When Pakistan Army mowed down 10,000 refugees heading for India in only a few hours

It was 4 PM and the solar was nonetheless beating down as Ershad Ali frantically looked for his father Chikon Ali among the many tons of of our bodies piled up in Patkhola water physique close to the present-day Chuknagar College. Suddenly, his eyes fell on a small baby — a woman — attempting to feed from her useless mom’s breasts, who lay there lifeless after the firing. The baby’s garments have been soaked in blood.

Ershad Ali took up the lady in his arms and introduced her dwelling. He named her ‘Sundari’ as he had seen vermilion on her mom’s hair parting and likewise shaankha (white bangle comprised of conch shell) on her fingers. An area Hindu household raised her.

Another survivor of the capturing, Surendranath Bairagi, noticed individuals getting ready their meals. All of a sudden, sound of gunshots rang by the small city. People ran helter-skelter like a confused flock, scurrying for canopy. Bairagi scampered in the direction of the river, the place many our bodies lay scattered. When he emerged secure after the capturing, Bairagi discovered all his brothers useless.
In only a few hours on May 20, 1971, round 10,000 refugees desperately attempting to cross over to India have been mowed down by Pakistan Army’s cruel automated firing at Bangladesh’s Chuknagar in Khulna bordering West Bengal.

Pakistan’s genocidal marketing campaign throughout Bangladesh’s Liberation War has few parallels in post-colonial historical past.

Since the outset of the genocide concentrating on Bengalis — Hindus and freedom-loving Muslims alike — the Pakistan Army resorted to mass bloodbath to create a reign of terror that will scare Bengalis to submission. The Chuknagar bloodbath was one of many many such incidents of mass killing as a part of General Tikka Khan’s ‘Operation Searchlight’.

On March 25, 1971, hundreds of panic-stricken Bengalis rushed in the direction of the Indian border by way of Khulna from locations like Barisal, Bagerhat, and Faridpur. After a tediously lengthy journey, worsened by starvation and worry, they converged on Chuknagar and adjoining areas by crossing the Bhadra River to take respite for just a few days.

Ghulam Hossain, then chairman of Atlia Union, reported this sudden inflow to a Pakistani army platoon in Satkhira.

Troops rushed to Chuknagar at frenzied pace, divided into three items. One headed for Malopara-Raipara, the second for the Chuknagar bazaar, and one other for the Bhadra river financial institution.
What adopted was essentially the most largest and brutal pogrom. The indiscriminate firing from three sides caught the hordes of refugees unawares and defenceless. Men, girls and kids have been gunned down and their efforts to cover in boats, behind timber or within the fields went in useless.

From the marshy areas in Chuknagar to temples, playgrounds, college premises and rivers, lifeless our bodies lay strewn in all places. Bhadra River turned crimson with the blood of hundreds.

‘I WANT TO KNOW MY IDENTITY’

After a neighborhood Hindu household took over her duty, Sundari grew up in a liberated Bangladesh. In 1984, she received married to Batul Sarkar of the identical space. She misplaced her husband in 1990 and now stays along with her sons.

Sundari lives in a tin-shed home, which was allotted to her below a authorities housing mission, on the banks of Kanthaltala River in Dumuria upazila. She can also be working as an workplace assistant at Dumuria Upazila Shilpakala Academy.

Sundari mentioned that earlier than this, she had obtained 11 satak (round 4,500 sq. toes) khas land (authorities land). But as there was a water physique, she couldn’t fill it with soil as a consequence of monetary constraints.

She mentioned, “Every May 20, I am going to Chuknagar slaughterhouse in whose neighborhood there’s a memorial that was constructed by the federal government to pay homage to those that died within the firing. It’s a tomb (like many others) that retains reminding Bengalis the excessive price they paid for freedom.”

Sundari added, “While visiting the slaughterhouse, I’m at all times overwhelmed with feelings. I wish to know my identification; I wish to know the names of my mother and father.”

One of the witnesses of the bloodbath, Fazlur Rahman Morol, the caretaker of the Chuknagar slaughterhouse, mentioned, “After the bloodbath, many our bodies floated on the river. That’s why it was not attainable to establish the precise variety of martyrs.” Especially, the identities of relations of those that got here from Barisal, Faridpur, Bagerhat Sadar, Rampal of Bagerhat, Morelganj, Kachua, Sharankhola areas could not be established.

ABM Shafiqul Islam, president of Chuknagar Genocide 1971 Memory Preservation Council, mentioned that on that day, the bloodbath happened in an space unfold over 4 miles of Chuknagar.

“After the massacre, the local people immersed some bodies in the Gangrail and Bhadra rivers. They did not consume fish from those water bodies for two months. Some bodies were buried in the ground to avoid stench. Human bones were found during the establishment of Chuknagar College,” Islam revealed.

Sheikh Baharul Alam, a member of the trustee board of Khulna’s ‘Liberation War Archive Museum’, identified that the Razakar Army was shaped below the management of Jamaat’s AKM Yusuf on this area 15 days earlier than the start of the battle. And this allied drive of Pakistan Army assaulted round 10,000 locals.

Baharul mentioned, “In the most brutal massacre of 1971 in Chuknagar, the exact number of martyrs is still unknown, but 10,000 to 12,000 innocent, unarmed Bengalis were killed.”

Local journalists revealed that in recorded human historical past, there is not any different incident the place such a lot of individuals have been killed in such a short while because the one in Chuknagar in May 1971

Shahriar Kabir, an eminent genocide researcher, underlined that in 51 years since Bangladesh’s Independence, round 3,500 mass graves have been recognized.

“Such a huge number of graves clearly speak of human casualties at the hands of Pakistan Army. Serious effort from all quarters is required to conduct further investigation in search of such unidentified graves,” mentioned Professor Mamun, who can also be a instructor at Dhaka University.

During successive regimes led by Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and their iron brother Jamaat-e-Islami, a celebration of battle criminals, efforts to uphold liberation battle values have been thwarted and battle criminals glorified.

Since the assassination of nation’s founding father, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the nation has been dominated for 30 years below army dictators and BNP-Jamaat alliance. In all these years, efforts had been made to erase testaments to the world’s worst genocide marketing campaign.