A beginning has been made by giving military training to secessionist guerillas, provoking border incidents and imposing restriction on Pakistani diplomats in India. These measures have raised tension between the two countries. Next, stories are being circulated of impending guerilla warfare and fabricated charges of brutalities. No wonder that a sense of insecurity has been created among innocent people of the border districts. Thus began the exodus from East Pakistan.
India magnifies the problem to claim territory
It is interesting that on May 15, when it was announced that India had sent a protest note to Pakistan on the question of refugees, an Indian spokesman was reported by Reuters News Agency to have said in Calcutta that between five to six million would soon have crossed into India from Pakistan.
The Reuters News Agency report from both Calcutta and New Delhi quoted “informed sources as having said that the note might be a first step towards a claim by India that Pakistan should cede some territory to house he refugees." In other words, when India raised the refugee issue, they set the target of six million refugees to provide a pretext for claiming a slice of Pakistani territory to settle the projected “six million" refugees. By June 16, the official figure was raised to the projected six million, irrespective of the facts or reality.
According to the Reuters News Agency reports during the 12-day period preceding June 16, the flow of refugees was reduced to “a little more than a trickle,” but the Indian figures were constantly mounting. On May 18, the figure given by the Indian Prime Minister was over one million. On May 24, he raised the figure to 3.5 million, but the daily inflow was stated to be 60,000 a day. It is difficult to understand how it could increase from one million to 3.5 million between May 18 and May 24 at the rate of 60,000 per day. On June 7, the Indian figure was raised to 4.7 million. On June 11, it was 5.5 million and on June 16 it reached the target of 6 million set on May 15.
On June 17. Sardar Swaran Singh publicly declared in Washington that “an area in Pakistan may have to be set aside for the refugee camps." The reason for wanting this Pakistani territory was disclosed by him in a statement before Parliament on May 25, when he said that the “government would not hesitate to recognize “Bangladesh,” and that certain factors had to be taken into consideration, such as the “extent of territory controlled."
A press report from New Delhi by Mr. Daniel Peiris, published in the Christian Science Monitor on May 28, said that India was considering the following three courses of action:
"1. To recognise the Bangladesh provisional government in East Pakistan and send in trained refugee guerillas.
"2. To order the Indian Army to wage a 'limited war' to clear a 50-mile deep strip in East Bengal for the 3,500,000 refugees who have streamed into India.
