বাংলাদেশের স্বাধীনতা যুদ্ধ দলিলপত্র (দ্বাদশ খণ্ড)/১৫৫
| শিরোনাম | সূত্র | তারিখ |
|---|---|---|
| বাংলাদেশের অনুকূলে জনমত সৃষ্টির উদ্দেশ্যে বিদেশ সফরশেষে সংবাদপত্রে পদত্ত জয়প্রকাশ নারায়ণের অভিজ্ঞতা ও বলিষ্ঠ বিবৃতি | বিবৃতি | ২১ জুন, ১৯৭১ |
PRESS STATEMENT
A. Left Delhi 16th May and returned 27th June - In all 47 days.
B. Places visited: Cairo, Rome, Belgrade, Moscow, Helsinki, Stockholm, Boon, Paris, London, Washington. New York, ottawa, Vancouver, Tokyo, Bangkok (for rest-no interviews), Djakarta, Singapor, Kuala Lumpur, Bangkok (to catch Air India flight to Dehli).
1. I had under taken this mission as a servant of peace on behalf of the Sarva Seva, Sang and the Gandhi Peace Foundation, I am very thankfull indeed, for all the help, financial and otherswise, that I received from them.
2. Equally, I must express my warm appreciation of all the help and hospitality that we received from our country’s representatives in all the capitals we visited. we are most thankfull to them in practicular and to the Government of India in general for all that they did to make my mission as useful as possible.
3. It ws not to beg for aid for refugee relief or only talk about human suffering and to arouse the moral conscience of the world that I under took the arduous trip. Succour for millions of refugees who have fled to India, as well as succour for many millions more subjected to terror in Bangladesh and faced with famine and epidemic there, is of course urgent and I naturally spoke about it. As for the moral conscience of the world or what is left of it, the press everywhere except for Cairo, have done, and I think are still doing, a wonderful job.
4. My greater concern was with the political issue involved and need for their urgent resolution, because as I tried to point out, to those whom I met, the refugee problem and the humanitarian problem were only by products of the underlying political probem.
5. Thanks to the world press as well as to other sources of information including their own diplomatic channels, I found that governments were fairly well posted in regard to the political aspects of the question. I think it was generally felt that the Government of Pakistan by using its brutal might to suppress the democratic verdict of the people of Bangladesh had put into jeopardy the very survival of Pakistan as a united nation. Yet, I found the spokesmen of some governments clutching at the straw of hope that some links between the two wings might still be preserved. Therefore, they all seemed to be pressing Pakistan to stop military operations and seek a political accommodation-this was the popular term in Washington-with the leaders of Bangladesh. When questioned if they had accommodation with stooges in their mind, they were emphatic in declaiming any such thought. Again, when confronted with the view that after what the Pakistan army had done in Bangladesh no self-respecting Bengali would accept even a “tenous link” with West Pakistan, wishful thinking took the place of hard reason.
6. The fact of the matter is, and left this be understood clearly in this country, that the great powers are all anxious to preserve the status quo in terms of the balance of power already established in the world. Some of them are particularly keen to preserve the balance on South Asia which has been created by them through a deliberate policy of neutralising India by lostering up Pakistan.
7. The adverse consequences of a prolonged guerilla warfare in Bangladesh for the stability and progress of the sub-continent are also realised, but the hope is nourished that somehow the evil might be warded off.
8. Some of the policy-makers in world capitals still remain to be convinced of the inevitability of the emergence of a strong resistance movement in Bangladesh. It is not until the freedom fighters in Bangladesh convincingly disprove the Pakistani claims of “normalcy” that they can be expected to face the realities of the situation.
9. For the rest they will continue to “friendly” advice to president Yahya to put his house in order and may even refuse to provide all the aid he wants from them.
10. In any event, it is India that is immediately concerned and will have to face the consequence of Pakistan’s action and I found no evidence anywhere that anyone was prepared to pull the chestnuts out of the fire for us.
11. Some of the economic burden of caring after the refugees they may be prepared to share though our estimate of numbers perhaps appeared exaggerated to them but it is obvious that the social and political burdens will have to be borne by India alone. And heaven knows these burdens are far heavier then the economic ones.
12. The decision of the Aid Pakistan Consortium is a welcome decision. But, first of all, it dose not rule out bilateral aid members of the consortium, and, secondly, it remains to be seen if a quisling set-up in Bangladesh, such as the President of Pakistan seems to be evisaging, will be accepted by the consortium as a fulfillment of its conditions.
13. To sum up the impressions of my tour, we in India mist understand that we cannot expect others to solve our difficulties for us. We have to do that ourselves. Secondly, we have to decide if continued suppression of the people of Bangladesh, with all its attendant economic, political and social consequences, will be in our national interest. This is not the same as asking whether a break-up of Pakistan will be in India’s national interest. President Yahya khan and his advisers have already succeeded in breaking up their nation. The question to be answered is whether the attempt by West Pakistan to occupy Bangladesh by force, with all its present and future consequences for us, is a spectacle which we can continue to behold with little more than brave words. For myself, I am quite clear in my mind that it would be a grave betrayal of India’s national interests to delay action much longer.
14. It is quite obvious from the shocking statement made by President Yahya Khan yesterday that Islamabad has neither the willingness nor the ability to devise a satisfactory political solution of the problem it has created in Bangladesh. It is not contemplating any agreement with the elected leaders of Bangladesh and is in fact planning to hold farcical new elections in a large number of constituencies to legitimise its colonial stranglehold over Bangladesh. It should now be clear to us and to the whole world that it is chimerical to expect the present rulers of Pakistan to revise their basic attitudes to Bangladesh. This has, in fact, made the hope, of a political settlement in Pakistan more unrealisable than before.
15. Everyone, I met abroad was full of praise for the Prime Minister’s restraint and statesmanship in dealing with a difficult crisis. I too admire her for that. But she must decide now if the time for action has not arrived. Action, not from any altruistic motives of rescuing East Bengalis from Pakistan terror and restoring to them their lost democracy, but to prevent Yahya Khan from exporting his internal chaos into this country and achieving a demographic re-distribution of his population at our cost, and, above all, to defend our national security and our political, economic and social institutions. I concede that the Prime Minister must choose her time because she alone is in a position to know and weigh all the pros and cons involved. But even to a private citizen like me the basic consideration are clear and it is on that ground that my plea for action is being advanced.