India and Pakistan fought a war that led to the birth of Bangladesh 45 years ago. An evaluation, as The Tribune National Security Forum today discusses “Defence at 70

On the offensive: Indian armour in action during the 1971 War photo: AFP

Harish Khare

India had not sought the 1971 War. It was a conflict that was imposed on India by Pakistan and its bumbling generals. In the end, it became — and, remains — the perfect example of  statecraft, with a national leadership displaying the requisite  competence and self-assurance, optimally mobilising the nation’s intellectual, bureaucratic, diplomatic and defence resources, to accomplish the intended goals.

The 1971 War constitutes the only example in our recent history when our armed forces not only inflicted a crushing defeat on the adversary but also forced the vanquished enemy to sign an instrument of surrender.

There can be little doubt that the clinical victory over Pakistan was Indira Gandhi’s finest moment. She had just led her party to a decisive victory in the March 1971 Lok Sabha elections and was all set to reorient her government’s policies, personnel  and priorities; but, all those best-laid plans soon got quagmired  in the crisis in the then East Pakistan.

The Yahya Khan-ZA Bhutto duo stood committed to strategic stupidities and insisted on taking a suicidal route; India became involved in the game, much against its wishes.

The Arthashastra teaches us a simple lesson: the task of leadership is to safeguard the national interests. Indira Gandhi had the prescience to understand that there was no way India could absorb on a permanent basis all those thousands and thousands of refugees who were daily pouring into India after the brutal crackdown on the Bengalis, Hindus and Muslims alike, in East Pakistan.

Indira Gandhi and her advisers read the geopolitical scene astutely and cunningly concluded that except for offering lip sympathy, the global powers would do little to alleviate India’s growing and groaning burden. The Pakistani dictators’ bloody suppression of its own people was no longer Islamabad’s internal affair; the baneful consequences for India were all too evident. India would have to do something to sort out the generals.

Once the objective got defined and identified, all instruments and resources of the Indian state got mobilised. The armed forces and its leadership were empowered to finesse the strategic approach and tactical by-plays. The Prime Minister had formidable political colleagues in Jagjivan Ram, Y. B. Chavan and Sardar Swaran Singh; she had already enlisted the best of the bureaucratic talent — PN Haksar, DP Dhar, PN Dhar, TN Kaul, LK Jha. And, she had the practical common sense to encourage a perfect — and, as it turned out, a match-winning — synergy between the political/civilian leadership and the armed forces. On their part, the armed forces displayed an unprecedented intra-services convergence of temperaments, missions and egos.

But there was no bombast, no bragging. No xenophobia. No shouting nationalism. There was calm in the air, and there was a competence at work. The citizen was mobilised as the nation defied the United States and its implacably vengeful leaders like Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger. As those cold practitioners of realpolitik sent in — as an exercise in intimidation and coercion — a naval flotilla towards the Bay of Bengal, Indira Gandhi was addressing a massive public rally in Delhi. The citizens were very much a part of the war effort.

The outcome of the 1971 was entirely satisfactory to the Indian psyche and to the Indian strategic interests. However, the world does not take kindly to such clinical overpowering of one nation by another. The USA-China-Pakistan axis got steeled up. At home, the economic consequences of the war began spelling hardships. The taste of victory in our mouths gave way to the bitterness of economic cost. We learnt a new lesson: all wars, even those won decisively, bring in their wake economic dislocation and dissatisfaction. Very soon we were introducing new fault lines in our national life.

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How the war unfolded

May 15: Indian Army starts aiding Mukti Bahini.

August 16: Operation Jackpot, the commando operation that sabotaged Pakistan Navy and its assets in Chittagong, Chandpur, Mongla and Naryanganj.

August 30: Pakistan Army cracks down on Dhaka (then Dacca) guerrillas.

October 13: Dhaka guerrillas kill Abdul Monem Khan, governor of East Pakistan.

October 31 to November 3: Battle of Dhalai: Indian attack from Tripura into East Pakistan to stop Pakistani cross-border shelling.

November 20 to November 21: Battle of Garibpur, the Indian attack in Boyra in East Pakistan.

November 22 to December 13: Sporadic fighting followed by Battle of Hilli, the Indian attack on Bogra in East Pakistan.

December 3: Pakistani air attacks on India result in India declaring war on Pakistan.

December 4: Battle of Longewala, where India routs a large Pakistani armour attack in Jaisalmer.

December 5: Battle of Basantar: India attacks and captures Pakistani territory opposite Jammu. Navy launches Op Trident to bomb Karachi.

December 6: Bhutan becomes the first country to recognise Bangladesh after India.

December 7: Liberation of Jessore, Sylhet and Moulovi Bazaar.

December 8: Operation Python: Indian naval attack on Karachi in West Pakistan.

December 9: Battle of Kushtia: The Indian attack from West Bengal into East Pakistan, liberating Chandpur and Daudkandi.

December 10: Liberation of Laksham.

December 11: Liberation of Hilli, Mymenshingh, Kushtia and Noakhalx.

December 14: Selective genocide of Bengali nationalist intellectuals. Liberation of Bogra.

 

December 16: End of the Bangladesh Liberation War. Indian Army enters Dhaka and East Pakistan Army surrenders.

Simran Sodhi

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, November 30

India today put the ball back in Pakistan’s court on the resumption of a bilateral dialogue and said it had so far received no request from Pakistan for such a meeting on the sidelines of the Heart of Asia (HOA) Conference.“Pakistan has not requested for any bilateral meeting so far,” Gopal Baglay, Joint Secretary in the Ministry of External Affairs, said. In the build-up to the HOA Conference at Amritsar on December 3-4, Pakistan has been signalling that it is ready to resume bilateral talks. (Follow The Tribune on Facebook; and Twitter @thetribunechd)Sartaj Aziz, Pakistan’s de facto foreign minister, will be in Amritsar on Sunday, while Finance Minister Arun Jaitley will lead the Indian delegation as External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj is unwell.Aziz’s visit is significant since it is the first high-level visit from Pakistan ever since the January Pathankot airbase attack. Sushma Swaraj travelled to Islamabad to attend the HOA Conference in December last year. Her meeting with Aziz and Pakistan PM Nawaz Sharif marked resumption of a formal dialogue.Pathankot, Uri and now Nagrota terror attacks have made domestic opinion very anti-Pakistan, making it difficult for the government to engage in dialogue with a nation “using terror as an instrument of state policy”.

JAMMU ATTACKS Army rescues hostage women, kids in Nagrota, kills 3 militants; three infiltrators shot dead in Samba

Seven soldiers, including two Majors, were killed when militants dressed as policemen stormed a military camp in Jammu and Kashmir on Tuesday, triggering a fierce gun battle that raged for more than 12 hours.

A defence statement said the bodies of three militants were recovered and “operations are in progress to sanitise the complete area”.

The brazen attack was the second in as many months since the siege of another army base at Uri left 19 Indian soldiers dead, spiking tensions between India and Pakistan.

In a separate gunfight, 70km from Nagrota, three infiltrators were killed and a senior BSF officer and five jawans were injured near the international border in Chamliyal area of Samba sector, officials said.

While the operation in Chamliyal was over quickly, the gun battle at Nagrota, a town on the highway between Srinagar and Jammu, continued after sundown.

Defence spokesperson Lt Col Manish Mehta said a “hostage– like situation” arose after the militants entered two buildings housing officers and families of the army unit, located about three kms from the headquarters of the 16 Corps. “The situation was very quickly contained and thereafter, in a deliberate operation all were successfully rescued, which included 12 soldiers, two ladies and two children,” the statement added.

The two rescued children are 18 months and two months old, an army officer said.

An officer said the wives of the two army officers blocked the entry of their quarters with “all the household items, making it difficult for the terrorists to break into the houses”.

Staccato bursts of gunfire and loud explosions continued in the cantonment as helicopter gunships and drones hovered overhead in fading light of the day.

“The operation is on, we have suspended it for the night, but the area has been placed under tight cordon, the army does not want to take any risk and we will resume the operations with the first light of the morning (on Wednesday),” the spokesperson said.

The army said the group of heavily armed militants — believed to five-six in number — arrived at the base in a Maruti car before opening fire and lobbing grenades at the sentries on the main gate.

PM Narendra Modi was briefed on the attack by defence minister Manohar Parrikar and army chief General Dalbir Singh in Delhi. No civilians were targeted, Parrikar said.

India blames Pakistan-based militants of targeting security personnel and civilians in the state, a charge Islamabad denies. The latest incidents came on a day Pakistan saw a change of guard in its powerful military with General Qamar Javed Bajwa taking over as the army chief from General Raheel Sharif.

In his farewell address, the outgoing military chief warned India not to mistake his country’s “restraint” over recent tensions in disputed Kashmir for weakness. The violence followed a brief lull in fighting between Indian and Pakistani troops, who have been exchanging heavy mortar and artillery fire for months across the de facto border that divides Kashmir between the two nations.

Relations at the government level have worsened, with the two nations expelling diplomats from their capitals as each side accuses the other of starting the fight.

Following the attack, the administration shut all schools in the cantonment, located close to the National Highway 1A.

Kartar Singh, 55, who has a grocery shop next to the encounter site, said he heard gun shots early in the morning.

“The situation was very quickly contained and thereafter, in a deliberate operation all were successfully rescued, which included 12 soldiers, two ladies and two children,” the statement added.

The two rescued children are 18 months and two months old, an army officer said.

An officer said the wives of the two army officers blocked the entry of their quarters with “all the household items, making it difficult for the terrorists to break into the houses”.

Staccato bursts of gunfire and loud explosions continued in the cantonment as helicopter gunships and drones hovered overhead in fading light of the day.

“The operation is on, we have suspended it for the night, but the area has been placed under tight cordon, the army does not want to take any risk and we will resume the operations with the first light of the morning (on Wednesday),” the spokesperson said.

The army said the group of heavily armed militants — believed to five-six in number — arrived at the base in a Maruti car before opening fire and lobbing grenades at the sentries on the main gate.

PM Narendra Modi was briefed on the attack by defence minister Manohar Parrikar and army chief General Dalbir Singh in Delhi. No civilians were targeted, Parrikar said.

India blames Pakistan-based militants of targeting security personnel and civilians in the state, a charge Islamabad denies. The latest incidents came on a day Pakistan saw a change of guard in its powerful military with General Qamar Javed Bajwa taking over as the army chief from General Raheel Sharif.

In his farewell address, the outgoing military chief warned India not to mistake his country’s “restraint” over recent tensions in disputed Kashmir for weakness. The violence followed a brief lull in fighting between Indian and Pakistani troops, who have been exchanging heavy mortar and artillery fire for months across the de facto border that divides Kashmir between the two nations.

Relations at the government level have worsened, with the two nations expelling diplomats from their capitals as each side accuses the other of starting the fight.

Following the attack, the administration shut all schools in the cantonment, located close to the National Highway 1A.

Kartar Singh, 55, who has a grocery shop next to the encounter site, said he heard gun shots early in the morning.

Qamar Bajwa.

Islamabad, November 29

General Qamar Javed Bajwa, an expert in PoK affairs, today took over as Pakistan’s new army chief succeeding Gen Raheel Sharif, who warned India against adopting an “aggressive stance” in Kashmir.

Gen Raheel handed over the command of world’s sixth-largest army by troop numbers to 57-year-old Bajwa at a ceremony held in the Army Hockey Stadium, close to the General Headquarters (GHQ) in Rawalpindi.

(Follow The Tribune on Facebook; and Twitter @thetribunechd)

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Saturday appointed Bajwa as Chief of Army Staff (COAS) by elevating him to the rank of four-star general.

Raheel in January had declared that he would not seek extension. There were speculation that the PML-N government would give him extension at the eleventh hour citing reasons that he was needed by the country to lead war on terror. The post of Army chief is the most powerful in Pakistan.

In his final speech as the army chief, 60-year-old Gen Raheel cautioned India against adopting an aggressive stance in the region.

He said that in recent months “India’s increasing terrorism and aggressive stance” in Kashmir have “endangered” the region.

“India should know that mistaking our policy of patience for weakness would be dangerous,” he said.

“This is reality, that in South Asia, lasting peace and progress is impossible without solution of the Kashmir issue.

For that, international community’s special attention is necessary,” he said.

He also stressed the need for institutions to work together for the nation’s progress.

“It is important that all institutions work together against external threats and internal threats. For this, we will need to follow the National Action Plan in letter and spirit,” Gen Raheel said.

“The army will remain alert to threats, whether external or internal,” he said.

For regional peace, he said, issues should be resolved politically.

The China-Pakistan Economic Corridor is a major factor in ensuring regional peace, he said.

“The departure of the first cargo from Gwadar port has shown this journey cannot be halted now,” he warned. “The time is here now that the enemies of CPEC stop working against it and become a part of it.”

Bajwa was earlier serving as Inspector General of the Training and Evaluation and also commanded the famed 10 Corps, the army`s largest, which is responsible for the area along the Line of Control (LoC).

As a major general, Bajwa led the Force Command Northern Areas. He also served in the 10 Corps as lieutenant colonel.

He also served with a UN mission in Congo as a brigade commander alongside former Indian army chief Gen Bikram Singh, who was also there as a division commander.

The new army chief has wide experience of LoC affairs due to his extensive involvement with Pakistan occupied Kashmir (PoK) and northern areas.

According to reports, General Bajwa’s “pro-democracy credentials” and his low-profile influenced the Prime Minister to appoint him to the powerful post of army chief superseding four top generals.

The military has been in charge of the country for more than half of Pakistan’s nearly 70-year history since independence from Britain. —PTI

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, November 26

The appointment of Lt Gen Qamar Javed Bajwa as the next Pakistan army chief to replace Gen Raheel Sharif has kicked up social media traffic, with speculation in some quarters that his family may have old ties with the Sikh Bajwa families in India.While many Indians bearing the Bajwa surname and those who are members of “Bajwa” groups on the social media have been receiving congratulatory messages, some of them have clarified that people bearing the Bajwa surname on both sides of the border originally come from the same clan, from the Sialkot-Narowal belt. All were originally Hindus before they conversion to Sikhism or Islam began a few hundred years ago. Some Pakistani Bajwa families also claim that they converted from Sikhism. In fact, majority of the Sikh Bajwa families migrated to India after Partition and some of them who chose to stay back in Pakistan are said to have converted to Islam later. There are several surnames common to Sikhs and Muslims.Though little is publicly known about the ancestry of Gen Bajwa, he is said to be a Jat belonging to the Punjabi Muslim stock. This also has a coincidence with the Indian Army Chief, Gen DS Suhag, who also happens to be a Jat.Though there may no longer be any direct blood relationship between the present generations of Sikh Bajwas and Muslim Bajwas, social interaction between the two continues.

New Delhi, November 25Seven days after ex-serviceman Ram Kishan Grewal allegedly committed suicide on November 1 over the “one rank, one pension” (OROP) issue, the government had credited the arrears of Rs 53,978 to his bank account, the Lok Sabha was informed today.On inquiry regarding the payment of the OROP benefits to him, the pension disbursing bank has informed that he was drawing a pension of Rs 22,608 per month, Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar said in a written reply. “He was entitled to a revised pension of Rs 25,634 per month under the OROP. The total amount of arrears of Rs 53,978 on account of implementation of the OROP has been credited to the bank account of late ex-subedar Ram Kishan Grewal on November 8, 2016,” he said.The minister said Rs 3020.97 crore had been spent this financial year as on November 12 on account of the payment of OROP arrears . 70-year-old Grewal, a resident of Bhiwani district, ended his life on November 1 by consuming poison in Delhi.— PTI

Islamabad, November 2

Pakistan had “readied” its battle plans after “threats from India”, the country’s air force chief said on Thursday and warned the neighbour against “acts of aggression”, as tensions escalate in the Indian sub-continent.Air Chief Marshal Sohail Aman said Pakistan was “not worried about India at all”, while he spoke at 9th International Defence Exhibition and Seminar (IDEAS).”India should show restraint and instead solve the issue of Kashmir as that would be better for them,” he was quoted as saying by the Express Tribune.He is quoted to have said Pakistan could not ignore this kind of pressure. “We are well capable of responding in the face of any aggression,” he said.India launched a counter-offensive against Pakistan on Wednesday, a day after terrorists killed three Indian soldiers  — beheading one of them — under Pakistan’s army cover fire in a gun battle in Kashmir’s Machil sector.Pakistan claimed on Wednesday that Indian forces had hit a passenger bus in Pakistan occupied Kashmir, killing nine and wounding as many people.The country also claimed it had killed seven Indian soldiers after its neighbour had “opened fire” along the Line of Control, killing three of Pakistan’s soldiers. Pakistan’s soldiers continued to shell Indian outposts, injuring six jawans.Pakistan’s Prime Minister has said the country would not tolerate “deliberate targeting” of innocent civilians, particularly children and women, ambulances and civilian transport.”Pakistan has exercised maximum restraint despite continuing ceasefire violations from Indian security forces along LoC,” he said on Thursday. The International Border and the Line of Control has been fraught with tensions since Indian Army conducted a military strike that targeted terrorist 6-7 launch pads across the border in Pakistan’s territory on September 29. The attack came 10 days after a terrorist strike on a military camp in north Kashmir’s Uri. Nineteen indian soldiers were killed in the attack.Although Pakistan has since denied such a strike, there have heavy cross-border firing and shelling since. India has accused Pakistan of having violated a truce agreement of 2003 several times in the past two months.India has long accused Pakistan of harbouring terrorist camps, a charge the neighbour has repeated denied. — PTI

Wednesday morning the country was told of a big mortar assault by the Indian Army along the Line of Control. There is considerable satisfaction that the government has given a free hand to the Army to settle scores with its Pakistani tormentors. The immediate provocation was a sneak attack from Pakistan that killed three Indian Army men on Tuesday. For grislier effect, the body of one of them was mutilated. This tit for tat in body count has been going on ever since 18 Indian Army soldiers were killed in Uri. The next day, New Delhi arranged for an orchestrated media event announcing retaliatory surgical strikes, that we were led to believe had laid the demon of Pakistani intransigence permanently to rest.Pakistan’s army calls its country a security state and abashedly claims to be its sole guardian angel. New Delhi has happily played into its hands by opting for an eye for an eye policy on the border. There is no doubt that the mutilation of the dead is no bravery and the perpetrator must be made to pay the price for this desecration. However, as events have shown there has been no end to the violence on the border. One violent act begets another. Post surgical strikes, 18 Indian soldiers and several civilians have laid down their lives. The death toll on the other side of the border has been higher.By now South Block should have realised that a burst of machinegun fire or even a sustained mortar assault does not achieve the type of closure its men of muscle had desired. Even though the Army on Wednesday undertook the biggest fire assault since 2003, it will not achieve the desired result of silencing Pakistani guns. Tomorrow another skirmish on the border might even the score. If New Delhi does not wish to get trapped in this cycle of blood feud, it must tap the interlocutors and their skills. Pakistan’s foreign policy czar Sartaj Aziz has already signalled his desire to attend a multinational meet in Amritsar. That will be a good time to begin rolling back the spurious satisfaction the gun provides.

Ajay Banerjee

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, november 22

In the past fifty-three days after the September 29 ‘surgical strike’, India and Pakistan have been locked in a tit-for-tat firing along the Line of Control (LoC).    India has lost 18 of its troops — that includes the Army and the Border Security Force (BSF), while Pakistan is estimated to have lost more men even as it downplays its own casualties.(Follow The Tribune on Facebook; and Twitter @thetribunechd)Today, when reports filtered in that three Army men have lost their lives at Machil close to the Line of Control in the Kashmir valley, the death toll for the Army reached 13 martyrs, either killed by firing from across the LoC by Pakistan army or by militants aided by the Pakistan army.Pakistan has publically admitted to 13-14 deaths of its own, though the Indian assessment based on ground reports from local informers and radio intercepts is that Pakistan has lost 24 soldiers.Even this morning when the encounter with militants was on in Machil, Pakistan army was giving cover fire, sources said, adding that the LoC has been ‘very active’ as the snow will soon close down the high passes in the Himalayas. “Be aggressive” is the message to formation commanders on ground, who have been told to respond to all ceasefire violations. The decision of time of strike is left to the local units while the nature of weapons has been small arms and mortars. There have been some 400 violations of the November 2003 ceasefire.  Not only have the number of violations gone up,  the intensity and periodicity is up several notches across the LoC and the 198-km international boundary.

Col Mohan Singh (retd) is a veteran golfer and a regular member of our four-ball. On his day, he can give anyone a run for their money. Fit as a fiddle at the ripe age of 75, his sense of humor and disciplined lifestyle makes him a likeable personality.

It was at the fourth tee-off that he complained of slight breathlessness. A 24-hour holter confirmed a low heart-rate and a need for a pacemaker for healthy living. As an ex-serviceman and eligible to avail of ex-servicemen contributory health scheme (ECHS), he got admitted to this oldest, upscale and well-established private hospital at Mohali.

Technological advancement in medical science threw open multi choices of pacemakers to be fitted; a basic MRI non-compatible and advanced versions of MRI compatible ones, of course, at considerably enhanced costs.

ECHS caters to the basic model but the hospital lets one exercise the costlier option with payment over and above. Mohan opted for the MRI compatible one and the extra money was duly deposited. The patient was taken to the operation theatre for the required procedure for fitment of the pacemaker. Surgery to open the area below the rib bone was performed with expertise and now everything was set for the MRIcompatible pacemaker to get implanted, when suddenly, a smiling brave Mohan got the shock of his life when he was quietly informed, “Colonel saab, sorry, the machine that you opted for is not available in the hospital store. We will have to make do with the base model.” It was a do or die situation and the helpless patient was left with no choice, a fait accompli.

Well, it still remains a mystery as to how a hospital of this stature accepted payment for a thing that it doesn’t have. Mohan is now out of the hospital, of course with the excess money duly reimbursed, but surely after a nightmarish experience.

And, here goes the second episode on the thin line between fate and fait accompli. Rajeev was upbeat. His dream of settling down around Chandigarh was finally taking shape. A reluctant Delhiite, he called me up the other day, “Pandit, our ancestral house is being sold and I am getting my share. Could you help me find a suitable place in the budget? Urgent!” Rajeev and me go a long way back. Common interests in minor vices and a critical virtue called golf bind us together as partners in charity and crime. We zeroed on to a 3BHK with an independent terrace in the vicinity of Chandigarh. It was a done deal and the token money was exchanged. Date for the letter of agreement and with partpayment was fixed for November 9.

The house in Delhi was under sale and thus had to be vacated. The luggage was hurriedly packed and dispatched to the yet to be bought flat at Chandigarh, the seller being a kind man. Then, tsunami struck a night before. Exactly, a minute after the PM’s four-minute address, my mobile buzzed with a distraught Rajeev being the caller.

The deal was in jeopardy due to the changed perspective of modalities. Both the parties met to find a solution but none emerged. A piquant situation for my friend who was suddenly rendered homeless with a ‘four minute blitzkrieg’! My better half was requested to utilise her soft skills to break the deadlock. She took a minute to announce her verdict, “Rajeev, why don’t you rent the flat for the time being, move in and get your act together. This is not the end of the road. Things will fall into place.” The magic solution was acceptable to the seller who was as keen to have the deal ultimately accomplished. Rajeev has moved in, albeit, as a tenant, a fate accompli, overriding his fate of seeing himself as an owner of the flat. The writer is a Chandigarh-based

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