[ALOCHONA] Don't trust army, Mujib told Bhutto

Don't trust army, Mujib told Bhutto

Syed Badrul Ahsan

On the morning of March 22, 1971, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman resumed his dialogue with President Yahya Khan. At the same time, the Awami League team was busy negotiating the wording of the proposed proclamation with the President's advisers. On arriving at the President's House, Mujib found Bhutto there. As the Bangalee leader would later say, he pulled the PPP chairman aside and on to the verandah in order not to have their conversation overheard or bugged. Bhutto would later corroborate Mujib's statement and would go on to say that at a certain point both leaders were taken to see General Yahya Khan. Once they were together, all three men exchanged polite greetings.

Mujib then asked Yahya if he had agreed to the Awami League draft proclamation submitted earlier, to which the President replied that Bhutto's agreement too was necessary, which was the reason why the PPP leader was in Dhaka. Bangabandhu's response was that it was the President's responsibility to convince Bhutto to accept the deal the regime and the Awami League were busy hammering out. As the PPP chairman would report, the Awami League chief then noted that formal talks on the deal could begin once Bhutto agreed to it in principle. Until that happened, all discussions would remain confined to an informal stage. Once the deliberations among the three came to an end, Mujib and Bhutto went out to the verandah again where, in Bhutto's words, the Bangalee leader asked him to agree to the plan drafted by the Awami League on a transfer of power. Bangabandhu cautioned the People's Party leader about the army and told him not to trust the soldiers. If they destroyed him first, said Mujib, they would then destroy Bhutto.

On the same day, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto told a press conference in Dhaka that his party was examining the broad agreement reached between the Awami League chief and President Yahya Khan. He added, though, that the President had told him that the agreement was subject to 'our agreement.'

In Kamal Hossain's words, faint hopes arose in the evening of a solution to the crisis being reached. The Awami League leadership met to discuss the finer details of the proposed proclamation relating to a transfer of power. All night long, work went on towards giving a final shape to the draft proclamation.

Meanwhile, President Yahya Khan, through an announcement, for the second time postponed the session of the National Assembly scheduled for March 25. The move came under immediate criticism from the leaders of three minority parties represented in the assembly, namely, Khan Abdul Wali Khan of the National Awami Party, Mian Mumtaz Daultana of the Council Muslim League and Maulana Mufti Mahmood of the Jamiat-e-Ulema-e-Islam.

http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/news-details.php?nid=178681

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