constitutions, in how many pronouncements and proclamations in every country in the world are these words not used? Are we to be guided just by rhetoric and eloquence? In India itself, democracy does not function in several of its provinces: they are under direct Presidential rule. And secularism is honoured more in the breach than in the observance. Militant groups let loose murder and slaughter against religious minorities—and we are asked to take the word for the deed.
We were also told about foreign relations of Bangladesh and Its policy of nonalignment. The mentor of that government has set the example of non-alignment by concluding the Indo-Soviet military alliance.
The Representative of India talks of freedom of Bangladesh. In 1905, that same East Pakistan, which was part of Bengal Province, achieved its emancipation from the economic -exploitation and domination of the capitalists and caste Hindus of Calcutta and became a separate province within India-that was done by the British Government in 1905. But those same capitalists, industrialists, the caste Hindus of India, carried on a ceaseless agitation of murder, assassination and terror, and forced the British Government to annul the partition. So the separation of East Pakistan-which took place in 1905, because it had been exploited for two centuries, both under British rule and subsequently by the privileged classes in India-was annulled and East Pakistan. Was again made a part of Bengal, so that the rule of the privileged classes was reimposed. It is only the Pakistani people and their strength that stand between that kind of reimposition of domination and the development of the people of East Pakistan in freedom and as the dominant partners and the dominant elements in the political life of Pakistan,
Then the Representative of India went into the history of the movement for autonomy, talked of the six points and quoted from Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. Well, let me tell you something about the six points.
On 23rd March-two days before the Federal Army had to take action to suppress the massacres of non-Bengali elements that were being perpetrated by the secessionist elements-the leaders of the secessionist movement, or the leaders of the Awami League, presented a draft proclarnation to President Yahya Khan stating that it was their last word and that the President of Pakistan could take it or leave it; in it they also said that Pakistan shall be a confederation-from a federal state, it was to transform itself into a confederation. The other political parties believe that confederation is an association, of two sovereign states and not a union of provinces or states into one single whole. Surely, this was a legitimate point of view with which one may agree, or not agree, but how does this become the concern of India? In other words, the Pakistan Government Was asked to accept an ultimatum to transform Pakistan into a confederation of two sovereign States. And yet, we have a lecture from the Representative of India about how we should conduct ourselves in regard to the ordering of our constitutional and political life. Let him first study his own Constitution and see how much autonomy is given to the provinces. How much autonomy does West Bengal, his own province have in the Indian federation? To what extent are the resources of Bengal and Assam spent within those provinces?
Then again, in every form the Indian Representatives repeat the hundreds of thousands of people murdered by the Pakistan armed forces. It is a matter of the deepest
