Truth lost? Most military records of Bangladesh war missing

[Old School]

In one post on PDF? All of this?

Please share some thoughts. I know what you meant. Epics can be written on these things.

 

[leonblack08]

I am actually writing a book on it.

MaShaAllah that's wonderful.

Please do let us know when you have published it.

 

[VikingRaider]

I absolutely don't believe in the 3 million number that has been propagated in Bangladesh since 1971.

I think other than some chetona fifth columnists ( less than half percent in Muslims, who spread the propaganda) no one believe in 3 million.

Believable figure is roughly 2.5 lakhs ( roughly 3 lakhs) , as Ahmed sharif said ( originaly said by Nirmal Sen) in an interview. He stated that dead Bengalis were 100000 and non Bengalis are 150000! Tbh this info is hard for me to digest that Bengalis died less amount than non Bengalis, still every sane person will believe that the death figure from both side can't be higher than 3 lakhs. I believe 3 million was a simple mistake made by Mujib as, he wanted to say three hundred thousands.

Surprisingly the chetona khors never ever question or blame Ahmed sharif! Perhaps because he quoted Nirmal Sen and sharif himself was an atheist.
@leonblack08, @Old School please read it thoroughly, specially the red bottom para about death figure. 3 million isn't a popular figure for most of Bangladeshis as PDF users troll.


An interview with prof. Ahmed sharif

Friday May 13 2005 17:33:09 PM BDT

By Keshab Mukhapadhay, Translated from Bengali by Tayeb Husain, Lund, Sweden

We know very little of our history and that is why we have so much controversial and often conflicting views about our social, political and economic life. Prof. Ahmad Sharif was not a historian but he had great knowledge of your medieval literature and he knew history greatly through his relentless research works over a few decades.

Prof. Sharif was a great teacher but teaching was his profession; people of Bangladesh will always remember him as an uncompromising secularist, a great fighter for human freedom and a man of rare courage against anything that he considered wrong and unfair.

Throughout his long career as a teacher at Dhaka University he maintained great integrity of character and he was a source of constant inspiration to his students. However, to general public, he was an embodiment of secular faith, a great pleader of social justice and an uncontaminated progressive thinker.

There were no many Sharifs in both Bengals at any time and that is why we need to listen to him, take note very carefully what he said about our past and what he predicted about our future. Mr. Keshab Mukhaopadhay, a well known newspaper editor from Kalkatta met Prof. Sharif sometime in 1997 where the professor expressed his views candidly covering social, political and many other aspects of Bangladeshi life.

In this interview he also talked about West Bengal, Rabindrnath and other famous personalities of greater Bengal. His views are quite blunt and straight forward. I want to present this interview to the NFB and other readers who do not know Bengali. The translation is not professionally done but the message is not missed anywhere of this interview. My objective is to find out with the readers how far the Professor was correct in his assessment of things, especially his comments on Pakistan movement, Urdu-speaking Muslims, West Bengal, Bengali Muslims and Hindus, Rabindranath etc.

**************************
Here is the interview:
**************************

Keshab: The Bengali Muslims once fought for Pakistan then again said goodbye to it and established Bangladesh. Now 25 years have passed, still there is no stability in the country. What is the reason?

Sharif: This is a natural question but the answer is complicated. The reason for this complication is due to the fact that the leadership of the movement in 1947 was not in the hands of the Bengalis. It was the Urdu-wallas (Urdu speaking people) who were in the leadership. They came from, which is now Bihar and the Uttar Pradesh; they were the Urdu speaking Muslims of North India. The leaders of those provinces controlled and directed the Muslim League. They were developed economically, educationally and in everything in spite of the fact that they were only 12% of the population.

It was those people who thought that, after the British were driven away, they would be oppressed and ill-treated by the Hindus. Therefore, the Urdu-speaking Muslims had the requirement of a homeland; that was also the dream of Iqbal and Abdur Rahim and that dream, later on, turned into Pakistan movement. On the other hand, the Bengali Muslims were always mute.

These were the people who accepted Islam from scheduled caste staff of Hinduism, people of lower rank in the society, without any means and doing menial works. During the Turkish-Moghul rule they had no leadership role in the affairs of the state or in the society. They were under the rule of the local high caste Hindus. As a result they had no education or initiation.

The conventional view that was prevailing was that, due to hostility towards British rule the Muslims did not accept English education was not correct (of Bengali Muslims) because, they were quite illiterate in Arabic or Persian languages too. They (Bengali Muslims) were descendants of lower caste, untouchable Hindu-Buddhist stock and they had no literary tradition.

As a result we can see that the local Bengali Muslim had no covenant job not only in Bengal but anywhere in India even during the Turkish-Mughal era. The upper caste Hindus, on the contrary, could assert and got accepted their demand (for jobs) at that period. In Turkish-Mughal era the Upper caste Hindus ruled at village and district levels. There was nothing in those days in social or state structure for the development of Muslim population, changing religion did not change their professional or economic lives and that is true for most of the people in Muslim community.

The Muslim started English education after the Sepoy mutiny and Wahabi movement in 1870. The Hindus lost the sympathy and favour of the British at that time and they (the British) began patronising the Muslims. In these days, again, under the leadership of Sir Syed Ahmad the Muslim community united and expressed their obedience to the British rule and thereby started getting favour from them.

Many educated Hindus, who were employed by the company and who run business with them lost their jobs and business. Many Hindu Diwan and other employees also lost their employments. ]

The other reason for it was that the company officials had no right to get engaged in business any longer during the rule of Queen Victoria. As a result, the educated Hindus after losing their jobs moved to small towns and villages and stated establishing schools. You can easily understand, the English educated Muslims you find only who were born after 1890. And in this context we can say, and the names of the persons you know, for example, Ibrahim Khan, Barkatullah, all of them were born after 1890. One or two persons could be earlier also but nobody from Bengali Muslim community got English education before 1880.


Keshab: Mir Moshrraf Hussain …….

Sharif: No, No, he was not a Bengali Muslim. Mir Mosharraf Hussain was also an Urdu-Walla. And he was not well educated either, had little (formal) education. Educated Muslims worthy enough to be mentioned (in those days) were all Urdu-Walla. Our Sufia Kamal, Begum Rokeya, Badaruddin Omar, all is Urdu-Wallas. Omar’s grandfather learned Bengali for doing politics in Bengal.

They were the Zamindar of Barddhaman and Kalna. Momin sahib did not even know how to speak Bengali. Mir Mosharraf Hussain himself wrote that his father knew no Bengali alphabet. He was rent-collector of Dil Duar. Dil Duwar family was his relation. In undivided Bengal there was minister post based on connection. Abdul Halim Goznovi and Abdul Karim Goznovi were Zamindar of Dil Duar from Tangail.

Both of them were Rokeya’s sister’s sons. They were also Urdu-Wallas. Mohammad Ali of Bogra, the Ponnis and the Nawbabs of Dhaka ….. all were Urdu-Wallas. You can not find one Bengali (Muslim) Zamindar or a (Bengali) Muslim graduate until 1884. The (Bengali) Muslim farmers started sending their sons to school only after it was established (by the Hindus) near their homes.

For the Bengali Muslims the opportunity for education came after 1890 and from 1915 to 1922/25 few Bengali Muslims became deputy Musifs. Before that Nawab Abdul Latif, Justice Ameer Ali, Ameer Hussain and last one you saw – Hussain Saheed Sarwardhi, all were Urdu speaking Muslims. Foreign and non-Bengali speaking gave leadership to Muslim community. Bengali Muslims, due to illiteracy and ignorance and perturbation towards Hindus accepted the leadership of the Urdu-wallas.

The Bengali Muslims became members of Muslim League and only followed their orders and instruction. There were reasons for (their) doing so. Bengali Muslims, sons of farmers and after passing or failing matriculation, looked for jobs as clerks, peons, orderlies but Hindu Babus would not employ them.

In every office these Babus were sitting tightly. The Bengali Muslims found, whenever the went out of their house, Hindu shopkeepers, Hindu lawyers, Hindu clerks, Hindu teachers, Hindu Zamidars, Hindu doctors and the Hindus looted everything! They thought of themselves as descendants of the Nawabs, and related to the Mughals and now they were poor and destitute because the Hindus snatched away from them everything. Their past was not so and the British propagated this propaganda.

W. W. Hunter wrote the book ‘Indian Musalman’ in 1873. It was a dangerous book. Hunter said, “Hundred and fifty years ago it was impossible for a Musalman to be poor”. Who were these Musalmans? He did not explain it because he was motivated man. These Musalmans were not Bengali Muslims. They were from middle Asia; - the Turkish-Mughal ruling class.

The Bengali Muslims, by this propaganda, got confused and thought that they were rich and the Hindus snatched away everything from them. Dr. Azizur Rahman Mallik, being confused by this idea, wrote his thesis on ‘Muslim Education’ but failed to differentiate the point. He could not find any difference between the ruler Muslims and the farmer-Fisherman Muslims of Bengal who were converted to Islam. Ho found everything similar in shape and appearance. The British said, ‘Why the Muslims do not go to school? Because they are Urdu-speaking and they would not go to school if the medium of instruction is not Urdu or Persian. They would not attend the Bengali medium primary school’.

During the British era Bengali speaking Hindus, such as Rammohan and many others, gave leadership to Hindu community. They worked through many committees where the Muslims were also represented. But Muslim representation (in these committees) were the Urdu-speaking, non-Bengali Mughal Muslims with whom Bengali Muslims had no social, matrimonial, linguistic, cultural or any other sorts of relationship. But they represented Muslims of Bengal

And for that reason, the Bengali Muslims never got any benefit of these committees even though they had their representative. In every committee, from the committee for woman education … there were Muslim representative. These (the representatives) knew nothing about the Bengali Muslims, their ignorance about the Bengali Muslims was monumental and they despised the Bengali Muslims. The result was as it should have been.

Khondakar Fazle Rabbi, the Diwan of Murshidabad, wrote a book on the Muslims of Bengal (greater Bengal). In that book he wanted to say that Muslims mean aristocrats and not converted Muslims except, however, some low class Bengali Muslim converts. The same message we heard from the mouth of Nawab Abdul Latif. He also said, ‘The mother tongue of Bengali Muslims is Urdu but those who are low class, their language is Bengal. We shall have to change it slowly to Urdu ’.

Therefore, to Urdu-walla, Bengali Muslims meant low class, vulgar people. This is recorded fact. You can verify the truth of this statement in West Bengal and in Kalkatta. There (West Bengal and in Kalkatta) the Urdu-speaking Muslims do not consider Bengali Muslim as their brothers or find any relations with them. They rather despised Bengali Muslims. If one understands this point, one can easily and clearly understand how the Urdu-walla Muslims got control and leadership on the Bengali Muslims.

The non-Bengali Muslims leaders led the Bengali Muslims in Pakistan movement. They (Non-Bengali Muslim Leaders) took the advantage of our illiteracy, our poverty and our foolishness. ‘Jinnah represents Muslims of India’ the British declared cleverly and to create confusion.

The truth is that the Muslim League had no hold on what is now Pakistan, it had (the Muslim League) hold in North India and in Bengal only. The Muslim League could have had this hold because the Bengali Muslims who were deprived of wealth and property by the Hindus and wanted jobs (by supporting Muslim League). We must remember, all the movements they joined before (joining Muslim League) were for jobs.

In October 1906 when the representative of the Muslims met Lord Minto in Simla pleading job quota for the Muslims, Minto advised them, “ You form an organization like the Congress and we would support you. And through your organization you put forward your demand and we shall accept it”.

We found it through Minto’s wife in other documents. Minto’s wife wrote a letter to her sister saying, ‘We have extended the durability of the British rule in India’. Within two months, in December 1906, Muslim League was born in Dhaka under the initiative of Nawab of Dhaka. If we remember all these (historical facts), we would understand that the Bengali Muslims had no self-understanding and maturity (that was necessary as a group). The reason for it (such situation) was economic, social, political and historical.

If India was divided in 1937 instead of 1947, no clerk would have been available in Dhaka. If one looks to the calendar of Kalkatta University one can understand it. The Bengali Muslims had no self-understanding or self-consciousness and that is why they were carried away madly by passing fashion in 1947. We found that the English somewhat decided to give away Pakistan.

And in a conference in Bombay Rajagopal Acharia also confessed that there was no way out to keep the Muslim under control without a separate state. The 57 years old Jawaharlal Nehru was also not ready to wait any longer to occupy the Prime minister’s seat. The communists also supported the two nation’s theory. Under these circumstances, in a conference in Delhi, Jinnah turned the word ‘states’ of the Lahore proposal (19469) into one ‘State’. Fazlul Quader Chowdhury from Chittagong protested against it but without any support could not present the matter to Jinnah. Swarwardhy also supported one state principle.

Fazlul Huq was then expelled (from Muslim League). When the final decision to divide the country was taken only then the Muslims came to their senses. From Punjab, Feroze Khanoon proposed that, ‘We want to keep Punjab united’. Jinnah had no objection if the Hindus and the Muslims in Bengal build a separate state. But Gandhi did not agree to it. We can find this information in correspondences that Sarat Chandra Bose made with Gandhi.

Keshab: What was the reason for Gandhi’s objection?

Sharif: Because, in Bengal, the Muslims were the majority. First he put a condition and that is that the interior and the finance ministries would be in the hands of the Hindus. It was accepted (by the Muslims) but later on it was said that they (Hindus) cannot trust them (the Muslims).

Take the case of Assam that joined India and it was possible because the big party was given evil advice which Gandhi picked up from Fazlul Huq. Fazlul Huq arranged a conference in Lucknow with the nationalist and in that conference he propagated the point all over India. He said (Fazlul Huq) that these people (the Muslim League) wanted to form Pakistan with Bengal and the Punjab but the Muslims were not in majority in West Bengal and in East Punjab. Therefore, how it could be formed? That was a very catchy thought. Before the division of the country, from 1937 to 1947, the Muslims were in power (in Bengal) and they lost it due the division.

After the division the massacre took place in Punjab, they (the Punjabis) did not get involved in politics but took part in slaughtering. On the other hand, the Bengalis did politics but no massacre occurred in Bengal until 1950. These are important information. The Bengali Muslims never had education or political awareness. Once Mountbatten imposed on them independence and next time Indira Gandhi did the same thing. Indira Gandhi required breaking Pakistan and there she came forward to get it done.

The Soviet Union stood by her side. The Bengalis had the perturbation that the West Pakistanis were extorting them, that is what it was. However, nobody can say for sure if they (Bengalis) wanted full independence. But the events changed in such a way that the Bengalis went for independence and they got it, without any endeavour.

Keshab: How can you say without any endeavour? Thirty lacks people gave blood…………….

Sharif: lies, it is not thirty lacks, not even two and half lacks, three hundred thousand that is what Mohaiman wrote. Nirmal Sen says that the total number killed was about two and half lacks and among them, about one lacks are Bengali and one and half lacks are Bihari and Pakistani. They kept the truth hidden for getting political advantages. END Of Interview

*********************

NB: Comments on Prof. Sharif’s interview, if any, may please be made through the ‘Readers Opinion Column’ only.

…………………………..to be continued
_____________________________

Translated from Bengali by Tayeb Husain, Lund, Sweden
E-mail: gtmail@telia.com

https://web.archive.org/web/20150204080757/http://www.bangladesh-web.com/view.php?hidRecord=44486

 

[Old School]

I think other than some chetona fifth columnists ( less than half percent in Muslims, who spread the propaganda) no one believe in 3 million.

Believable figure is roughly 2.5 lakhs ( roughly 3 lakhs) , as Ahmed sharif said ( originaly said by Nirmal Sen) in an interview. He stated that dead Bengalis were 100000 and non Bengalis are 150000! Tbh this info is hard for me to digest that Bengalis died less amount than non Bengalis, still every sane person will believe that the death figure from both side can't be higher than 3 lakhs. I believe 3 million was a simple mistake made by Mujib as, he wanted to say three hundred thousands.

Surprisingly the chetona khors never ever question or blame Ahmed sharif! Perhaps because he quoted Nirmal Sen and sharif himself was an atheist.
@leonblack08, @Old School please read it thoroughly, specially the red bottom para about death figure. 3 million isn't a popular figure as PDF users troll.


An interview with prof. Ahmed sharif

Friday May 13 2005 17:33:09 PM BDT

By Keshab Mukhapadhay, Translated from Bengali by Tayeb Husain, Lund, Sweden

We know very little of our history and that is why we have so much controversial and often conflicting views about our social, political and economic life. Prof. Ahmad Sharif was not a historian but he had great knowledge of your medieval literature and he knew history greatly through his relentless research works over a few decades.

Prof. Sharif was a great teacher but teaching was his profession; people of Bangladesh will always remember him as an uncompromising secularist, a great fighter for human freedom and a man of rare courage against anything that he considered wrong and unfair.

Throughout his long career as a teacher at Dhaka University he maintained great integrity of character and he was a source of constant inspiration to his students. However, to general public, he was an embodiment of secular faith, a great pleader of social justice and an uncontaminated progressive thinker.

There were no many Sharifs in both Bengals at any time and that is why we need to listen to him, take note very carefully what he said about our past and what he predicted about our future. Mr. Keshab Mukhaopadhay, a well known newspaper editor from Kalkatta met Prof. Sharif sometime in 1997 where the professor expressed his views candidly covering social, political and many other aspects of Bangladeshi life.

In this interview he also talked about West Bengal, Rabindrnath and other famous personalities of greater Bengal. His views are quite blunt and straight forward. I want to present this interview to the NFB and other readers who do not know Bengali. The translation is not professionally done but the message is not missed anywhere of this interview. My objective is to find out with the readers how far the Professor was correct in his assessment of things, especially his comments on Pakistan movement, Urdu-speaking Muslims, West Bengal, Bengali Muslims and Hindus, Rabindranath etc.

**************************
Here is the interview:
**************************

Keshab: The Bengali Muslims once fought for Pakistan then again said goodbye to it and established Bangladesh. Now 25 years have passed, still there is no stability in the country. What is the reason?

Sharif: This is a natural question but the answer is complicated. The reason for this complication is due to the fact that the leadership of the movement in 1947 was not in the hands of the Bengalis. It was the Urdu-wallas (Urdu speaking people) who were in the leadership. They came from, which is now Bihar and the Uttar Pradesh; they were the Urdu speaking Muslims of North India. The leaders of those provinces controlled and directed the Muslim League. They were developed economically, educationally and in everything in spite of the fact that they were only 12% of the population.

It was those people who thought that, after the British were driven away, they would be oppressed and ill-treated by the Hindus. Therefore, the Urdu-speaking Muslims had the requirement of a homeland; that was also the dream of Iqbal and Abdur Rahim and that dream, later on, turned into Pakistan movement. On the other hand, the Bengali Muslims were always mute.

These were the people who accepted Islam from scheduled caste staff of Hinduism, people of lower rank in the society, without any means and doing menial works. During the Turkish-Moghul rule they had no leadership role in the affairs of the state or in the society. They were under the rule of the local high caste Hindus. As a result they had no education or initiation.

The conventional view that was prevailing was that, due to hostility towards British rule the Muslims did not accept English education was not correct (of Bengali Muslims) because, they were quite illiterate in Arabic or Persian languages too. They (Bengali Muslims) were descendants of lower caste, untouchable Hindu-Buddhist stock and they had no literary tradition.

As a result we can see that the local Bengali Muslim had no covenant job not only in Bengal but anywhere in India even during the Turkish-Mughal era. The upper caste Hindus, on the contrary, could assert and got accepted their demand (for jobs) at that period. In Turkish-Mughal era the Upper caste Hindus ruled at village and district levels. There was nothing in those days in social or state structure for the development of Muslim population, changing religion did not change their professional or economic lives and that is true for most of the people in Muslim community.

The Muslim started English education after the Sepoy mutiny and Wahabi movement in 1870. The Hindus lost the sympathy and favour of the British at that time and they (the British) began patronising the Muslims. In these days, again, under the leadership of Sir Syed Ahmad the Muslim community united and expressed their obedience to the British rule and thereby started getting favour from them.

Many educated Hindus, who were employed by the company and who run business with them lost their jobs and business. Many Hindu Diwan and other employees also lost their employments. ]

The other reason for it was that the company officials had no right to get engaged in business any longer during the rule of Queen Victoria. As a result, the educated Hindus after losing their jobs moved to small towns and villages and stated establishing schools. You can easily understand, the English educated Muslims you find only who were born after 1890. And in this context we can say, and the names of the persons you know, for example, Ibrahim Khan, Barkatullah, all of them were born after 1890. One or two persons could be earlier also but nobody from Bengali Muslim community got English education before 1880.


Keshab: Mir Moshrraf Hussain …….

Sharif: No, No, he was not a Bengali Muslim. Mir Mosharraf Hussain was also an Urdu-Walla. And he was not well educated either, had little (formal) education. Educated Muslims worthy enough to be mentioned (in those days) were all Urdu-Walla. Our Sufia Kamal, Begum Rokeya, Badaruddin Omar, all is Urdu-Wallas. Omar’s grandfather learned Bengali for doing politics in Bengal.

They were the Zamindar of Barddhaman and Kalna. Momin sahib did not even know how to speak Bengali. Mir Mosharraf Hussain himself wrote that his father knew no Bengali alphabet. He was rent-collector of Dil Duar. Dil Duwar family was his relation. In undivided Bengal there was minister post based on connection. Abdul Halim Goznovi and Abdul Karim Goznovi were Zamindar of Dil Duar from Tangail.

Both of them were Rokeya’s sister’s sons. They were also Urdu-Wallas. Mohammad Ali of Bogra, the Ponnis and the Nawbabs of Dhaka ….. all were Urdu-Wallas. You can not find one Bengali (Muslim) Zamindar or a (Bengali) Muslim graduate until 1884. The (Bengali) Muslim farmers started sending their sons to school only after it was established (by the Hindus) near their homes.

For the Bengali Muslims the opportunity for education came after 1890 and from 1915 to 1922/25 few Bengali Muslims became deputy Musifs. Before that Nawab Abdul Latif, Justice Ameer Ali, Ameer Hussain and last one you saw – Hussain Saheed Sarwardhi, all were Urdu speaking Muslims. Foreign and non-Bengali speaking gave leadership to Muslim community. Bengali Muslims, due to illiteracy and ignorance and perturbation towards Hindus accepted the leadership of the Urdu-wallas.

The Bengali Muslims became members of Muslim League and only followed their orders and instruction. There were reasons for (their) doing so. Bengali Muslims, sons of farmers and after passing or failing matriculation, looked for jobs as clerks, peons, orderlies but Hindu Babus would not employ them.

In every office these Babus were sitting tightly. The Bengali Muslims found, whenever the went out of their house, Hindu shopkeepers, Hindu lawyers, Hindu clerks, Hindu teachers, Hindu Zamidars, Hindu doctors and the Hindus looted everything! They thought of themselves as descendants of the Nawabs, and related to the Mughals and now they were poor and destitute because the Hindus snatched away from them everything. Their past was not so and the British propagated this propaganda.

W. W. Hunter wrote the book ‘Indian Musalman’ in 1873. It was a dangerous book. Hunter said, “Hundred and fifty years ago it was impossible for a Musalman to be poor”. Who were these Musalmans? He did not explain it because he was motivated man. These Musalmans were not Bengali Muslims. They were from middle Asia; - the Turkish-Mughal ruling class.

The Bengali Muslims, by this propaganda, got confused and thought that they were rich and the Hindus snatched away everything from them. Dr. Azizur Rahman Mallik, being confused by this idea, wrote his thesis on ‘Muslim Education’ but failed to differentiate the point. He could not find any difference between the ruler Muslims and the farmer-Fisherman Muslims of Bengal who were converted to Islam. Ho found everything similar in shape and appearance. The British said, ‘Why the Muslims do not go to school? Because they are Urdu-speaking and they would not go to school if the medium of instruction is not Urdu or Persian. They would not attend the Bengali medium primary school’.

During the British era Bengali speaking Hindus, such as Rammohan and many others, gave leadership to Hindu community. They worked through many committees where the Muslims were also represented. But Muslim representation (in these committees) were the Urdu-speaking, non-Bengali Mughal Muslims with whom Bengali Muslims had no social, matrimonial, linguistic, cultural or any other sorts of relationship. But they represented Muslims of Bengal

And for that reason, the Bengali Muslims never got any benefit of these committees even though they had their representative. In every committee, from the committee for woman education … there were Muslim representative. These (the representatives) knew nothing about the Bengali Muslims, their ignorance about the Bengali Muslims was monumental and they despised the Bengali Muslims. The result was as it should have been.

Khondakar Fazle Rabbi, the Diwan of Murshidabad, wrote a book on the Muslims of Bengal (greater Bengal). In that book he wanted to say that Muslims mean aristocrats and not converted Muslims except, however, some low class Bengali Muslim converts. The same message we heard from the mouth of Nawab Abdul Latif. He also said, ‘The mother tongue of Bengali Muslims is Urdu but those who are low class, their language is Bengal. We shall have to change it slowly to Urdu ’.

Therefore, to Urdu-walla, Bengali Muslims meant low class, vulgar people. This is recorded fact. You can verify the truth of this statement in West Bengal and in Kalkatta. There (West Bengal and in Kalkatta) the Urdu-speaking Muslims do not consider Bengali Muslim as their brothers or find any relations with them. They rather despised Bengali Muslims. If one understands this point, one can easily and clearly understand how the Urdu-walla Muslims got control and leadership on the Bengali Muslims.

The non-Bengali Muslims leaders led the Bengali Muslims in Pakistan movement. They (Non-Bengali Muslim Leaders) took the advantage of our illiteracy, our poverty and our foolishness. ‘Jinnah represents Muslims of India’ the British declared cleverly and to create confusion.

The truth is that the Muslim League had no hold on what is now Pakistan, it had (the Muslim League) hold in North India and in Bengal only. The Muslim League could have had this hold because the Bengali Muslims who were deprived of wealth and property by the Hindus and wanted jobs (by supporting Muslim League). We must remember, all the movements they joined before (joining Muslim League) were for jobs.

In October 1906 when the representative of the Muslims met Lord Minto in Simla pleading job quota for the Muslims, Minto advised them, “ You form an organization like the Congress and we would support you. And through your organization you put forward your demand and we shall accept it”.

We found it through Minto’s wife in other documents. Minto’s wife wrote a letter to her sister saying, ‘We have extended the durability of the British rule in India’. Within two months, in December 1906, Muslim League was born in Dhaka under the initiative of Nawab of Dhaka. If we remember all these (historical facts), we would understand that the Bengali Muslims had no self-understanding and maturity (that was necessary as a group). The reason for it (such situation) was economic, social, political and historical.

If India was divided in 1937 instead of 1947, no clerk would have been available in Dhaka. If one looks to the calendar of Kalkatta University one can understand it. The Bengali Muslims had no self-understanding or self-consciousness and that is why they were carried away madly by passing fashion in 1947. We found that the English somewhat decided to give away Pakistan.

And in a conference in Bombay Rajagopal Acharia also confessed that there was no way out to keep the Muslim under control without a separate state. The 57 years old Jawaharlal Nehru was also not ready to wait any longer to occupy the Prime minister’s seat. The communists also supported the two nation’s theory. Under these circumstances, in a conference in Delhi, Jinnah turned the word ‘states’ of the Lahore proposal (19469) into one ‘State’. Fazlul Quader Chowdhury from Chittagong protested against it but without any support could not present the matter to Jinnah. Swarwardhy also supported one state principle.

Fazlul Huq was then expelled (from Muslim League). When the final decision to divide the country was taken only then the Muslims came to their senses. From Punjab, Feroze Khanoon proposed that, ‘We want to keep Punjab united’. Jinnah had no objection if the Hindus and the Muslims in Bengal build a separate state. But Gandhi did not agree to it. We can find this information in correspondences that Sarat Chandra Bose made with Gandhi.

Keshab: What was the reason for Gandhi’s objection?

Sharif: Because, in Bengal, the Muslims were the majority. First he put a condition and that is that the interior and the finance ministries would be in the hands of the Hindus. It was accepted (by the Muslims) but later on it was said that they (Hindus) cannot trust them (the Muslims).

Take the case of Assam that joined India and it was possible because the big party was given evil advice which Gandhi picked up from Fazlul Huq. Fazlul Huq arranged a conference in Lucknow with the nationalist and in that conference he propagated the point all over India. He said (Fazlul Huq) that these people (the Muslim League) wanted to form Pakistan with Bengal and the Punjab but the Muslims were not in majority in West Bengal and in East Punjab. Therefore, how it could be formed? That was a very catchy thought. Before the division of the country, from 1937 to 1947, the Muslims were in power (in Bengal) and they lost it due the division.

After the division the massacre took place in Punjab, they (the Punjabis) did not get involved in politics but took part in slaughtering. On the other hand, the Bengalis did politics but no massacre occurred in Bengal until 1950. These are important information. The Bengali Muslims never had education or political awareness. Once Mountbatten imposed on them independence and next time Indira Gandhi did the same thing. Indira Gandhi required breaking Pakistan and there she came forward to get it done.

The Soviet Union stood by her side. The Bengalis had the perturbation that the West Pakistanis were extorting them, that is what it was. However, nobody can say for sure if they (Bengalis) wanted full independence. But the events changed in such a way that the Bengalis went for independence and they got it, without any endeavour.

Keshab: How can you say without any endeavour? Thirty lacks people gave blood…………….

Sharif: lies, it is not thirty lacks, not even two and half lacks, three hundred thousand that is what Mohaiman wrote. Nirmal Sen says that the total number killed was about two and half lacks and among them, about one lacks are Bengali and one and half lacks are Bihari and Pakistani. They kept the truth hidden for getting political advantages. END Of Interview

*********************

NB: Comments on Prof. Sharif’s interview, if any, may please be made through the ‘Readers Opinion Column’ only.

…………………………..to be continued
_____________________________

Translated from Bengali by Tayeb Husain, Lund, Sweden
E-mail: gtmail@telia.com

https://web.archive.org/web/20150204080757/http://www.bangladesh-web.com/view.php?hidRecord=44486

The fictional figure of 3M was originated from Tashkent ( Former Uzbekistan USSR) command center of the 1971 war set up by the Soviet GRU (Military Intelligence) . They were in charge of worldwide propaganda war against Pakistan, China and USA. Mujib just parroted that number instructed by his Indo-Soviet patrons. It was not a simple 3 lakh/million arithmetical error. General public do not try to go beyond hearsay. Googling is not enough when one does not even know the key words to begin with.

 

[Joe Shearer]

Please share some thoughts. I know what you meant. Epics can be written on these things.

Fair enough.

I hope you will allow me to express myself according to what I have seen and heard first-hand, always, of course, subject to your critical scrutiny. No free passes wanted, but please accept that what I will write will be the truth as I know it, and no propaganda.

 

[Old School]

Does everyone need to analyze the events in the past ? No. General public do not necessarily have to remember or recall every event in the past.
However, military planners must take everything from the past into consideration for the future planning of military operations.
Some people who get irritated by the military history, forget that this is not a general discussion forum. PDF is a military forum where thousand years of military history can be recalled whenever necessary.