Bangladesh’s first navy dictator Gen Zia was eager on navy management in 1971, says writer Sukharanjan Dasgupta

Bangladesh’s first navy ruler Gen Ziaur Rahman, who later based the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) to legitimise his maintain on energy, was all the time eager on navy management of the nation as he envisaged a Pakistan-style navy rule for the nation amid the nation’s battle towards Pakistan in 1971.

In an unique interview with India Today, writer and veteran columnist Sukharanjan Dasgupta mentioned he was briefed about Gen Zia’s political ambitions by a senior BSF officer throughout the 1971 warfare. As the chief correspondent of Anandabazar Patrika, he reported on the Liberation War by gathering data from freedom fighters in Bangladesh.

Dubbed as a “friend with a pen in India” by the nation’s main day by day star for his reportage on the liberation warfare, Dasgupta is the writer of the best-seller “Midnight Massacre” on the 1975 Bangladesh coup that killed most members of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman’s household and led to Zia’s emergence because the nation’s first navy dictator.

“BSF troopers were fighting with freedom fighters under Zia’s command from the very outset of the Pakistani crackdown on the Chittagong-Tripura border. Sometime in June 1971, he told a Bengali BSF officer that the country should be handed over to the army,” says Dasgupta.

He says then BSF IG Golak Majumder had advised him about this dialog, which was saved a secret however reported.

“Desh ta Swadhin hole amader hathe deyar chestha korben. Juddho amra korchi, Neta ra sudhu bhashan dicchen (we should be allowed to run the country.. the leaders are just lecturing around),” Zia had advised the BSF officer whose report went as much as BSF DG Nari Rustomji by Golak Majumdar.

The complete communication was secret however Dasgupta learnt of it from Majumder.

In 1971, Sukharanjan managed to make all his colleagues on the Anandabazar Patrika workplace in Kolkata donate sooner or later’s wage to wounded refugees sheltered in India, reads a narrative on his contributions in a number one day by day in Bangladesh.

Ironically, the ramifications of this “midnight massacre” would open a brand new sordid chapter in Bangladesh’s historical past because the successive navy governments destroyed the secular credentials of the nation, scrapping “secularism” and putting in “Islam” by constitutional amendments.

Unlike Pakistan’s navy rulers, the 2 Bangladeshi navy dictators based political events to cement their management and guarantee their legacy. Zia based the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and legitimized the pro-Pakistan Jamaat-e-Islami, which his spouse Khaleda later changed into an ally.

The function of Gen Zia within the ugly assassination of Mujibur Rahman and his household on August 15, 1975, has not been adequately probed and the function of a number of different actors within the conspiracy, together with Pakistan, has not been investigated completely. Lawrence Lifschultz mentioned that the lads behind that assassination wouldn’t have moved round freely with out Zia’s backing. And Zia wouldn’t have been brazen sufficient to convey concerning the ‘Indemnity Ordinance”, that protected the killers of the nation’s founding father.

The celebrated writer says that Indira Gandhi was made conscious of this growth that there have been Bengali navy officers who fancied Pakistan kind military management quite than a free flowing Indian fashion poll field democracy.

“I have good reasons to believe that Indian intelligence kept Zia under surveillance after his outburst against politicians. Much as Awami League turncoat Khandkhar Mostaque was following his secret meetings with US diplomats in Calcutta,” Dasgupta advised India Today.

“That may explain why Sheikh Mujibur Rahman promoted Safiullah as army chief and not Zia because he may have been forewarned by Indira Gandhi. This is a grouse Zia possibly held against Sheikh Mujibur Rahman because he was senior to Safiullah and that may explain his tacit approval of the 1975 coup carried out by junior officers who he later protected through the Indemnity Ordinance,” Dasgupta mentioned.

Mostaque took cost of the post-Mujib authorities after the bloody coup. His US connections, says Dasgupta, had been well-known to Indian spymaster P N Banerjee alias Nath Babu.

“But Banerjee told me he advised against any action on Mostaque because he was useful for disinformation to be planted on the Americans,” says Dasgupta.

“The impression conveyed to Mostaque was India cannot militarily intervene in East Pakistan because it needed a large body of troops to control the Naga and Mizo insurgencies in Northeast and the Naxalite rebellion in West Bengal. This happened while India actually prepared for military action. The US was driven into complacency by the disinformation through Mostaque,” mentioned Dasgupta.

P N Banerjee was later discovered mysteriously lifeless in a Dhaka resort in late 1974 however he had conveyed the potential of a navy coup to Sheikh Mujibur Rahman a number of instances.

Indira Gandhi personally conveyed the risk to Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, however the nice chief by no means believed his personal individuals may kill him and took the warnings evenly.

Gen Zia had famously written off Bangabandhu’s assassination with a basic comment in August 1975.

“So what vice president is there” was how Zia replied when a junior officer rushed to him and apprised him about Mujib’s assassination, in response to a BBC Bangla report.

“Faced with at least 19 assassination attempts so far, similar threats exist for Mujib’s daughter and now PM Sheikh Hasina. She should be very careful,” Dasgupta mentioned.

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