পাতা:বাংলাদেশের স্বাধীনতা যুদ্ধ দলিলপত্র (চতুর্দশ খণ্ড).pdf/৫৫

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বাংলাদেশের স্বাধীনতা যুদ্ধ দলিলপত্রঃ চতুর্দশ খন্ড শিরোনাম সূত্র তারিখ ১১। দ্বদের মূলে ওয়াশিংটন পোষ্ট ৪ এপ্রিল, ১৯৭১ THE WASHINGTON POST APRIL 4, 1971 ROOTS OF CONFLICT By Selig S. Harrison The full story behind the political deadlock in Dacca last week and the frenzy of Gen. Yahya Khan's military retaliation against the Bengalis is a story of wheels within wheels going far beyond the struggle for autonomy by the 73 million people of Bangladesh. Gen. Yahya and the dominant leaders of West Pakistan were worried about the possible political impact of surrender to Bengali autonomy demands on the internal balance of power in the western wing that is the base of the presently military regime. West Pakistan is torn by deep internal divisions between the dominant Punjab Sind provinces, on the one hand, home base of the ruling industrial, military and land aristocracy, and the assertive minority provinces of the North-West Frontier and Baluchistan. Gen. Yahya was determined to avoid concessions to the Bengalis that would necessitate a comparable measure of autonomy for the 60 million strong western provinces. The North-West Frontier country, made famous by Kipling in his tales of the Khyber Pass, is Pushtu speaking and has long sought autonomy either as a part of Pakistan or through an independent "Pushtunistan". Racially kindred to tribal groups in neighboring Afghanistan, the Pushtuns or Pathans have enjoyed intermittent Afghan support in their feuds with successive Pakistan regimes. Sparsely populated Baluchistan has grown increasingly self conscious in recent years following the discovery of natural gas deposits in what has long been regarded as desert, Baluchi tribal leaders want some of the gas now channeled to industries in the neighboring Punjab to be utilized for the industrialization of Baluchistan. In the complex, three-way conflict between Gen. Yahya, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and the western minority provinces, the pivotal figure last week was former Foreign Minister Zulfiqar All Bhutto, leader of the West Pakistan Peoples Party, which emerged with the single largest bloc of votes in the National Assembly among west wing parties. Mr. Bhutto wanted Gen. Yahya to transfer power to a single, unified West Pakistan entirely, since a transfer to four separate provinces would have left him with the status of a local leader of the Punjab and Sind. The minority provinces in the west have long looked to the Bengalis as allies in their struggle against the Punjab and Sind. They wanted Mujibur to insist on the transfer of power to each or four separate provincial Assemblies in the West along with the transfer to the Sheikh's Awami League in the East.