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Speech of the Prime Minister of India, Mrs. Indira Gandhi at a Public Rally in Dacca, 17 March 1972

“My heart overflows as I come to your beautiful country and to this historic ground. For many years, we had all heard of the beauty of Bangladesh. For many years, we had known about the agony you have suffered, and especially the fierce atrocities of last year. The story of your journey through darkness has moved the hearts of people and brought tears to the eyes wherever people value the human spirit.

We Don’t Know Defeat

“At first, I remember the students, the labourers, the peasants, the intellectuals, the soldiers, the police, the people, the Hindus and the Muslims of my Bangladesh who were killed. I, wishing for their souls and paying tribute to them, would like to say a few words to you.

Politico-Military Strategy of the Bangladesh Liberation War, 1971

The Indian subcontinent marked 50 years of the 1971 Indo-Pak War or the Bangladesh liberation war: on 16 December 2021. While this event was commemorated in India and Bangladesh, it is a time for introspection for Pakistan.

From 7 March to Independence (Sat-e-March Theke Swadhinata) (In Bengali)

Independence is a man’s birthright that helps people to express themselves within the contours of family, state and society. The lack of freedom leads to the insecurity that he strives to escape from. The paucity of political freedom is largely associated with the independence of a state in which people usually live in a state of captivity, in mass deprivation and persecution. To tackle these issues of dispossession and exploitation, revolutionaries emerge on the scene with charismatic words, values and acts, with the motive of emancipating people.

Interview: Liberation War Through the Cinematic Lens

Question: 01: How relevant was 1971 for you, both in political and cultural sense?

The Liberation War of 1971 and India

India’s role in the liberation war is often seen through the geopolitical prism. Its response to developments in East Pakistan was complex and evolved over a period of time. Before taking recourse to military action, India exhausted its diplomatic initiatives to draw the attention of the international community to the refugee crisis which arose due to the Pakistan Army-perpetuated genocide – a term first used by India in the Parliament Resolution of 31 March.

Waging War Through Humour: Political Cartoons and the War of 1971 as Depicted in Calcutta-Based Print Media

The article takes up the political cartoons printed in newspapers, particularly in Bengali from West Bengal to highlight the popular opinion-base they built in support for Bangladesh and the War of 1971 which perhaps brought a new age in Indian foreign policy where military intervention was upheld as a tool for maintaining peace and security in the region.

Histories and Memories of the Liberation War: Saranarthis in Tripura

In the twentieth century, South Asia experienced mass migrations of millions of insecure homeless people twice: it witnessed the Partition-refugees from 1947 and saranarthis during the liberation war of 1971. The Indian State treated the first category as ‘citizen-refugees’, whereas the saranarthis were like temporary shelter-seekers. Among the Northeastern states, Tripura played the most crucial role in providing them with all essential supports.

Historicising the Birangona: Interrogating the Politics of Commemorating the Wartime Rape of 1971 in the Context of the 50th Anniversary of Bangladesh

Two decades ago, ‘1971’ was deemed to not have a market within Indian publishing houses and media outlets. Yet, one is struck by the contemporary Indian focus on the iconic figure of the Birangona – brave women, a title given by the State of Bangladesh to women raped by the Pakistani army and their Bengali and non-Bengali collaborators during the Bangladesh war of 1971.

Bangladesh: A Half Century into Freedom

The article is an observation of the fifty years that have gone by since the liberation of Bangladesh through a guerrilla war against Pakistan in 1971. It spells out the causes behind the military and political collapse of the Pakistan state in Bangladesh, formerly the eastern province of Pakistan. Furthermore, the article is a brief study of the conditions confronting Bangladesh at birth, which at a certain point pushed the country into reverse gear through the rise of illegitimate regimes in the mid-1970s and early 1980s.