The Liberation War & national history
The 1971 Liberation War from the Six-Point Programme to victory: chronology, key actors, declarations, and the historiography the BCS rewards.
From Language to Liberation
Bangladesh's nationhood is the culmination of a 24-year struggle that began the moment Pakistan was created on 14 August 1947. The Language Movement (Bhasha Andolon) crystallised Bengali grievance: on 21 February 1952 (8 Falgun 1358 in the Bengali calendar), police fired on student demonstrators near Dhaka Medical College, killing Rafiq, Salam, Barkat, Jabbar and others who demanded Bengali as a state language. UNESCO declared 21 February International Mother Language Day in 1999, and the Shaheed Minar commemorates the martyrs. This episode established the political vocabulary of self-determination that the Liberation War later realised.
The Six Points and the 1970 Mandate
Sheikh Mujibur Rahman's Six-Point Programme, announced in Lahore in February 1966, demanded a federal structure, separate currency or fiscal autonomy, provincial control of taxation, trade and a militia for East Pakistan. It became the charter of autonomy and the basis of the Awami League's electoral platform. The regime responded with the Agartala Conspiracy Case (1968), accusing Mujib of sedition; mass protests during the 1969 mass uprising (Gono Obhyutthan) forced its withdrawal.
The general election of 7 December 1970 was decisive: the Awami League won 167 of 169 seats allotted to East Pakistan in the 313-seat National Assembly, an absolute majority. President Yahya Khan's refusal to convene the Assembly and the prime ministerial ambitions of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto produced the constitutional deadlock that precipitated war.
Operation Searchlight and the Declaration
On the night of 25-26 March 1971, the Pakistan Army launched Operation Searchlight, a planned crackdown on Dhaka targeting students, intellectuals, Hindus and Awami League cadres; Dhaka University's Jagannath Hall and Rajarbagh Police Lines were among the first targets. Sheikh Mujib was arrested and flown to West Pakistan. The Declaration of Independence was proclaimed in the early hours of 26 March 1971 — a date observed as Independence Day (Swadhinata Dibos). Major Ziaur Rahman's broadcast from the Kalurghat radio station in Chittagong on 27 March announced independence on Mujib's behalf, a point of enduring historiographical contest between Awami League and BNP narratives.
The Mujibnagar Government (Provisional Government of Bangladesh) was formed and took oath on 17 April 1971 at Baidyanathtala (renamed Mujibnagar) in Meherpur, with Mujib as President (in absentia), Syed Nazrul Islam as Acting President, and Tajuddin Ahmad as Prime Minister. It directed the war from exile, organising the Mukti Bahini into eleven sectors under M.A.G. Osmani as Commander-in-Chief. India recognised Bangladesh on 6 December 1971; the Pakistani garrison under Lt-Gen A.A.K. Niazi surrendered to Lt-Gen Jagjit Singh Aurora at the Ramna Race Course, Dhaka, on 16 December 1971 — Victory Day (Bijoy Dibos), with the Instrument of Surrender signed before some 93,000 prisoners of war.