IANS
Agartala, India
Ahead of Bangladesh’s Independence Day on March 26, a three-day exhibition “1971: Genocide and Torture” opened in India’s Tripura state capital Agartala on Monday to showcase the sacrifices hundreds of thousands of people of erstwhile East Pakistan made to achieve their freedom.
Bangladeshi patriots vowed to win their independence on March 26, 1971, when Bangabandhu Mujibur Rehman at a huge Dhaka rally gave the call, and launched a massive guerilla struggle against the then Pakistani rulers and their army.
The ‘Mukti Juddha’ (Liberation War), as it is called in Bangladesh, ended in creation of Bangladesh on
December 16, 1971.
“As Tripura was one of the crucial areas from where the ‘mukti joddhas’ (freedom fighters) after getting training and shelter carried out guerilla warfare against the Pakistani army, that’s why we are organising the first such exhibition in this Indian state,” said Genocide and Torture Archive and Museum Trust president Muntasir
Mamun.
He added: “Pakistani forces during the nine months of hostilities massacred over 3mn Bangladeshi men, women and children, and gang raped over 600,000 women and tortured hundreds of thousands of
people.”
During the exhibition, many documentary films on Bangladesh liberation war would be screened and a workshop with the painters and artists of both Bangladesh and India would be
organised, Mamun said.
The Tripura government and Tripura Sanskriti Samanay Kendra, a renowned literary and cultural organisation, are the co-organisers of the exhibition which intends to depict heinous and inhuman mass killings, rape and torture, committed during the war, before the new
generation.
During the Bangladesh Liberation War, 10mn men, women and children from then East Pakistan took shelter in West Bengal, Tripura, Assam and Meghalaya.
Bangladesh affairs expert and writer Gautam Das said Tripura had six to seven camps in several sectors from where the ‘mukti joddhas’ fought in the 1971 war that led to the creation of Bangladesh.
“Over 1,600,000 Bangladeshis - a number larger than the state’s then total population of 1,500,000 - had taken shelter in Tripura alone,” he said.
The Tripura government is creating a “Mukti Juddha” Park at Chottakhola in Belonia, 115km south of Agartala, to commemorate the Bangladesh Liberation War and its heroes.