Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, chief of the Awami League, addressing a public rally in Dhaka’s Paltan Maidan during his election campaign. | Photo: Dawn/White Star Archives
THE Awami League Chief Sheikh Mujibur Rahman today [February 15] reiterated that the country’s constitution would certainly be framed on the basis of his party’s Six Point programme and the Student Action Committee’s Eleven Point programme. No power could stop it, he said. Sheikh Mujibur Rahman advised the West Pakistan leaders to accept the Six Point programme in toto. If it was accepted then “we can live together”, the Awami League chief said. He asked the leaders of that Wing not to create confusion and misunderstanding and to accept the Six Points. Sheikh Mujibur Rahman assured them that the Six Points were not against the ordinary people of West Pakistan but against the exploiters of West and East Pakistan. Addressing the West Pakistani leaders of his party who were sitting with him on the dais, the Awami League chief smilingly said: “Unfortunately you have produced more (exploiters)”.
The Awami League chief said the Six Points could not be changed. When he first presented it after the war in 1965, it was his property. When the Awami League accepted it, it was the party’s property, but now after the elections it had become the property of the people and nobody had the power to change it, he said.
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DISPUTE OVER CONSTITUTIONAL ISSUES
DAWN February 16, 1971 (News Report)
PPP not to attend NA session if AL not flexible
MR Z. A. Bhutto, Chairman of Pakistan People’s Party, today [February 15] declared that his party will not attend the National Assembly session starting on March 3 at Dacca unless it was made clear to him and his partymen that there would be some amount of reciprocity from the majority party, either publicly or privately. Addressing a crowded Press conference he did not term his decision as boycott of the Assembly but said: “We can’t go there only to endorse the constitution already prepared by a party and to return humiliated. If we are not heard and even reasonable proposals put by us are not considered, I don’t see the purpose to go there”.
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CONSTITUTION-MAKING — NO CONSENSUS
DAWN March 2, 1971 (News Report)
National Assembly session postponed
PRESIDENT Yahya Khan yesterday [March 1] announced his decision to postpone the National assembly session scheduled to start in Dacca from March 3 to a later date in view of the grave political situation in the country. The President’s decision was announced in a statement specially broadcast over Radio Pakistan. At the same time President Yahya made a solemn promise that as soon as the situation improved he would not hesitate in calling the session of the National Assembly.
The President also said that he will do everything possible to help political leaders in achieving an understanding. He appealed to the political leaders and the countrymen to exercise restraint at this “grave hour of our life”.
Saying that he was taking the decision “with a heavy heart”, he explained that if the National Assembly session was held without the participation of political leaders from West Pakistan it would have led to the disintegration of the Assembly itself and thus his entire effort to transfer power to the people would have been wasted.
He said it was, therefore, imperative to give more time to the political leaders to arrive at a reasonable understanding and he hoped that they would rise to the occasion.
The President said that the decision has been taken because a major party of West Pakistan, namely the Pakistan People’s Party, as well as certain other political parties have declared their intention not to attend the National Assembly session on March 3.
In addition, the President said, the general situation of tension created by India has further complicated the whole position.
He said he had repeatedly stated that constitution was not an ordinary piece of legislation but it was an arrangement to live together. For a healthy and viable constitution, therefore, it is necessary that both East and West Pakistan had adequate sense of participation in the process of constitution-making.
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EAST PAKISTAN ON THE BOIL
DAWN March 5, 1971 (Editorial)
On the brink
THE situation as it now stands after President Yahya Khan proposed a meeting of 12 leaders of Parliamentary groups to solve the constitutional crisis and Sherth Mujibur Rahman expressed his inability to attend it is one which will fill all patriots with deep anxiety. Never in its history has the country faced a moment of danger like the one it does now and the sense of peril is made more acute by the fact that primarily the threat has its origins within the country and cannot be conveniently ascribed to an external enemy. The postponement of the National Assembly session without the fixation of a new date has created a grave crisis of confidence in the Eastern Wing of the country. Rightly or wrongly the people in East Pakistan have interpreted the move as an attempt to prevent them from asserting their democratic rights as citizens of Pakistan and from securing a constitutional dispensation that satisfies their aspirations. An acute sense of desperation has led to a widespread movement of protest and defiance. How far the Awami League will be able to exercise control over the movement remains to be seen. There is no doubt that Sheikh Mujibur Rahman is under mounting pressure from those who lack patience and those who are too inexperienced to realise what the stakes are.
The very first task is to prevent the crisis from getting worse and to create a climate of opinion in which a meaningful attempt can be made to produce a constitution which will satisfy a majority of the people and attract the commitment of the federating unites. And such a consulitution has to embody the essence of the Six-Point formula. We are firmly convinced that no initiative in this direction will have any chance of bearing fruit in today’s context without an immediate announcement setting a very early date for summoning the National Assembly.
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TROUBLE ON PAKISTAN DAY
DAWN March 25, 1971 (News Report)
‘Resistance Day’ parade
MARCH 23 was heralded here [Dacca] with the observance of the programme announced by the Students Central Action Committee, which declared it as a Resistance Day. The Bangla Desh flag fluttered atop all buildings, both Government and non-Government, including the Dacca High Court and the Secretariat buildings. Private houses and residences throughout the city, including the Dhanmondi residence of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, were seen flying the flag, which was designed by and flown for the first time on March 2 at the Dacca University Arts Faculty campus at a mass students rally by the Students Action Committee. The tricolour flag is bottle-green with a red sun and gold coloured map of Bangla Desh.
Buses, trucks, rickshaws, cars and carts all alike flew the flag of Bangla Desh and the black flag together. The black flag symbolised the mourning for the people killed during the mass movement in the last weeks, which came after the postponement of the National Assembly session scheduled on March 3.
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POLITICAL ACTIVITY BANNED
DAWN March 27, 1971 (News Report)
Awami League is outlawed
THE President, Gen. Agha Mohammad Yahya Khan, today [March 26] banned all political activities and imposed complete press censorship throughout Pakistan. In a broadcast to the nation, the President said: “As for the Awami League, it is completely banned as a political party.”The President said that Martial Law Regulations will very shortly be issued in pursuance of these decisions. The President told the nation that he had taken these decisions “in view of the grave situation that exists in the country today.” The President said: “Let me assure you that my main aim remains the same, namely, transfer of power to the elected representatives of the people”.
“As soon as the situation permits I will take fresh steps towards the achievement of this objective”, the President added. He said Sheikh Mujibur Rahman’s action of non-cooperation movement “is an act of treason”. President Yahya said: “They have insulted Pakistan’s flag and defiled the photograph of the Father of the Nation. They have tried to run a parallel government. They have created turmoil terror and insecurity”.He said that a number of murders had been committed in the name of the movement. “Millions of our Bengali brethren and those who have settled in East Pakistan are living in a state of panic and a very large number had to leave that Wing out of fear for their lives”.
He added that the armed forces, located in East Pakistan have been subjected to taunts and insults of all kinds.
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AWAMI LEAGUE PLAN EXPOSED
DAWN May 7, 1971 (News Report)
Army action saved Pakistan
THE outlawed Awami League had set the small hours of March 26 as the zero hour for an armed uprising and the formal launching of “the Independent Republic of Bangla Desh”, an official spokesman of the Pakistan Government revealed here [Rawalpindi] today [May 6].
In a detailed statement on the East Pakistan situation, the spokesman said that the plan was to seize Dacca and Chittagong, lying astride the Army’s Air/Sea lifelines to West Pakistan. But, he said, the Army moved barely a few hours before the Awami League zero hour and made a series of pre-emptive strikes around midnight of March 25-26, seized the initiative and saved the country.
He said the Army at that time consisted of a division of 18 battalions, including 12 from West Pakistan, spread thinly over cantonment in the interior and deployed along the border with India. Arrayed against them were infiltrators from India and deserters from the East Pakistan Rifles, the East Bengal Regiment and other auxiliary forces, equipped with mortars, recoilless rifles and heavy and light machine guns liberally supplied from across the border.
The spokesman also gave a resume of Sheikh Mujib’s continual shifting of stand from his pre-election interpretation of Six Points as the demand for largest measure for autonomy within the framework of a single country (for which he got the mandate), to the demand of confederation and his attempts to achieve it through conspiracy and force using “Nazi-style tactics”.
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OFFENSIVE AGAINST EAST PAKISTAN
DAWN November 23, 1971 (News Report)
All-out Indian attack