The Story up to March 1971

How the 1970 elections sowed the seeds of the Bangladesh liberation war. An extract

This chapter follows the early years of Pakistan, the challenges of governance in a state constituted by two widely separated and culturally distinct territories, and some of the failures that led to separatism in the Eastern wing. It covers the general elections of 1970, the victory of the Eastern-based Awami League and the Pakistani refusal to honour the election result.

In Pakistan

The roots of what is now Bangladesh’s desire to separate from what was originally West Pakistan go back to the time of Partition itself, to 1947. Pakistan was created in two geographically separated and culturally distinct regions, at the time West Pakistan and East Pakistan, nearly two thousand kilometres apart, with post-Partition India squarely in between. The population of East Pakistan was actually greater than that of West Pakistan; during Independence, there were around forty-two million people in the East against thirty four million in the West. But political power and major institutions of the government were concentrated in West Pakistan and dominated by its people.

These unpromising factors were the starting point for many genuine challenges of governance, but there was no shortage of man made and self-inflicted challenges as well. Budgetary discrimination began almost immediately after Independence, as the federal g