Perpetrations of 1971 – An Analysis in Light of Hamoodur Rahman Commission Report

Abstract

Hamoodur Rahman Commission is probably the only postwar inquiry commission authorized by the Pakistani government that inquired and submitted report on events that took place in 1971 (Helal, 54). It submitted two reports to the Pakistan government, one original in 1972 and one supplementary in 1974. For many years these reports were not published or disclosed by the authority and were subject to heavy speculations and assumptions both in Pakistan and Bangladesh. Finally they saw some light after about 25 odd years from the submission. The full disclosure and originality of the original and main report still bears a question mark (“we should never trust India’’). This has not been officially disclosed even after the announcement from Pakistani Government to declassify it partially. There have been efforts by different researchers to amalgamate various pieces of the repot into a concrete version. Then again there have been claims that the original report was either destroyed or manipulated by the authority at that time to hide their own misdeeds (“Hamoodur Rahman Commission”). The original report was also called ‘tentative’ by the Commission itself as it was subject to revision after accounting major stakeholders of the event who were in India as Prisoners of War (POW) at that time. For the purpose of this write-up we would therefore consult the supplementary report which has been formally declassified by the Pakistan government to its full extent in line with the original report’s outcome, Hamoodur Rahman Commission Supplementary Report- “HRCSR” introduction. The supplementary report that was submitted in October 1974 has been kept as a classified document by Pakistan government until December 2000 only to make it public as result of the Indian media’s leaking of the same.