THIS refers to the segment ‘From the past pages of Dawn’ (March 29). Excerpts from an editorial published on March 29, 1946, talked about the phenomenal victory in the Bengal elections of the Muslim League that had been championing the idea of partition of Bengal. Anti-partition candidates, like the Nawab of Dhaka and another political heavyweight of the time, Syed Nausher Ali of Jessore, were ‘trounced’.
Many shades of irony could be seen in the said excerpt when read with the accompanying piece, which related to a report carried on March 29, 1971, just 25 years after the Bengal elections. Its title, ‘Calm prevails’, is a reference to a broadcast by Radio Pakistan of a statement by the then chief martial law administrator of East Pakistan, Gen Tikka Khan.
Bangladesh
Jessore
Khulna
Pakistan
Dhaka
Radio-pakistan
Sindh
East-pakistan
Zulfikar-ali-bhutto
Gen-yahya
Syed-nausher-ali
Sheikh-mujibur-rahman