Thread on the myth of 3 million killed, 200,000 raped in 1971!

In order to cherry pick proof for the plucked-out-of-thin-air 3 million figure allegedly murdered by Pakistan Army in '71, Mujib ur Rehman constituted a Commission on Jan 29 '72 to locate verifiable evidence.

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Chowdhary Abdul Mumin in his book "Behind the Myth of Three Million", published in 1973, reported that this Commission comprised representatives from the Army, Border Security Force, Rangers, Police and Civil Administration. Despite their best efforts, this Commission..

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completely failed to locate any mass graves or other evidence of any kind. The Commission gave a newspaper advertisement offering 1,000 Taka to anyone who comes forward with figures of the dead. Only 38,000 came forward. The Commission then conjured up a figure of a...

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56,743 deaths. Mujib showed great displeasure at the Commission’s findings and disbanded it, stating, “I have declared three million dead, and your report could not come up with three scores thousands! What report you have prepared? Keep your report to yourself...

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What I have said once shall prevail”.

Western independent sources too solidly rubbish this 3 million figure. The Peace Research Institute in Norway along with Uppsala University of Sweden in their findings in 1972, estimated that about 58,000 people died in 1971.

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In addition to this, in June 1972, William Durmmond in the LA Times reported that “……. the figure of 3 million deaths is an exaggeration so gross as to be absurd …… no more than 25,000 people died.” On March 1st, 1973, Swedish journalist Ingvar Oja reported in...

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Dagens Nyheter, the largest daily of Stockholm: “The allegation regarding the killing of 3 million people is highly exaggerated, not more than 50,000 people died in East Pakistan”.

Sarmila Bose the famous Bengali Indian writer and Research Associate at Oxford University,

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in her book, Dead Reckoning in 2011, writes “…. the number 3 million appears to be not more than a gigantic rumor”. She estimated that around 50,000 – 100,000 people including Bengali’s, Beharis and West Pakistanis may have perished in the conflict in East Pakistan.

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Even basic arithmetic, which seems to be beyond the grasp of the Bangladeshi establishment, shows the unabashed absurdity of the 3 million killed and 200,000 women raped myths. To illustrate, perhaps at the expense of disgusting the readers, the Army action in East Pak....

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started on 26 March and lasted till 16th December, 1971 – a total of 262 days. This implies that about 11,450 Bengalis would need to have been picked-up, killed and buried every day. When compared to the 2nd World War for instance, 6 million Jews killed by Nazi Germany...

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in 6 years comes to only 2,740 killed every day – markedly less. Both the figures of the daily killings are fantastically preposterous and defy common sense.

The other myth regarding 200,000 Bengali Women raped by Pakistani Army in 1971 was also investigated by the above

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Commission. This time they had offered 3,000 Taka for any informant of rape. Only 2,680 cases came forward. The Commission rounded it to 25,000 victims. This was also not acceptable to Mujib. This estimate 200,000 rapes has also been rejected by an Austrian based academic

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Bina D’Casta, who had researched this area and who believes that the number is too high. Further, Tajamul Hussain, Bengali freelance journalist in his book “Bangladesh victim of Black Propaganda Intrigue and Indian Hegemony”, writes that General Manikshaw felt embarrassed

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at the figures and thinks that 3 million killed and 200,000 women alleged to have been violated seem fictitious, baseless and far removed from the truth.

Claims of 3 million killed were stopped after a tripartite agreement in '74.

~ Dr Junaid Akram

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