NEW NATION FOREIGN EDITOR SHIRI MULGAOKAR LOOKS AT THE PROBLEM OF THE EXODUS FROM EAST PAKISTAN
Fears grow over flood of refugees
Hints of action from New Delhi
The warning that India may turn to drastic measures if the flood of refugees from East Pakistan into West Bengal is not stopped is beginning to acquire a new stridency with Mrs. Gandhi’s statement in New Delhi yesterday.
There have been hints of action by India to stop the situation from getting completely out of hand but the use of armed force seems unikely.
Mrs. Gandhi put the number of refugees at 3.5 million and Indian estimates are that the total will reach 5 million before the monsoon sets in and makes movement more difficult.
These figures are contested by Pakistan and the Indian fear is that many of the refugees will be denied re-entry into East Pakistan when normalcy is restored by a too rigorous examination of their credentials as Pakistan citizens.
The frontier between West Bengal and East Pakistan is an open one for the most part, but the movement of refugees on this scale could have been checked, if not altogether stopped, had India so desired.
Such action was, however, politically ruled out because of the strong West Bengal sympathies with the people of East Pakistan in their struggle to attain selfdetermination.
Indian resources in availability of food and in getting it to the refugee camps have come under heavy strain. Expenditure on refugees is now running at nearly 55 million a day and cannot be sustained without serious budgetary complications.
The uncovered budgetary deficit is stready of the order of $1000million and the fresh burdens on the refugee account will mean very serious financial dislocation.
Indian appeals for foreign help to meet the expenses on the refugees have yielded
The insupportable financial burdens are not the end of the story. The presence of the refugees and their fanning out in the countryside will create new tensions. Their entry into the labour market will mean decilning wage rates. There is always the danger on top of this of the incitement of communal passions.
The Indian estimates or the communal composition of the refegees is that 60 per cent of them are Hindus and 40 percent Muslims. This would mean that nearly half of the Hindu population of East Pakistan has already migrated. Most of them will be reluctant to return though the Indian government says that all of them will eventually have to go back.
There seems little doubt that the Pakistan authorities in the east are actively helping to swell the refugee flood. This reduces Pakistan’s difficulties in moving food supplies to the population and Pakistan is deriving some satisfaction that the ill wind that has blown over their east wing is spreading out over India.
Reference : The New Nation, 25.05.1971