BANGLA DESH DYING?
REFUGEES STREAMING TOWARDS INDIAN BORDER
16 (AP)
THE battered and demoralized forces of Bangla Desh- breakaway East Pakistanabandoned their provisional capital almost without a fight Friday and thousands of refugees streamed out of the town towards the Indian Border.
Pakistani government troops captured Kushtia, 30 milles (48 km) to the north, and Bangla Desh resistence everywhere seems to be dying:
The India government radio consistently partisan, spoke for the first time of a Bangla Desh retreat and reported the followers of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman were resorting to guerrilla warfare.
There was little evidence of guerrilla fighting in the Chuadanga region, however, Bangla Desh troops appeared battleshy and ready to throw away their arms. There was confusion everywhere and Bangla Desh officers had virtually given up the fight.
Chuadanga, a town of some 25,000 people which the recently formed Bangla Desh government established as its provisional capital, was almost deserted.
Refugees reported Chuadanga was shelted and then strafed by two Pakistani Air Force Sabre jets shortly before noon.
When Foreign Newsmen reached the town later several streets were pitted with small craters and the walls of the police station were scarred with machinegun bullets.
A dead cow and two dead dogs still lay in the main street. Twelve people were said to have been killed in the attack and there ever no officials on hand to verify the report.
Several buildings were damaged by rockets or mortar fire.
The entire town was shuttered and empty. Green, red and white Bangla Desh flags hung limply from deserted buildings. The head-quarters of commander in chief Major Mohammed Osman were abndoned.
A millitary jeep headed out of town with three wounded men lying in the back.
A lone pedicab still plied for hire and a handful of Bangla Desh partisans- Mukhti Fauj (liberation forces)- cycled off which rifles slung over their shoulders.
There was no sign of the advancing Pakistan Army or of any attempt by the Bangla Desh fighters to defend the town.
According to some reports, Pakistani troops had established an advance post three miles from Chuadanga but their main force probably was much further away.
Long columns of refugees straggled out of Chuadanga by every route, heading for the Indian border 15 miles (24 km) to the West.
Officials in Calcutta reported 100,000 refugees so far have reached India. Makeshift camps have been set up on the border but many are finding shelter with relatives and friends. Food is being provided in the camps by the government.
The refugees are going on foot and by mule and creaking bullock cart, on bicycles and rickety pedicabs. Hundreds jammed ferryboats across a border river.
MEETING WITH INDIA
In the first direct contact reported between a senior Indian government official and an East Pakistan leader, Indian Industrial Development Minister Moinul Haq Choudhury said Friday that he had met Maulana Bhashani for three hours early Thursday.
Choudhury told United News of India that he met the leader of the national Awami Party for three hours ‘somewhere along the border’ of India’s Assam State and East Pakistan.
The agency, in a dispatch from the Assam capital of Shillong said Bhashani had urged India to lend all ppossible moral and material help’ to the independence fight and to recognize the government of Bangla Desh.
INDIA CHARGES
The Indian Foreign Ministry said Friday Pakistan is trying to turn its civil war in its ‘secessionist’ Eastern province into international confrontation against India.
Their attempt is to interpret the present struggle of the people of East Bengal (East Pakistan) for self-respect, economic development and peace, as another point of dispute merely between India and Pakistan, the foreign ministry’s spokesmun said in a statement.
The spokesman, In response to a question, told a newsconference where the statement was read out that ‘We are prepared to meet and face any eventuality’ if fighting broke out of the india-Pakistan border. :
Reference : Indonesian Observer, 17.09.1971