The sixteenth of December 1971 did not come easy to us, the citizens of Dhaka who had remained in a kind of siege for two weeks before that unexpected dawn of liberty.
The joys of an imminent victory and liberation of Bangladesh that began with the first air battle in the Dhaka sky on the third of December, followed by constant flow of news from the bordering districts of advances of the Mukti Bahini and Indian Army and retreat of Pakistani forces, would soon give way to a sense of impending disaster.
This became more pronounced when brigade after brigade of the Pakistan army would retreat to Dhaka, and they became beleaguered in Dhaka. There was a fear that Pakistan army -- which was rumored to have amassed nearly three divisions (each division numbering 25-30,000 soldiers) over the past nine months, were all huddled in and around Dhaka -- would make a last-ditch effort to fight the Indian army and the Mukti Bahini which had encircled the city.
This news or rumour would be further exacerbated when the Indian Army started dropping leaflets from planes asking the beleaguered Pakistan army to surrender.
Yahya Khan and General Niazi’s last stand?
As denizens of a besieged city, we were both thrilled and frightened as the prospects of a surrender seemed remote, judging from the rhetoric of then Pakistan President Yahya Khan and Lt General Niazi, his psychotic military representative in then East Pakistan.
The way these two acted contrary to the reality in East Pakistan seemed that the besieged army in Dhaka would rather burn the whole city fighting the invading Indian army and take us to our deaths along with them rather than surrender to the “Indians.”
In fact, even two days before the actual surrender, we were certain that we would be watching a hand-to-hand fight in the streets with bullets flying all over and piercing all houses in Dhaka. We were of course overextending our fearful imagination, but such was our level of anxiety, that we were led to believe that doom’s day was near for us.
In fact, nearly half the remaining population of Dhaka city had fled the city well before December 16, fearful of street battles. It is to be remembered that a third of Dhaka's population had left the city following the marauding attacks on the city by the Pakistan army in the dark night of March 25, 1971.
Elation
But none of the dire thoughts that we had materialized. Instead, we heard over the radio and TV announcement of a ceasefire and surrender of Pakistan armed forces on December 16. Nothing could be more surreal than that announcement for us, the beleaguered citizens of Dhaka, and in particular for me.
For me, it was freedom from self-internment in different homes in Dhaka, using them as hideouts. This was because I had abandoned my position as sub-divisional officer of Manikganj two months earlier in protest to my superior officer’s demand that I accompany the District Superintendent of Police (an officer sent over from West Pakistan to manage District Police of Dhaka) in his round up of Manikganj in search of Mukti Bahini.
So, December 16 was the National Day of Liberation for Bangladeshis, and a day of freedom for me from hiding. I decided to witness the historic occasion of surrender at Ramna Racecourse, which was to take place sometime around noon.
I set out from my cousin’s home in Dhanmandi in a car driven by a senior colleague Mokammel Haq with my cousin. It was a Datsun car, and we took the road to Ramna Racecourse (now Suhrawardy Uddyan) via Elephant Road. Mirpur Road, which we took first from Dhanmandi, was totally deserted. We did see a few gatherings of youth in the streets shouting Joy Bangla, but no signs of any Pakistani military or militia which were common to see even a couple of days before.
A close call
We assumed all Pakistani forces had retreated to the barracks under orders from their superiors because of the surrender agreement. There were no policemen on the streets either. It was past midday, but the streets were eerily empty.
I remember it was a Thursday, a working day. Even though most people had left the city in the last few days, there would be people going to markets for daily necessities. But no sign of people in the streets, and all shops were closed. Even then, we decided to head on to Ramna Racecourse to witness history.
Something dire was waiting for us as we turned onto Elephant Road. The road was empty of any traffic, and the shops were closed. But as we sped through the empty road, I saw from the rear seat of the car where was seated a man in a typical grey Pakistan militia uniform (a kurta and shalwar) pointing a rifle at us.
As I called out at Mokammel Haq, our driver, to watch out, the militia man had already fired his rifle at the car. The bullet missed the car as Mokammel Haq deftly maneuvered the car and swerved to the right. He fired again, missing, but this time scratching the bonnet of the car. We drove past him as the crazy lone soldier kept on firing.
We decided right there that we should return home as the roads were not safe. We drove up to Shegunbagicha, and instead of going to Ramna we turned back toward Dhanmandi, abandoning our desire to witness history. On our way back, we did see an unpleasant sight of a dead soldier (Pakistani army uniform) lying dead on the sidewalk. I did not know if the death was from an encounter with a Mukti Bahini or an Indian soldier.
Joy, yet uncertainty
That day, we had to be satisfied with watching the event on TV. As we watched the historic event, I was overwhelmed with two emotions. One was the joy that we had finally overcome an impossible war in a relatively short time, which at that time had seemed to be an eternity. The other was of uncertainty and anxiety over what would happen next.
The second emotion was aggravated a couple of days later when the streets were filled once again with people, mostly young ones who had remained indoors for fear, lest they be arrested by the army on suspicion of being a Mukti.
But included among them were also bandits and looters who always take advantage of chaos and breakdown of law and order to rob people and shops. And indeed, they did.
For a number of days following December 16, the shops and business houses in the Stadium and Motijheel areas became targets of loot and vandalism. In one infamous incident which became a poster of post-independence violence in Dhaka and reported in Time magazine, a man accused of being a razakar was bayoneted to death by a person claiming to be a freedom fighter.
These sad incidents were succinctly summarized by a tea-stall owner who I used to visit in those stressful days in Dhaka in 1971. He was no freedom fighter with arms, but in spirit he was better than many of us.
In those dark days, he would tell me that the days of Pakistan army occupation were nearing the end. Soon, East Pakistan would be liberated, because he had seen the Mukti Bahini in action and their resolve in his village which was across the river. He would ask me not to worry.
A new threat that persists
But he was a worried man after the lootings and random killings that were committed in the name of mukti. In his words, for nine months we had waited for the Pakistan Army to leave, and we would have our new country. We knew it was a question of time.
Now that we have our country, when would we be free from the monsters we see now? These are not people from another place, they are our own people. If they start looting us, if they start mayhem in the country, where can we go?
Today, on this 52nd anniversary of our Victory Day, the words of the tea-stall vendor still reverberate in my ears. The promise of December 16 was to bring to our people a country of prosperity, not only economic, but also a country free of exploitation, corruption, and rule of law.
Our constitution guaranteed these, from a government that would be chosen by the people. Unfortunately, we cannot say that we have delivered that promise, yet.
On this day, we hope that our leaders, at least those who had witnessed that day of victory on December 16, will remember what sacrifice our people made to achieve that victory, and deliver that promise.
Ziauddin Choudhury has worked in the higher civil service of Bangladesh early in his career, and later for the World Bank in the US.