Question: Should Hindu refugees also be asked to return to East Bengal? And, what do you think about a united Bengal, independent of India and Pakistan?
Foreign Minister: My reply to the first question is that no one will return merely because he is asked to return, be he a Hindu refugee, a Muslim refugee, and, I would like to add for your information, that there are, besides these two communities, Christian refugees and Buddhist refugees also. They have been quite impartial in their acts of oppression of various communities.
The refugees will not return simply because they are being asked to return. They will return only if the crisis of confidence, which has overtaken the people there, is ended, and, in its place, an atmosphere and a situation of confidence and hope is regenerated. This can come about not by asking an individual to go or not to go, but by induction to East Pakistan of an administrative set up which represents the ideals and aspirations of the people, so unmistakably demonstrated at the time of the last election giving 167 seats out of 169 to the Awami League. I think it is a record of success, by any standard in the world, in any part of the world.
So, it is really the establishment, the re-establishment, there of an administration which inspires the confidence of the people that the return of the refugees will be facilitated.
With regard to the second question, I have already touched upon it. I do not realize that in West Bengal, one of our valiant members of the great Indian community, who with their rich historical and cultural heritage have played such a significant role in the reconstruction and developOment of the country, and who have taken such prominent part in the mainstream of public life in India, after seeing what has happened to people in East Bengal, would ever dream of or think of, opting out of the Indian territory, and would ever dream of taking a step which, to us, appears to be borne out of a complete misunderstanding and misjudgment of the situation.
Question: Your Excellency, would you please comment on a Radio Network report that your Government is preventing or hindering press coverage of American airlifts of Pakistani refugees while allowing coverage of similar Soviet airlifts?
Foreign Minister: We are completely non-aligned between these two super powers. And, I would like to dispel any such feeling in any quarter that we are discriminating in the matter of coverage of C-130 planes as compared to AM-12 or AM-14 planes. I have myself seen a full and complete report of the sorties undertaken by the American planes. I am sure that in India, which has traditions of a free press which most of the time is not too charitable to us-even they have never complained that there has been any discrimination on this score.
Question: Do you feel confident that the Government of Pakistan would equitably distribute relief supplies given to it on a bilateral basis?
Foreign Minister: I have my grave doubts about their capacity to dole out even the last in an impartial manner. And, I have grave doubts if it will reach the real needy
