By Dheemant Anil
Abstract
The birth of Bangladesh can be considered the first time a climatic event led to the birth of the nation. It is therefore important for us to study the lead up to the Bangladeshi War of Liberation, as it gives us vital lessons as to how climate can play a role in the politics of the nation, these lessons might soon become painfully aware to us.
Introduction
This year would mark the 51st anniversary of the liberation war in Bangladesh. For the Bangladeshi people, it marks a major event in their history, as this was the conclusion of a long and brutal struggle for the dream of an independent Bangladesh. For India, this war was one of the finest hours in its history, where India secured its position as the regional hegemon of South Asia. For Pakistan, it is remembered with pain as a second partition had occurred, which led Pakistan to be half the state it originally was. To understand the role of the climate, however, it is important to go back in history.
Background
In 1947, Pakistan emerged as an independent nation-state from the old British India. It was divided into two halves, the west, and the east. One American journalist put it extremely succinctly when he wrote that both sides were not like each other, with one being of the desert and the other being of the monsoon. Perhaps the story of the first Governor of East Pakistan, who found out that in the entire region, there was not a single flag of Pakistan to be found.
From the beginning, the Pakistani establishment had a lukewarm attitude towards the Bengali population. They mostly saw them as pseudo-Muslims or culturally Hindus. When, in the year 1953, there were riots in the East over the imposition of the language of Urdu over Bengal, many in the West saw it as a sign that the East was still in connection with its identity of old. This attitude was further cemented in the Ayub Khan era when he wanted to keep the Bengalis out. Otherwise, it was feared the Hindu Minority in Bengal would wield power in Pakistan, in the name of the Bengalis.
The Hindu minority was a sticking block for many of the Western Pakistanis. Hindus were often prioritised in education and government. This meant that at any given point in time, many professors and bureaucrats would be Hindu. Even if Pakistan tried to limit their influence, it could not. One solution would have been to provide schools and colleges to the larger Bengali Muslim population, but this would require funds from the economy to be diverted.
This was not what the ruling establishment wanted. East Pakistan, for them, was a colonial project; its only role was to provide resources like jute and rice to the West. And as such, the West never invested anything other than the bare minimum. An example can be the Army, which barely had an Army officer above the rank of Colonel who was from Bengal. M. A. G. Osmani was perhaps the only officer who managed to reach the rank of Colonel, and that too after a long process. Pakistani officers referred to the Bengalis as “the Black Bastards” and considered them to be a “non-martial race”, which meant that they were unlikely to stand and fight and were seen as weak people, compared to the Pathans and the Punjabis of the West who were seen as a “martial race” and were encouraged to join the ranks of the Army and were over-represented.
All of these were the ingredients that were present for the separation of Bangladesh; what was needed was a catalyst that would show the attitude of the West Pakistanis towards their eastern counterpart, and which would come from an unlikely source: Mother Nature.
Cyclone Bhola
November 1970, saw the disastrous 1970 cyclone Bhola, sometimes referred to as the Great Cyclone of 1970, hit West Bengal, India, and East Pakistan, which is now Bangladesh. It’s still the deadliest tropical cyclone on record and among the deadliest humanitarian catastrophes in history. The storm’s surge inundated many of the Ganges Delta’s low-lying islands, resulting in at least 300,000 deaths and possibly as many as 500,000. During the 1970 North Indian Ocean cyclone season, Bhola was the sixth and most powerful cyclonic storm.
On November 8, a cyclone developed over the middle of the Bay of Bengal and proceeded northward, strengthening along the way. When it peaked, the winds had a devastating speed of 185 km/h. When it hit the land, it devastated East Bengal on a level unheard and unseen ever before. The international community mobilised and sent relief to the region. Even India, which had prepared a massive relief effort, was ready to help East Pakistan. Mujibur Rahman noted ruefully that it was the Royal Marines who helped in the efforts to help bury the dead, while their army simply sat.
Aftermath
The efforts made by the Pakistani establishment were simply made to ignore the population. Which they had ignored throughout their rule. Many of the efforts were made by the International Community and Pakistan’s “Arch Enemy” India, while the Pakistani establishment itself simply chose to ignore the region and send the bare minimum, which included a crop duster plane. General Yahya Khan was a prime example of this ignorance. His visit was barely 15 minutes long, and he simply left, angering the Bengali population further. Added to this was almost an ignorance of this topic in West Pakistani society. For many in the East, it felt as if they didn’t exist at all, and their sole purpose was to be extracted for their resources and left to their own devices, which infuriated them further.
This was a catalyst that led to the large-scale mobilisation of forces in the local population. Mujibur Rehman soon became a figure around whom all the resistance started consolidating. Such was the anger, that in the General election of the 1970s the Awami League swept the elections in the east, with it being able to form a government on its own.
The cyclone had by then given birth to a new cyclone which would lead to the Birth of a new Nation. Mujibur Rehaman first demanded that the nation be given its resources on an equal basis and to ensure that the East was represented in the national consciousness of Pakistan instead of being lost to the identity of the West. A war was not on Mujib’s mind, rather it was to ensure that the East got its due in the larger state.
Conclusion
West Pakistan was not ready to have this as Yahya Khan had the support of an upcoming politician called Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto. He was part of the ruling Punjabi Aristocracy of Pakistan and was someone the generals could relate to. He was also the favourite of the elite classes of Pakistan and was the one who was supposed to become the Prime Minister until Mujibur Rahman came along. This could not be tolerated by any of the powers long established within the Pakistani State, and for many, it was unthinkable that a Bengali would rule the country, that too as the prime Minister of the Nation, which as already explained, many of the Pakistani leadership never wanted in the first place and had been working to prevent it from happening. Yahya Khan took the step of declaring the election to be fraudulent and declared Martial law, inclusive of that they launched Operation Searchlight, a violent crackdown on the intelligentsia of these movements.
Therefore they targeted the Hindus, whom they believed to be the main source of Bengali Nationalism. However, soon they shifted their target upon the Bengali Muslim population whom they saw as beneath them, and as such viciously attacked them which had a twofold effect. Any hope that the Bengali population had, soon turned into Anger, which led to the refugee crisis and then led to the famous war of 1971, where the independent Nation of Bangladesh was created with the help of Indian arms.
Cyclone Bhola brings to us an interesting event in which not by any means an absurd argument, given the Islamabad government’s nonchalance in the face of one of the worst recorded natural disasters anywhere in the world, which led to the creation of the new nation of Bangladesh
It is perfectly possible that the Awami League’s near-clean sweep of National Assembly seats in the province was facilitated by the horrors of November, which would have otherwise resulted in a hung house and a loss of power and sovereignty to both the West and the East. Perhaps Bangladesh was the world’s first example where Climate and a few hundred thousand troops gave birth to a nation.
Author’s Bio
Dheemant Anil is a student of law at the OP Jindal Global University and is an international Relations enthusiast. He is also a movie enthusiast and is interested in the history of the world and has been interested in learning about the world during the great wars and understanding why history happened the way it happened and would like to have a conversation with the history of the world and of the story of how the trade routes changed the world.
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