The Pakistani army can be arraigned on charges of genocide on count (a), (b) and (c) above, and, to some extent, probably on count (d). Thus, incidents of massacre of the members of a particular religious group, the Hindus, are too many, to leave even an iota of doubt as to the intent of the army to destroy them wholly. The indiscriminate killing all over Bangladesh of men, women and children also proves the intent of die army to destroy the Bengalis, a distinct national and ethnical group. Both these will satisfy the requirements of the charge of genocide under section (a) above. To frame charges under (b), there will be no dearth of instances all over Bangladesh. Facts on the basis of which charges can be framed under section (e) are too obvious to be mentioned: i0 million refugees in India, 30 million fugitives in Bangladesh herself, millions of people without any shelter as a result of arson, etc., should be enough to prove the intention of the killers.
A pertinent question can be raised as to whether the genocide in Bangladesh consists in acts of individual aberration or an organized governmental policy. Any one who has followed political events in Pakistan should not have any doubt that the genocide plan was premeditated and prepared at the highest governmental level. Looking back we find that, as early as 1966, after Sheikh Mujibur Rahman presented his Six-point formula, Ayub Khan declared that he would prefer going to a civil war rather than conceding to the demands of?,the Sheikh. Five years later, en March 6, 1971, his success or, Yahya Khan, repealed the same threat. A few days earlier he removed Admiral Ahsan from the Governorship of the then East Pakistan and Lt. General Shahibjada from the command of the Eastern Command. By nature humane, none of these two persons hail from West Pakistan. Tikka Khan who rose from the ranks replaced Admiral Ahsan. On March 15 Yahya Khan came to Dacca for talks with Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. The Sheikh reported? progress in their talks. But the talks were just to hoodwink the world and to gain some time. While the parleys were going on the army however cleared out areas around the Dacca Airport. They also controlled the administration of the airport where planeloads of arms and ammunition continued to come. One shipload of arms also came at Chittagong port. Meanwhile; they disarmed the EPR men throughout Bangladesh. When all preparations were complete, the army cracked down on the unarmed and innocent civilians of Bangladesh.
The tragedy of the freedom struggle however lies more in the fact that the United Nations failed to condemn the hideous action of the Pakistani army or to take any positive step to check it. The painful indifference of the U.N. once more brings into sharp relief the fact that the world body is what the super powers like it to be. ' The say the Pakistani army during the nine month period also raised a pertinent question: should a government have the unfettered right to do what ever it likes within its territory and get away with it without be cured by the world community? A perusal of the U.N. Charter convince any one that promotion of Human Rights is one of the stones on which the world body is founded. In actual fact, it however, that there is an unbridgeable gap between the assertion principle and its execution.
The people of Bangladesh who went through untold misery and suffering and have at the end come out triumphantly have a special responsibility to fellow?sufferers all over the world. Already the people of India have remarkably shown their awareness of this responsibility. Let the two peoples therefore work together for building up a world where there will be no racial hatred, religious intolerance and cultural discrimination, a world where dignity of man will be upheld, human values will be respected and rights of man will he zealously guarded, a world where there will be no exploitation of man by man, no tyranny, no oppression and a world where one man will love another and make it worth living.

** This paper was read in a seminar and published in 'A Nation Is Born' by Calcutta University Bangladesh Sahayak Samiti. Reprinted here with the author's permission. Mr. M. Maniruzzaman Mia is ex. V.C of Dhaka University and a former Ambassador.