The Bangladesh Liberation War of 1971, when Bangladesh fought to be independent of Pakistan, was in large part prompted by the 1971 Bangladesh genocide. Pakistan had attempted to suppress calls for Bangladeshi self-determination with genocide. They killed between 300,000 and 3,000,000 people and raped between 200,000 and 400,000 Bengali women, who had been declared “public property.” The nine-month-long Bangladesh Liberation War there was also ethnic violence between Bengalis and Urdu-speaking Biharis. Biharis faced reprisals from Bengali mobs and militias and estimates of Biharis killed range from 1,000 to 150,000 to 500,000. As with any war, there were also refugees. It is known that 8 to 10 million people, mostly Hindus, fled Bangladesh and the violence.
Eventually it became clear that Pakistan was going to lose the war, and control of Bangladesh. Their response was the systematic execution of Bengali intellectuals who they suspected supported independence. Professors, journalists, doctors, artists, engineers, anyone who could potentially help lead the new nation, were targeted. On 14 December 1971, over 200 of Bangladesh’s intellectuals were abducted from their homes in Dhaka. They were taken to torture cells in prisons around the city. They were then executed en masse.
The fact that this mass killing was orchestrated by Pakistan is one of the few parts of the Bangladesh Liberation War that is not debated. This is because after Bangladesh was liberated, a list of Bengali intellectuals (most of whom were murdered on the 14 December) was discovered in a page of Major General Rao Farman Ali’s diary. It had been left behind at the Governor’s House in Dhaka.
