Fault Line

The death of Nawab Akbar Bugti at the hands of Pakistan’s armed forces serves as a metaphor for the war between politics and militarism that characterises Pakistan’s unfortunate history as a nation. One need not agree with all of Nawab Bugti’s views to acknowledge that he was a towering political figure in his life and a man who retained his pride and honour in his death. Only those schooled in the ways of colonial soldiers can feel pride in killing an 80-year-old tribal chieftain with the help of modern precision weapons.

Officials described Nawab Bugti and his companions as “miscreants”, a term brought to South Asia by the British East India Company. The term was last used widely in 1971 by the Pakistani establishment to describe the Bengali people of erstwhile East Pakistan.

The Bengalis had voted for Sheikh Mujibur Rehman’s Awami League in the 1970 elections, hoping that their votes would enable them to write the constitution of the country of which they were the majority of citizens. But the generals who ruled Pakistan then did not approve of the people’s verdict or their chosen representative. When Mujibur Rehman refused to give in to the generals’ demand to accept their views on the constitution as final and in the national interest, confrontation between the people and the army began.

Late Brigadier Siddiq Salik, who worked as an officer in the Pakistan army’s public relations directorate at the time, wrote an excellent account of events in Dhaka after the 1970 elections titled Witness to Surrender. In that book, he cites a comment that sums up the attitude of the army in East Pakistan. According to Salik, the General Officer Commanding, Major-General Khadim Hussain Raja, told an Awami League sympathiser within the hearing of fellow officers: “I will muster all I can — tanks, artillery and machine guns — to kill all the traitors and, if necessary, raze Dhaka to the ground. There will be no one to rule; there will be nothing to rule.”

The military cracked down on the politicians and the people they led. Operation Searchlight began on the night of March 25, 1971 and its basis for planning clearly stated: “AL (Awami League) action and reactions to be treated as rebellion and those who support (the League) or defy ML (martial law) action be dealt with as hostile elements... As AL has widespread support even amongst EP (East Pakistani) elements in the Army, the operation has to be launched with great cunningness, surprise, deception and speed combined with shock action.”

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