Daily Dawn
22nd September 1962
Democratic Constition a Universal Demand
SUHRAWARDY STRESSES SOVEREIGNTY OF PEOPLE
DACCA, Sept. 21: Mr. H.S. Suhrawardy, a former prime Minister and leader of the now defunct Awami league, declared here today that he had not the least doubt that there was a ‘universal demand throughout the country for a full-fledged democratic Constitutiion.”
“The country” he said, “is present with problems of various kinds but none of these can be solved unless we have a Constitution which is based on the sovereignty of the people.”
In a nine-page statement released to the Press shortly before his departure for Karachi tonight, Mr. Suhrawardy further said: It will be only through a parliament where representatives of the people may get together to solve their various problems that we can hope for justice to all regions and people in Pakistan, which alone will cement the various parts of the country together so that all of us can march forward jointly for its progress and prosperity.
Mr. Suhrawardy dwelt on subjects like flood relief, flood control, development programmes, exploitation of natural resources, railways, agriculture, industries, atomic energy, students problems and political detenus.
FLOOD RELIEF
Describing the plight of flood victims in East Pakistan, Mr. Suhrawardy said it was unfortunate that the assistance that had been forthcoming bore little relation to the needs and requirements.
It was a tragedy he said that persons willing to spend lakhs upon lakhs in order to bolster up a government or to win seats in some useless Legislature will give paltry sums when it comes to saving life and helping the poor needy.
The need is so colossal that there is no point in “avoiding the stark naked fact the Government must help in a very, very big way, if the people are to be saved from extinction” he said.
Mr. Suhrawardy said that the gruel or food kitchen should be started immediately for the gratituitious distribution of foodgrains. He also suggested that all stocks of cloth and apparel should be purchased by the Government to distribute freely and commence test relief work as soon as the flood water receded.
As regrads flood control measures, Mr. Suhrawardy said these were as important for East Pakistan as dams, link canals and measures to counteract salinity and waterlogging were essential for West Pakistan. He said if the Government took up the matter of flood control in East Pakistan “serously”.
In this connection, Mr. Suhrawardy suggested that an appeal should be made to the United Nations and to “our friends to help us in this behalf.”
He made a special appeal to the East Pakistan Governor, Mr. Ghulam Faruque, to approach the proper quarters for expert advice and to bend his energies to the development of the province.
ACCUSED CENTRE
East Pakistan, he said, had suffered from the “libel” that it has been unable to utilise or absorb the money allotted to it for development, but this was not due to the inability of East Pakistan but to the “hinderances” that had been placed in its way by the Centre.
Describing the development programme as “lop sided” Mr. suhrawardy said little attention had been paid to the development of internal resources of the country such as gas.
He expressed the hope that Mr. Ghulam Faruque with his dynamic energy and wide experience will be able to give a “new orientation” to the development plans and put them into practice and not feel “bound” by the limitation of the Second Five -Year Plan.
TRIBUTE TO STUDENTS
Paying tributes to the innate sense of justice and fairplay of the students, Mr. Suhrawardy called upon their “detractors” to desist from calling them names and maligning and slandering them either as agents of subversive elements or as gullible idiots who understand nothing and who are a ready prey to the wiles of designing persons which, of course, does not include Government or the Ministers.
Continuing, he said “I think I know my boys and I am confident that they are most anxious to go back to their studies as they realise that neither they nor their parents can afford to lose precious time which must be devoted to their studies and precious money earned with toil and tears.” He suggested to the Government to grant “general amnesty to the students”.
RELEASE OF DETENUS
Mr. Suhrawardy urged that the political detenus be released, as there was no justification for their detention.
Mr. Suhrawardy, who could not address a public meeting in Dacca because of rain this afternoon, announced that he would now speak at a public meeting in the East Pakistan capital on Oct 7, which would be observed as a “protest day” against the firing on Sept. 17 by holding public meetings all over Pakistan. -APP & PPA.
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