পাতা:বাংলাদেশের স্বাধীনতা যুদ্ধ দলিলপত্র (ত্রয়োদশ খণ্ড).pdf/১৬৫

এই পাতাটির মুদ্রণ সংশোধন করা হয়েছে, কিন্তু বৈধকরণ করা হয়নি।



137

বাংলাদেশের স্বাধীনতা যুদ্ধ দলিলপত্রঃ ত্রয়োদশ খণ্ড

 শিরোনাম  সূত্র   তারিখ
পাকিস্তান ও ভারত সফর শেষে বৃটিশ পার্লামেণ্টের সদস্য মিঃ রেগিন্যাণ্ড প্রেনটিস-এর বিবৃতি সানডে টাইমস ১১ জুলাই, ১৯৭১

"THE REPRESSION OF BENGAL" BY MR. REGINALD PRENTICE, A MEMBER OF THE BRITISH PARLIAMENTARY DELEGATION WHICH VISITED PAKISTAN AND INDIA, IN "SUNDAY TIMES", LONDON, DATED JULY 11, 1971

 IN THE ABSENCE of a political solution, the crisis thrown up by the events in East Pakistan can only get worse. This applies to both Pakistan and India. In East Pakistan there is bound to be continuing repression, using the most brutal methods, simply because this is the only way in which a few thousand troops can maintain power over 70 million hostile people. The troops are heavily out-numbered. Their supplies and reinforcements have to travel 3,000 miles round the south of India. Parts of the country are very good territory for guerrilla forces. The guerrillas can take shelter in India and will be re-inforced by recruits from among the refugees. More than one observer has predicted an escalation of the fighting into a Vietnam type of situation.

 From the Indian side the prospect is equally depressing. In the border states the local officials, doctors and nurses are doing a wonderful job in keeping most of the refugees alive. But this is happening in a country which is desperately poor and most of it is happening in West Bengal, which is one of the poorest and overcrowded areas in the world. The local administration is observed with the refugee problem at the expense of other duties; local development projects are postponed; schools are closed to the children because they are packed with refugees. An explosive situation may well develop in the refugee camps as a result of months of enforce idleness. An equally tense situation may develop among the local people, who see the refugees getting more food than themselves and getting it free-although they do a full week's work. But this cannot be solved by letting the refugees work, because there is already very high unemployment.

 The world must take a larger share of this burden. So far the total aid committed from the rest of the world amounts to well under half the estimated cost to India for a six-month period. All countries must commit much larger sums of aid and recognize that this may have to continue for a very long time. But however large the aid contributions, India will inevitably pay an enormous price and this will become much greater as time goes on.

 This downward spiral can only be reversed by a political solution acceptable to the people of East Pakistan. In practice this must mean a solution acceptable to Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and the Awami League. The pattern is the familiar one of a colonial situation breaking up, in which the only people who can make an effective settlement are the leaders of the political party which has the confidence of the population. Yahya Khan must either accept this, or continue with his policy of suppression-a policy which is bound to fail sooner or later.