[vinnomot] GENOCIDE IN BANGLADESH

SAN-Feature Service

SOUTH ASIAN NEWS-FEATURE SERVICE

December 13,2007

 

GENOCIDE IN BANGLADESH

By Rukhsana Hasib

 

The Pakistani terror squad quickly spread to the neighboring cities, burning villages to the ground on the way, shooting escaping civilians; men, women and children, as they ran out of their burning homes.

 

SAN-Feature Service : It was a dark day in the history of genocide, March 25th 1971. A deathly hush had fallen over the bustling capital city of Dhaka, as Pakistani soldiers, armed to the teeth began their systematic and brutal blood bath of the Bengali army, navy and air force personnel, followed by mass executions of civilians; professors, doctors, lawyers and other professionals and university students were targeted. The city was terrorized as squads of Pakistani soldiers forced their way into homes in the middle of the night, dragged their targets out, before their screaming families and shot them in cold blood, checking them off their hit list.

 

The Pakistani terror squad quickly spread to the neighboring cities, burning villages to the ground on the way, shooting escaping civilians; men, women and children, as they ran out of their burning homes. By that time all news of the genocide operation was controlled by the Pakistan army and the propaganda machine was in full force, along with a complete curfew. Electricity and water was turned off along with all communications.

 

Major M.A. Hasib, stationed in Comilla cantonment, a city approximately 60 miles from Dhaka, was making arrangements and looking forward to a civilian life, after devoting a 21 year career to the Pakistan army. He had opted for an early retirement, because he had been superseded for promotion to Colonel twice. He was disgusted with the treatment of Bengali officers by the Pakistani army, who routinely and deliberately, used the concept of the glass ceiling and kept the Bengali officers in their midst at lower ranks.

 

Hearing of the atrocities committed by the Pakistani soldiers, from the news on BBC radio, his wife feared that he faced imminent danger. But he comforted her. Believing that since his early retirement had already been approved and came into effect only ten days earlier and that he had been a loyal army officer all his life, they had nothing to fear from him, thus no harm would come to him and his family. But the Pakistani death squads were taking no chances.

 

They came for him on the morning of March 29th 1971, as he sat down to

breakfast with his family and huddled together to listen to BBC news on the transistor radio. He was my father, Major M.A. Hasib. Four armed soldiers escorted into a jeep at gunpoint. That was the last time he was seen alive.

 

My mother and two small sisters were later thrown into prison camp, where they witnessed and suffered the atrocities committed by the Pakistani soldiers.

 

My father's brutal end came to light after Bangladesh became independent. An eye witness, a barber whose life had been spared, because his services were needed by the Pakistani soldiers, told authorities a brutal tale of torture and murder and led authorities to seven mass graves, only a short distance from our house, with 500 bodies, all blind folded, their hands tied behind their backs, shot by firing squad.

 

He was my father, Major M.A. Hasib. He was forty two years old.—SAN-Feature Service /uttorshuri

 

 

This personal tragedy  was presented recently  at the  Kean University seminar on  Violence and Genocide Seminar at Kean University,USA.

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