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Aurora, Niazi back on stage
Subir Bhaumik Former BBC Correspondent
Aurora, Niazi back on stage
PHOTO : Bangladesh Liberation War celebration Day, Dhaka, 16th December, 2014. Pic by Subir Bhaumik

The two generals were key to the surrender ceremony at Dhaka in 1971.

The singers had just finished their patriotic numbers when a shrill whistle rent the air.

A surge of men piled on to the stage where the Sectors  Commanders Forum , an organisation of those who fought the 1971 liberation war against Pakistan, were celebrating the Victory Day that ended in the birth of Bangladesh.

Some volunteers rushed in with a table and two chairs , others with a man dressed in Sikh turban and Indian military uniform and one clean shaven and clad in Pakistan military uniform.

The anchor who presented the celebrations, broke the  suspense  soon after.

The Sikh turbaned was supposed to be India’s former eastern army commander Lt..General Jagjit Singh Aurora, the clean shaven one Lt Gen A.A.K.Niazi who on 16 December 1971 surrendered with his army in East Pakistan to a joint command of Indian army and Bengali freedom fighters at the end of a bloody nine month civil war.

The two proceeded to sign and accept the Instrument of Surrender as the real Aurora and Niazi had done 43 years ago on this day – and the ‘ceremony’ was organised at the very spot where the real surrender ceremony had taken place in Suhrawardy Park , formerly Ramna race course, where ‘Father of the Nation’ Sheikh Mujibur Rahman had given the call for independence on 7th March 1971.

What followed was more dramatic.

More than twenty top notch freedom fighters  led by former Bangladesh Army Chiefs K.M Safiullah and Harun-ur-Rashid and retired colonels Abu Osman Choudhury and Shams-ul-Alam ,  proceeded to hand over the Bangladesh flag to as many youngmen and women .

‘’We are passing over the baton to the younger generation who have not seen the Liberation War but value our independence as much as we who fought do. We want them to uphold the values of secular Bengali nationalism that led us to fight Pakistan ,’’ said freedom fighter Haroon Habib, who is secretary general of the Sectors Commanders Forum.

‘’ We have full faith in Bangladesh’s GenNext. Our country will never tolerate regressive fundamentalism that we see surfacing in some parts of the world,’’ he said.

But many of these Bengali freedom fighters who fought alongside the Indian army appeared dismayed at why India does not celebrate this Victory Day with similar fanfare.

‘’ It was as much our victory as India’s. We died in tens of thousands but several thousand Indian soldiers also died for our freedom. We expect India to jointly celebrate this day with us,’’ said former freedom fighter Mahibul Islam  Edu .

India’s eastern army does observe  this Victory Day and brings over some Bangladesh freedom fighters to Calcutta’s Fort William.

‘’ But civilians are hardly involved , so few even in Calcutta appear to know about India’s biggest military  victory,’’ says Shams-ul-Alam, who was implicated with Sheikh Mujib in the famous Agartala Conspiracy case in the 1960s for alleged conspiracy to break up Pakistan.

The trial in that case catapulted SheIkh Mujib as the undisputed Bengali leader in what was then East Pakistan.

Retired Indian brigadier M.Chikara , who was Aurora’s staff  in 1971, agrees.

In a recent conference held by ‘Asian Confluenc e’ in Shillong, the former Indian officer grand India-Bangladesh celebrations on 16th December to strengthen relations between the two neighbours by leveraging shared history.

Dhaka university history professor Mesbah Kamal goes a step further.

‘’The Indian freedom struggle and the lives of Gandhi and Subhas Bose should find a place in Bangladesh school  history text books while our struggle for freedom from Pakistan and the life of Shiekh Mujib should find a place in Indian school history books,’’ Kamal proposed at the ‘Asian Confluence’ Seminar.  

Many feel that is crucial to drive home the point that India remains a friend for Bangladesh and that Bangladesh, though a Muslim majority country, is no Pakistan or Saudi Arabia but a  moderate nation closer to values to India than anyone else.

 

Amir Abdullah Khan Niazi signing the Instrument of Surrender under the gaze of Jagjit Singh Aurora on December 16, 1971 at Dhaka.

Standing immediately behind from Left to Right: Vice Admiral Krishnan, Air Marshal Dewan, Lt. Gen Sagat Singh, Maj Gen JFR Jacob (with Flt Lt Krishnamurthy peering over his shoulder).

Veteran newscaster, Surojit Sen of All India Radio, is seen holding a microphone on the right.

(Mr. Subir Bhaumik is a veteran journalist, former BBC correspondant and author of  two well acclaimed books ‘Insurgent Crossfire’ and ‘Troubled Periphery’

Currently Mr Bhaumik visiting Dhaka and filed this column on the Bangladesh Liberation War celebration Day, 16th December )

 

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