1970 Bhola Cyclone - The real reason for the seperation of East Pakistan?

[Slog]

I feel this aspect and its role in the whole episode is not given enough attention and for me this cyclone and its aftermath is the real reason for the separation.

The cyclone was the deadliest of all time and struck in November 1970 killing from 300,000 to 500,000 people and affecting several millions more. The Pakistan military government of the time initially had given a toll of 50 dead and acted as if nothing serious had happened. So relief efforts were very late and even when they happened they were lacking any real endeavor, seriousness and organization. So the anger of East Pakistanis was evident and this was the final nail in the coffin for all the injustices of the previous 20 years.

Now what I find very ridiculous is that 1970 elections were not postponed and were held according to schedule one month later. With a tragedy of this scale they should have been postponed for a few months at the very least. This gave a perfect opportunity to a party which had independence for the bengalis in its agenda (their manifesto said that east Pakistan should be independent in every aspect apart from foreign policy and defence). This coupled with the fact that the second largest party of Muaulana Bhashani's decided to boycott meaning that the Awami League had an open field to emotionally tap into the plight of the people who had just suffered from one of the worst natural disasters in history and to put up a manifesto and a demand for independence became very realistic and even appealing you could say. The only party which could really win seats did not participate and the Yahya govt did nothing to convince them to do so. If they had votes might have been split. For the AL independence was always the aim.

Ofocurse the thick headed policies of the Yahya government such as failing to accept the mandate and then a ridiculous army operation on a people who had suffered from a cyclone mere months earlier are rightly the real reasons but I think the cyclone and the terribly handled aftermath are even more important and are rarely mentioned in our history books. That was the turning point where the seperatists in East Pakistan could legitimately point and say that the people in Islamabad really dont give a damn about you.

Either way it has to be one of the quickest achievement of independence ever as far as the time between a call for independence and actually achievng it is concerned.

anyways any history buffs here? also a bengali perspective would be nice

 

[junaid.ahmed]

one can say this disaster enhance their separation asking but I think it was decided in agartala conspiracy that east Pakistan will be separated as bd

 

[Slog]

one can say this disaster enhance their separation asking but I think it was decided in agartala conspiracy that east Pakistan will be separated as bd

i think the seperation got traction and widespread support after this

 

[junaid.ahmed]

i think the seperation got traction and widespread support after this

yeah that cyclone increased the inferiority complex among the peoples & rightly so as Pak govt failed to rescue the peoples there. The apathetic & unemotional behavior of pak govt led them to wrest their land.

Actually we peoples always try to find the separation of bd in Yahya ki sharab or noor jahan ka shabab. but the matter is beyond this

 

[GenericBrand]

Whoah! A death toll of close to 500k and the military were bold and stupid enough to declare only 50 dead?

 

[MSaad1237]

Bangladesh was meant to be separated anyway. It would have separated sooner or later , NO MATTER WHAT, IMO..



IMO, Quaid made a mistake by joining East Pakistan (Bangladesh) with West Pakistan, two pretty different countries with different cultures etc. no ethnic similarities what so ever and soo much distance b.w them on the basis of religion.



Bangladesh and Pakistan should've been 2 separate Muslim brotherly nations from the start.

 

[JaDed]

First and foremost how they accepted such a division i mean what only were they thinking one in the west and one the east??
Plus Implementing Urdu down there throat when the Bengali language has years of history and literature was a bound disaster,India learn't it the hard way with South States but we survived because Hindi was never made the national language.
I think there were way too many factors for them asking for liberation.

 

[Slog]

First and foremost how they accepted such a division i mean what only were they thinking one in the west and one the east??
Plus Implementing Urdu down there throat when the Bengali language has years of history and literature was a bound disaster,India learn't it the hard way with South States but we survived because Hindi was never made the national language.
I think there were way too many factors for them asking for liberation.

i agree.

but my point is that this was possibly the straw which broke the camel's back.

you have to realize us subcontinental people are very emotional and not always ready to the idea of breaking away as far as a majority of the population is concerned. This was an event which got us to the point of no return imo

 

[Deosai]

East Pakistan was bound to separate from us, it was 1600 kilometers away with no connection in between -that is reason enough for it to have been a separate state, then there's also the large cultural and linguistic differences between Bengalis and West Pakistani groups, and the geographical distance amplified the differences.

East Bengal and Assam were intended to be a separate Muslim homeland for eastern Indian Muslims and Pakistan was intended as homeland for Northwestern and Northern subcontinental Muslims, that's why Allama Iqbal who is credited for being the man who dreamed up Pakistan never mentioned Bengal in his Shimla address and neither did Chaudry Rehmat Ali include Bengal in his plans for 'Pakistan', didn't even think of Bengal when he coined the name Pakistan

Some might argue that the Muslim league was founded in Bengal and had many Bengali members but back then ML wasn't a separatist organization and wanted to work for a United India, it was only later in the 1930s when Muslim Leaguers from the Northwest of India lobbied for a separate state for Muslims of that region and the Pakistan resolution was passed in Lahore -not Dhaka.

All of this bloodshed would've been avoided if Bengal was separate from the beginning and partition actually hurt the interests of Bengali Muslims; East Bengal alongwith Calcutta and Assam should have been ceded to Bengali Muslims to form their own republic and the remaining parts of west Bengal would go to the Indians.

That's what should've,would've, could've happened but didn't.

 

[RWAC]

I wouldn't ascribe this to be the only reason. However, it definitely added to the final push that made the local population rally in favor of independence.

 

[DrSchultz]

Meh, Mujib and his party were just bluffing with their 6 points agenda. Sure, they wanted more autonomy but definitely not a civil war.
Of course, that all changed when the Yahya Khan ordered a crackdown. Killing the hindu professors and students of Dhaka University on 26th changed the whole scene.

 

[Slog]

Apparently a lot of fundraising was done in West Pakistan after the end of this tragedy and an East Pakistan Relief fund was created where certain highways and other things would be tolled to raise funds for work here.

However most of the money never reached the east and funnily the program was still ongoing for a few years after 1971

 

[Slog]

The current cyclone Ampham is a higher category with stronger wings

Thankfully the damage has been kept low on relative basis