Declare Mujibnagar Day on April 17 as Republic Day of Bangladesh

Photo: SYED ZAKIR HOSSAIN

SALEEM SAMAD

On the 50th birth anniversary of Bangladesh, the nation was perhaps expecting that the government would declare April 17 as the country’s Republic Day. This is the day when the cabinet of the government-in-exile took an oath of office and accepted the challenge to lead the War of Liberation to achieve independence.

The venue was discreetly decided at Baidyanathtala, Meherpur in eastern Bangladesh (less than a kilometre from the Indian border). The site was secured by the Indian Border Security Force (BSF) and mounted anti-aircraft artillery to thwart any air attacks by marauding Pakistan fighter jets.

A day earlier, the Ansar saw hundreds of BSF soldiers and vehicles pour in and secure the area. The following morning, April 17, the leaders of government-in-exile, Indian officials, scores of journalists, international photographers, and TV camera persons also arrived with senior BSF officers accompanied by hundreds of additional troops.

At 11 am the ceremony began with recitation from the Qur’an and playing of the national anthem. The oath-taking ceremony was conducted by Abdul Mannan, MNA, and the proclamation of independence was read out by Professor Mohammad Yusuf Ali.

The assignment of portfolios was assigned among the ministers on April 18. The incumbents of the government were: Sheikh Mujibur Rahman (interned in Pakistan jail), president of Bangladesh. Syed Nazrul Islam (Vice President and also Acting President), Tajuddin Ahmad (Prime Minister), Khondaker Mostaq Ahmad (Foreign Affairs and Law Minister), Muhammad Mansur Ali (Finance Minister), AHM Qamaruzzaman (Home, Relief and Rehabilitation Minister), and Muhammad Ataul Gani Osmani (Commander-in-Chief of the Bangladesh Forces or Mukti Bahini). The guard of honour was given to Syed Nazrul Islam, the acting president of Mujibnagar.

The government-in-exile had an elaborate structure of administrative departments, agencies, and activities. Even though elaborate agencies were established, the government’s main work remained coordinating the Liberation War and boosting popular support in occupied Bangladesh.

Soon the government-in-exile operated from 8 Theatre Road, Kolkata. Tajuddin Ahmad supervised the military operations of the Mukti Bahini, held coordinating meetings with officials of Indira Gandhi, the Eastern Command of the Indian Army, the foreign dignitaries, the international NGOs in aid of the 10 million war refugees, and of course, smoothing the inner-conflicts within the hierarchy.

The Shadhin Bangla Betar Kendra broadcast was a moral inspiration for the millions of people who were either languishing in refugee camps across the borders of Bangladesh or living in hellish conditions in occupied Bangladesh.

The production of documentary films, postage stamps, propaganda posters, regular press briefing in Kolkata, definitely made a dent in telling the world of the genocide in Bangladesh and the war crimes committed by the marauding Pakistan troops.

Tajuddin Ahmad was an intimate colleague and a trusted comrade of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and enjoyed the recognition and full support of the Indian leadership -- which was an important resource that lent authority to his position, writes acclaimed economist Rehman Sobhan in his book Untranquil Recollections.

Well, the government-in-exile earned credibility and gave an alternative dichotomy to General Yayha Khan’s military regime in Rawalpindi.

Nonetheless, most historians interpret that the able stewardship of the Mujibnagar government, which was a symbolic icon of the nationalist struggle, had essentially lifted the morale of the revolution.

First published in the Dhaka Tribune, 20 April 2021

Saleem Samad is an independent journalist, media rights defender, and recipient of Ashoka Fellowship and Hellman-Hammett Award. He could be reached at <saleemsamad@hotmail.com> Twitter @saleemsamad

Bangladesh Arms Trafficking: Residual Networks

Veronica Khangchian

In perhaps, the single biggest arms seizure since the April 2, 2004, Chittagong arms haul case where 10 truckloads of weapons had been seized, a huge arms cache was recovered by the Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) of Bangladesh, over several days, from the Satchari National Park in the Chunarughat Sub-District of the Habiganj District in Bangladesh, adjoining the West Tripura District in the Indian State of Tripura. Officials disclosed that they recovered 184 rocket shells (40mm) and 153 chargers for rocket launchers abandoned inside one bunker on a hillock in the reserve forest, some 130 kilometers from the capital, Dhaka, during the raid on June 3, 2014. Another six more empty bunkers were located on the same day. On June 4, the RAB found another two bunkers and recovered 38 rocket shells, four machine guns, 95 rocket chargers, 1,300 rounds of machine gun ammunition, and over 13,000 bullets of different calibres. RAB recovered more arms and ammunition, including four machine guns in a bunker on June 8, and also found oil used for cleaning firearms. Another two empty bunkers were also located. As it resumed a search operation deep into the reserve forest on the eight consecutive day, RAB made additional recoveries, including one machine gun barrel, 633 rounds of ammunition, and 54 anti-tank shells, from three newly discovered bunkers, on June 9.

The area from where the arms were recovered was once the base camp of the now-defunct Indian insurgent outfit, the Tripura-based All Tripura Tiger Force (ATTF). The camp was later captured by insurgents belonging to the National Liberation Front of Tripura (NLFT). The United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA), with its principal theatre of operations in the Indian State of Assam, abutting Tripura, and ATTF had earlier smuggled a huge quantity of Chinese-made weapons from the Southeast Asian grey market by sea, landed them around Cox's Bazar or Chittagong, and transported these to rebel bases such as Satchari, from where arms were smuggled into India's troubled northeast.

However, some confusion prevails over the present recoveries. Indian security agencies are yet to ascertain whether these belong to any militant outfit active in India's Northeast. Media reports have speculated on the distant possibility of ULFA 'chief' Paresh Baruah asking ATTF to store the weapons in its one-time bases, and this cannot be ruled out. Reports also indicate that ATTF leader, Ranjit Debbarma (now in Tripura jail), who had close ties with Paresh Baruah, had stocked the cache in collaboration with ULFA militants. A June 4 media report suggested that the arms and ammunition belonged to ULFA leader Baruah. Information gleaned by Indian intelligence agencies from Debbarma, and provided to Bangladesh authorities, led to the recovery of the ammunition on June 3, three kilometers off the border. According to the report, arms smuggled from China by Baruah were kept in the Satchari Forest and were sent to Indian militants at opportune moments.

However, Bangladesh State Minister for Home, Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal, asserted that the haul was based on intelligence collected by local Bangladesh agencies. RAB Media Wing Director Habibur Rahman added that the arms and ammunition recovered in the Satchari Forest were apparently similar to those recovered in Chittagong in 2004, and to a truckload of ammunition recovered at Bogra in June 2003.  It is significant, moreover, that investigators of the Bogra ammunition haul had determined that the ammunition was bound for the Satchari Forest, and had also confirmed its linkages with NLFT and ULFA.

Earlier, a Bangladesh Court had arrived at a significant verdict in the Chittagong arms haul case, nearly 10 years after the incident. On January 30, 2014, a Chittagong District Court awarded the death penalty to 14 accused, including Motiur Rahman Nizami, Ameer (chief) of the Jamaat-e-Islami (Jel), Lutfozzaman Babar of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), the then Minister of State for Home, and ULFA-I 'commander-in-chief' Paresh Baruah (in absentia), for smuggling 10 truckloads of arms into Chittagong District in 2004, during the tenure of the BNP-led Government. Investigations revealed that the weapons were manufactured in China and were being shipped to ULFA. The condemned also include former Directorate General of Forces Intelligence (DGFI) Director Major General (Retd) Rezzakul Haider Chowdhury; former Director General of National Security Intelligence (NSI) Brigadier General (Retd) Abdur Rahim; and three other NSI officials – Director (Security) Wing Commander Shahab Uddin Ahmed; Deputy Director Major (Retd) Liakat Hossain; and Field Officer Akbar Hossain Khan. Others awarded the death penalty in the case are former Additional Secretary (Industry) Nurul Amin; the then Chittagong Urea Fertilizer Ltd. (CUFL) Managing Director Mahsin Uddin Talukder; CUFL General Manager (Administration) K.M. Enamul Hoque; and three businessmen, Hafizur Rahman Hafiz, Deen Mohammad and Haji Abdus Subhan.

In the initial stages of the trial, which commenced in 2005, only some small fry, mostly labourers, truckers and trawler drivers, were implicated, leaving out the big shots as the then BNP-led Government allegedly tried to cover up the involvement of the state machinery, including its Ministers and high officials of intelligence agencies. However, after an Army-backed caretaker Government took charge on January 11, 2007, ahead of the country’s General Elections, the Court of Chittagong Metropolitan Judge ordered further investigations on February 14, 2008. In June 2011, Muniruzzaman Chowdhury, Senior Assistant Superintendent of Criminal Investigation Department, submitted two supplementary charge-sheets, accusing 11 new suspects. While Paresh Barua and former Secretary of the Industries Ministry, Nurul Amin, have been absconding ever since the recovery of the arms, the other nine are behind bars. Baruah and Amin were sentenced in absentia. The verdict of the Special Tribunal observed that the role of the then Prime Minister Khaleda Zia in the incident was 'mysterious', and pointed to the direct involvement of then Ministers and top military and civil officials. Judge S.M. Mojibur Rahman also argued that the smuggling of such a huge volume of weapons and ammunition was not possible without Government support, and noted, “They [the intelligence officials] were involved in the conspiracy to destroy the entire nation by putting the country’s existence at stake.”

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina Wajed has now promised separate investigations into the role of former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia and her party (BNP) in the Chittagong arms haul case, declaring, ‘The trial of 10 truckloads of arms haul is over. We will now probe afresh the conspiracies behind it, from where the arms came, how it was brought to Bangladesh and who had funded it." The Prime Minister added that Bangladesh had become hotbed of activities of the Pakistani Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) after the assassination of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rehman in August 1975.

Analysts note that the death sentence awarded to Paresh Barua will have little impact on the outfit as Barua and most of his cadres have already shifted base out of Bangladesh. Intelligence officials in Assam, however, feel that the elusive insurgent leader will be under greater pressure to come forward for talks, should Myanmar act as Bangladesh did, and evict insurgents from India's north-east, including Barua and his cadres, from its soil. The Assam Police have intelligence inputs that Barua is currently operating out of his base along the Myanmar-China border. Officials in Bangladesh argue that the death sentence would at least ensure that Baruah would not be able to enter Bangladesh without the court’s intervention.

Significantly, the verdict comes at a time when ULFA-I is facing a crisis. Sources indicate that not more than 10 hardcore members of the outfit are inside Assam, and that the group has no more than 180 cadres in camps in Myanmar. Senior leaders who were in the Mon District of Nagaland have been called back to Myanmar after the outfit awarded the death sentence to 'operational commander' Pramod Gogoi alias Partha Pratim Asom. On March 16, 2014 [the party's 'Army Day'], ULFA-I asked its members to re-strengthen the outfit, fearing that certain members had a nexus with the SFs. At least eight ULFA-I cadres, including Pramod Gogoi, were executed on the instructions of ULFA-I's 'commander-in-chief', Paresh Baruah, for 'conspiring’ with Police and Security Forces to engineer a mass surrender of cadres over the preceding four months. Seven cadres had also been executed in December 2013, while they were trying to flee the Myanmar base to surrender to the Police. 'Operational commander' Pramod Gogoi was executed on January 15, 2014 in the Mon District. ULFA-I is said to have a total of around 240 cadres at present.

Significantly, the Goalpara Police recovered a stock of ammunition and detonators from ULFA-I along the Assam-Meghalaya border in the Goalpara District on January 27, 2014. The Police disclosed that a group of ULFA-I militants had entered Hatigaon, a village under the Agia Police Station, with arms and explosive materials, which they stored inside a rubber plantation. Goalpara Superintendent of Police (SP) Nitul Gogoi stated, “We got the information that a group under the leadership of Drishti Rajkhowa brought the ammunition from Bangladesh.”

Coordination between the Meghalaya based Garo National Liberation Army (GNLA), one of the biggest procurers of arms in Meghalaya, and ULFA-I, remains a concern. In the latest incident, on June 26, 2014, a militant identified as Dharma Kanta Rai, who was on ‘deputation’ from the ULFA-I to the GNLA, was killed during a rescue operation mounted by West Garo Hills Police at Darekgre near Rongmasugre village in West Garo Hills District, to free four abducted persons from the GNLA and ULFA. The abductions had been carried out on June 25 from Kantanagre village in West Garo Hills District. The deceased ULFA-I cadre was reportedly an improvised explosive device (IED) expert, used by GNLA to target Police movements.

Worryingly, media reports indicate that a large proportion of weapons and ammunition that reach the mushrooming in Meghalaya, are from the armory of insurgent groups presently engaged in peace parleys with the Government. These groups include the Nationalist Socialist Council of Nagaland (NSCN), National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB) and the pro-talks faction of ULFA (ULFA-PTF). According to sources, these frontline militant outfits never divulged the exact composition of their arsenal and, according to one source, “80 to 90 per cent of these arms lie unused for five to six years and just before their life span lapses, these militant groups prefer to dispose of these weapons.”

Further, despite dramatically improving relations between India’s Border Security Force (BSF) and Border Guards Bangladesh (BGB), Northeast insurgent groups continue to maintain some 45 hideouts in Bangladesh, mostly belonging to ATTF and NLFT (21 camps), according to BSF Special Director General B.D. Sharma. He added, on June 20, that the insurgents could not be fully wiped out from Bangladesh soil because deployment of BGB was thin compared to requirements, and that, “They are now raising new forces and we hope that the situation would improve soon. Besides, the terrain and riverine border also come in the way of maintaining effective border vigil.” However, Mohammed Latiful Haider, Additional Director General, BGB, has denied the existence of any camps of Indian militant outfits in the country. The denial came on June 25, after the first day of a border coordination conference held between senior BSF and BGB officials at Kadamtala, at BSF North Bengal Frontier Headquarters near Siliguri, under the Darjeeling District of West Bengal.

Bangladesh has now clearly declared that it would not allow its territory to be used against India. The assurance, reiterated to Indian External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj on her first foreign visit on June 26, 2014, came as the External Affairs Minister promised to put extra energy into bilateral ties. Swaraj stated that New Delhi sought a comprehensive and equitable partnership with Bangladesh for a secure and prosperous South Asia.  With recent developments, and agreed cooperation between India and Bangladesh, a further significant improvement can be hoped for.

First published South Asia Intelligence Review, Weekly Assessments & Briefings, Volume 12, No. 52, June 30, 2014

Veronica Khangchian is Research Associate, Institute for Conflict Management

Rohingya Muslim Migrants Caught in Limbo between India and Bangladesh

PALASH GHOSH

The historic conflict between the Indian state of West Bengal and the nation of Bangladesh has enacted a new chapter over concerns that many Rohingya Muslims have been illegally crossing into West Bengal from Bangladesh.

Officials with the Indian Border Security Force’s South Bengal Frontier (BSF) said they have arrested more than one hundred illegal Rohingya immigrants this year, and most of them likely came from Myanmar, where they have faced a brutal campaign of repression from the authorities.

“We increased our vigil on immigrants from Myanmar since the end of last year after some Rohingya Muslims were arrested… last November,” Santosh Mehra, the BSF’s inspector general said, according to Hindustan Times.

“It was tough to interact with them as they neither speak nor understand Hindi, Bengali or English.”

Rohingya also do not speak Urdu or any other Indian language. The Rohingya language is related to the Chittagonian tongue, a dialect related to Bengali that is spoken in southeastern Bangladesh, but differs from standard Bengali.

“As we don't know their [Rohingya] language, we have to get experts from universities or other agencies to act as interpreters,” Mehra told the Times of India.

The stream of illegal Rohingya immigrants has dramatically increased this year. Mehra added that in 2011 only two Myanmar Rohingya nationals were arrested in West Bengal in 2011, and just six last year.

A senior BSF official also told the Hindustan Times that the Bangladesh government has taken the initiative to expel Rohingya migrants back to Myanmar, where the overwhelmingly Buddhist majority does not want them. Myanmar authorities regard them as “illegal immigrants” from Bangladesh, while Dhaka rejects them as undocumented foreigners.

Mehra cited this catch-22 scenario by declaring that “we contact the Bangladesh High Commission [in India] after Bangladeshi migrants are held. [But] we cannot contact anyone after Rohingyas are held since no country recognizes them.”

He told the Times of India that “unlike illegal migrants from Bangladesh, it is difficult to send them back across the border … There are certain United Nations guidelines that have to be followed.”

Mehta also rejects concerns by some Indian intelligence officers that the Rohingya migrants are linked to terrorist groups, perhaps supported by entities in Bangladesh itself of even in Pakistan.

Intelligence agencies in New Delhi believe that some Rohingyas have received arms training from Islamic militant groups including the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), a Pakistani-based terror outfit, in the Chittagong Hills district of Bangladesh.

Indian officials suspect that LeT -- as well as militant organizations like Jamaat-ud-Dawah and Jaish-e-Mohammad -- are using the plight of the unwanted Rohingya Muslims migrants to stir up trouble between Bangladesh and both of its neighbors,m Myanmar and India.

An Indian intelligence told Times of India that Bangladesh has assured India that it will look into the matter of training camps in the Chittagong.

“We have specific information that LeT and Jamaat-ud-Dawah created an outfit known as Difa-e-Musalman Arakan [Burma],” he said. “This outfit was assigned to tie-up with Islamic organizations in Myanmar and Bangladesh. There are several other terror groups that are involved with the Rohingyas. While the Rohingyas are receiving funds from Saudi Arabia, weapons are apparently being sourced from Thailand.”

The Times reported that over the past year-and-a-half some 10,000 Rohingya Muslims have crossed into India, residing in West Bengal, but also in Andhra Pradesh, Bihar and Uttar Pradesh. Three-thousand of them alone are living in the capital city of New Delhi. They exist in a kind of limbo, with no rights of residency and little hope of ever attaining citizenship.

But some Indians have taken up their cause.

Nawab Zafar Jung, a former vice-chancellor of Jamia Milia Islamia University, in New Delhi, in tandem with leftist student unions at Jawharlal Nehru University (JNU), are demanding the government grant the Rohingya Muslims official refugee status.

First published in International Business Times, September 06 2013

Palash Ghosh has worked as a business journalist for 21 years in New York.

India: Abuses by Border Force Increasing

Photo: Villagers ripped apart by the border divide

Broken Pledges by India to End Killings, Torture at Bangladeshi Border

Authorities in India should investigate fresh allegations of human rights violations by the Border Security Force (BSF) along the Bangladesh border and prosecute those found responsible, says Human Rights Watch.

Despite assurances to the Bangladesh government and public orders to exercise restraint and end unlawful killings and attacks on suspected smugglers, evidence documented and published by Indian and Bangladeshi nongovernmental organizations suggest that the BSF is once again committing abuses including extrajudicial killings, torture, and ill-treatment of both Indian and Bangladeshi border residents.

“The Border Security Force has reverted to its previous tactics of unilaterally punishing suspects, defying orders from Delhi issued last year to exercise restraint and protect the right to life,” said Meenakshi Ganguly, South Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “But the central government is also responsible, since it has failed to hold perpetrators accountable. Justice is the best deterrent against further violations.”

In December 2010, Human Rights Watch released “Trigger Happy, Excessive Use of Force by Indian Troops at the Bangladesh Border,” which documented nearly 1,000 killings by the BSF over the last decade. In January 2011, the Indian government assured Bangladeshi officials that it would order the BSF to exercise restraint and encourage the use of rubber bullets instead of more lethal ammunition, steps welcomed by Human Rights Watch.

Although BSF attacks decreased significantly over the next year, the new evidence presented suggests that Indian border troops continue to frequently abuse both Bangladeshi citizens and Indian nationals residing in the border area. The recent allegations claim that in order to get around the restrictions on shooting at sight, BSF soldiers have been subjecting suspects to severe beatings and torture, resulting in deaths in custody.

Efforts by local residents and activists to file complaints and secure justice have resulted in threats and intimidation. The National Human Rights Commission has sought responses when allegations are filed, but without adequate witness protection complainants end up risking further abuse.

Large numbers of killings and other abuses have been reported in 2012. Odhikar, a Dhaka-based nongovernmental organization, has documented as many as 13 killings by the BSF since January 2012. Kolkata-based nongovernmental organization Banglar Manabadhikar Suraksha Mancha (MASUM), has documented five other killings during the same time period, based on statements from witnesses and families of victims.

In one recent example, MASUM reported to the National Human Rights Commission of India that on April 22, 2012, soldiers from the BSF’s 91st battalion chased and shot 21-year-old Babu Seikh in the Murshidabad district of West Bengal. According to MASUM, Seikh, along with three of his companions, was walking toward the marshland in the evening when they were chased by BSF soldiers who fired at them without warning. After a bullet hit Seikh, MASUM says that one of his companions saw the soldiers drag an injured Sheik to their camp nearby, where he later died in custody without access to medical attention. In another case, MASUM reported that on January 1, 2012, four Indian teenagers, accosted while smuggling cattle, jumped into a rivulet to avoid punishment. The BSF soldiers allegedly beat them when they tried to come out of the water. All four boys, severely injured because of the beatings, eventually drowned.

In another case, Odhikar reported that Mohammad Mizanur Rahman, a cattle trader who bought cows from India to Bangladesh and lived in West Khodaipur village of Dinajpur district, died on February 14, 2012, due to alleged torture by BSF soldiers. Rahman was caught by BSF soldiers when smuggling cows from India. According to Okhikar, he was then severely beaten near the border at Aboiter in Hili Thana, Gangarampur district in India. He was later taken by his companions to the Upazila Health Complex in Bangladesh for medical help, where he died at around 5:30 a.m. on February 14. The post-mortem report says Rahman died due to injuries to his head. At the time of death his right eye was missing; his right jaw, ear, and gums were crushed; and some brain matter had come out through a deep wound in his upper jaw.

Last year, MASUM released a video showing BSF soldiers brutally beating a Bangladeshi national caught smuggling cattle in West Bengal state. Eight soldiers were suspended but no further information is available regarding their prosecution or punishment.

Human Rights Watch knows of no cases in which BSF soldiers have been prosecuted for violations committed along the India-Bangladesh border. This includes a highly publicized case in which a 15-year-old Bangladeshi girl trapped in the wire fencing at the border was shot by the BSF in January 2011.

“While the Indian government claims that it holds its forces accountable, it produces no information to show that this is actually happening,” said Ganguly. “There appears to be complete impunity for BSF soldiers – even in the most egregious cases. Unless the government orders an independent investigation and ensures the prosecutions of those against whom credible evidence is found, such acts of brutality will continue.”

The India-Bangladesh border is heavily populated and very poor, with large numbers of people moving back and forth to visit relatives, buy supplies, and look for jobs. Others engage in petty and serious cross-border crime. The border force is mandated to address illegal activities, especially narcotics smuggling, human trafficking for sex work, and transporting fake currency and explosives. However, instead of arresting suspects and handing them over to the police for trial, BSF soldiers have taken it upon themselves to punish suspects.

Human Rights Watch called on the Indian government to do more to ensure compliance with the United Nations Basic Principles on the Use of Force and Firearms by Law Enforcement Officials. Given the failure of the BSF’s internal justice system to prosecute its members for human rights abuses, personnel of all ranks implicated in serious rights abuses should be investigated by civilian authorities and tried in civilian courts. This is particularly important because the BSF is now being deployed in security operations against Maoists in central and eastern India. Considering the widespread tendency to subject local residents at the Bangladesh border to verbal and physical abuse including severe beatings, the government should ensure a transparent system of accountability that will prevent violations in these areas.

The Bangladesh government, after initially failing to address this issue, finally began to call for the protection of its citizens. In March 2011, at a joint border coordination conference, Maj. Gen. Rafiqul Islam, head of the Bangladesh border guards, called on the BSF to respect the right to life and said that individuals “must be treated innocent unless and until he or she is proved to be a criminal or offender.” BSF director-general Raman Srivastava promised “to maintain utmost restraint on the border” and also provide troops “with non-lethal weaponry.”

“It is time for the Indian government to keep its promises to end abuses and hold its forces accountable,” said Ganguly. “At the same time, Bangladeshi government should publicly demand that the Indian government end this scourge of violence along their border.”

Published by Human Rights Watch, 

New York, June 12, 2012

To read the December 2010 Human Rights Watch report “Trigger Happy,” please visit:http://www.hrw.org/en/news/2010/12/06/indiabangladesh-indiscriminate-killings-abuse-border-officers