Operation Searchlight was a planned military operation carried out by the Pakistan Army to curb the Bengali nationalist program in the erstwhile East Pakistan in March 1971, which the Pakistani state justified on the basis of anti-Bihari violence by Bengalis in early March. Ordered by the central government in West Pakistan, this was seen as the sequel to "Operation Blitz"
which had been launched in November 1970. The real plan envisioned taking control of the major cities on 26 March, and then eliminating all opposition, political or military, within one month. President Yahya Khan at a conference in February 1971 said "Kill three million of them and the rest will eat out of our hands." Prolonged Bengali resistance was not anticipated by the Pakistani military leaders. The main phase of Operation Searchlight ended with the fall of the last major town in Bengali hands in mid-May.
The operation also precipitated the 1971 Bangladesh genocide and caused roughly 10 million refugees to flee to India while the civilian dead estimates range from 300,000-3,000,000. Bengali intelligentsia, academics and Hindus were targeted for the harshest treatment, with significant indiscriminate killing taking place. These systematic killings enraged the Bengalis, who declared independence from Pakistan, to establish the new state of Bangladesh.
Requirements for success in operation search light:
Operation to be launched simultaneously all across East Pakistan.
Maximum number of political and student leaders, and those among cultural organizations and teaching staff to be arrested.
Operation must achieve 100% success in Dhaka. Dhaka University would be occupied and searched.
Free and greater use of fire authorized for securing cantonments.
All internal and international communications to be cut off, including telephone, television, radio and telegraph.
All East Pakistani (Bengali) troops to be neutralized by seizing weapons and ammunition.
To deceive the Awami League, President Yahya Khan to pretend to continue dialogue, even if Mr. Bhutto disagrees, and to agree to Awami League demands.
Operation search light: Did it save or destroy Pakistan?
First let’s talk about why west Pakistan government decided to do operation search light program,
There are a lot of different between east and west Pakistan. Here are some key differences between the Pakistanis in the East and the West.
West Pakistanis spoke Urdu while Bengali was spoken in the East. It must be noted here that one of Jinnah’s key founding principles of the dominion was that Urdu would be the official language.
The East Pakistanis were shorter and relatively darker skinned.
The Political decisions were taken in Islamabad, Lahore, and Karachi and not in Dacca (Dhaka today).
Beside West Pakistan always tried to Absorption to East Pakistan.
This led to formation of Awami League in East Bengal led by Sheikh Mujib-Ur-Rehman. The Awami league, in 1966, started 6 league movement which asked had 6 demands:
The constitution should provide for a Federation of Pakistan in its true sense on the Lahore Resolution and the parliamentary form of government with supremacy of a legislature directly elected on the basis of the universal adult franchise.
The federal government should deal with only two subjects: defense and foreign affairs, and all other residuary subjects shall be vested in the federating states.
Two separate, but freely convertible currencies for two wings should be introduced; or if this is not feasible, there should be one currency for the whole country, but effective constitutional provisions should be introduced to stop the flight of capital from East to West Pakistan. Furthermore, a separate banking reserve should be established and separate fiscal and monetary policy be adopted for East Pakistan.
The power of taxation and revenue collection shall be vested in the federating units and the federal center will have no such power. The Federation will be entitled to a share in the state taxes to meet its expenditures.
There should be two separate accounts for the foreign exchange earnings of the two wings; the foreign exchange requirements of the federal government should be met by the two wings equally or in a ratio to be fixed; indigenous products should move free of duty between the two wings, and the constitution should empower the units to establish trade links with foreign countries.
East Pakistan should have a separate militia or paramilitary forces.
Pakistani government didn’t want to agree to 6 league movement and west Pakistani government didn’t want to see Sheikh Mujibur Rahman as a president of Pakistan. So West Pakistan decided to use their military force to stop Bangladeshi movement of right so they made a plan to kill East Pakistan people to stop there movement. Which is known as operation searchlight.
Argument
Through West Pakistan said that, operation search light was for save Pakistan. But actually, both Bangladesh and Pakistan realize that operation search light destroyed Pakistan. Bangladesh lost about 1,00,000 people in operation search light. And West Pakistan lost East Pakistan because if operation search light wouldn’t happen, war of independent in 1971would never been happened.
Conclusion
In the end we can say that operation search light was for destroy Pakistan and not to save Pakistan. At that time Pakistan didn’t realize that. But now Pakistan realize that operation search light was wrong idea. War of independent wouldn’t happen in next day, if operation search light wasn’t happened. As a Bangladeshi, I feel bad because of genocide in operation search light as well as happy because of that sacrificed we gained an independent a land.
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