will be a lot more economically feasible to fight against West Pakistan as compared to helping those 10 million refugees who ran to India with the hope that they might keep themselves alive here.
On 28th April 1971 Indira Gandhi directed General Sam Manekshaw to prepare for the war and get ready to enter East Pakistan and put an end to this conflict. Initially, General Sam Manekshaw was not confident enough that India could prepare for the war in such short period and ultimately be able to win it against Pakistan. So he even offered to resign from his post but Indira Gandhi kept her confidence in him and gave him the autonomy to conduct the operations as and when he felt India was ready to win the war. By July 1971 Indira Gandhi started referring to East Pakistan as Bangladesh.
On 3rd December 1971, Pakistan launched operation Chengiz Khan and began attacking Indian airfields. Pakistan feared that if India comes into the picture then it might help Bangladesh achieve its freedom. So Pakistan planned to start attacking even before India could start its operation. But this plan did not work because the Indian military force and military power were way stronger than Pakistan’s military and arm forces. With the entry of India into the war Pakistan appealed to the United Nation to enforce an immediate cease-fire on India and a recall of Indian troops. When the United Nation’s Security Council was held, USA favoured Pakistan and the Soviet Union favoured India. But the Soviet Union vetoed the resolution twice and later the United Kingdom and France also abstained from voting. On 6th December Bhutan became the first country to officially recognised East Pakistan as Bangladesh and later, on the same day India also officially recognised Bangladesh as an independent country. By 12th December 1971 in the Indo-Pak war 1971, Pakistan was facing a great defeat and hence the army of West Pakistan surrendered in the war. On 16th December 1971, the historic instrument of surrender was signed. More than 93000 troops surrendered to Indian forces and Bangladeshi liberation forces. This was the largest surrender in the world after World War II. The following year in 1972, the Shimla agreement was signed between India and Pakistan according to which Pakistan recognised Bangladesh as an independent country and in return all the prisoners of war were released over the following 5 months and the land of 13000 square km which India had occupied was returned to Pakistan. This is how the new country Bangladesh was formed. Later United Nations also recognised Bangladesh as an independent country.
To conclude it can be said that Bangladesh’s independence and heinous activities by Pakistan became the reason for the indo-Pak war1971.
