Swaran Singh Says Foreign Powers
Want Flow Of Refugees To Stop
(Continued from page 1)
For instance Mr. D. N. Tiwari wanted the Government to train refugees and send them back to Bangladesh to conduct guerrilla warfare. Many other members doubted that refugees would ever go back.
But Mr. Swaran Singh thought that such remarks would only weaken the Government’s stand on Bangladesh. If refugees were to stay in India, he asked, how the Government could work for a solution facilitating their return. The refugees, he emphasized, were a trust on behalf of the world community and had to go back. Also he rejected the suggestion for international supervision of the “return process”. This according to him was not practical as it was difficult to ensure protection to each individual. That is why the Government was for a political settlement acceptable to the people of East Bengal, Mr. Swaran Singh added.
In Parliament, Mr. Singh said important world Powers agreed that there could be no military solution to the problem of Bangladesh and that all military action there should stop immediately.
Mr. Swaran Singh who was making a statement in both the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha, claimed that as a result of his talks with the Governments of the countries he visited these Governments has also agreed that the flow of refugees into India from East Bengal must stop immediately and that conditions must be created enabling the refugees to return to their homes in peace and security and that this could happen only if the refugees could be assured of a secure future in their respective homes in Bangladesh.
The foreign powers are agreeable on the point that a political solution acceptable to the people of East Bengal was the only way of ensuring a return to normalcy; that the present situation was grave and fraught with serious dangers for the peace and security of the region.
From the Minister’s statement, it appeared that he had achieved considerable success in his mission for he got the world Powers to accept most of India’s own viewpoints on the Bangladesh situation and to back up his claim Mr. Swaran Singh enclosed with his statement copies of communiqués he had signed with various Government representatives during his trip.
If this was the impression Mr. Swaran Singh’s statement made, members did not agree with him, and even as he was making the statement in the Lok Sabha, Mr. S. M. Banerjee (CPI), Mr. Samar Guha (PSP) and Mr. H. C. Kachwai (Jana Sangh) pointed out the total outcome was quite contrary. Mr. Benerjee further charged that the Minister has “concealed the information about the dispatch by the USA of a third ship loaded with arms to Pakistan, for in his yesterday’s statement, the Minister did not reveal this point.”
Mr. Swaran Singh said today that between June 6 and 22 he visited Moscow, Bonn, Paris, Ottawa, New York, Washington and London. In each of these capitals he had discussions with the Heads of Government and the Foreign Ministers.
Focus of Attention
In these discussions the focus of attention and emphasis all along was on the grave and serious situation created for India by the influx of six million refugees from East Bengal, and the continuing crisis caused in this part of the world due to the massive killings by the West Pakistani military machine in East Bengal.
It was generally agreed, Mr. Swaran Singh said that the burden placed upon the resources of the Government of India by this massive influx of refugees into this country from East Bengal was intolerable and that the international community must give assistance in this respect both in cash and in Kind.
Mr. Swaran Singh said he made it clear in each capital that any assistance to the refugees from East Bengal was essentially an assistance given to Pakistan for they are nationals of that country uprooted through deliberate and wanton action on the part of their own Government.
He also made it clear that any military assistance to the military rules of Pakistan at this juncture would have the effect of encouraging and sustaining them in their anti-people activity and any economic assistance to them would be tantamount to condoning their deplorable action in East Bengal.
In order to demonstrate how strongly it felt on the issue, Mr. Bhagwat Jha Azad, a prominent Congress (R) member and former Minister of State for Labour and Employment, demanded that the House should have a full-dress debate on the subject. The situation was grave and “a mere question here or there and an answer yes or no will not serve the purpose”.
Reference: Hindustan Standard, 26.06.1971