KARACHI, April 3: Speakers at a seminar here on Thursday held the military and political leadership of the country equally responsible for the dismemberment of Pakistan in 1971 and called for closer relations between the peoples of Pakistan and Bangladesh.

They were of the view that it was the bureaucracy of the two countries which had so far failed to help their governments devise a process or developing a new relationship between the two countries. Had the two governments removed visa and trade tariff restrictions, the people could have come much closer, noted many of the speakers.

The seminar on “Pakistan-Bangladesh relations: Historical perspective and future prospects” was organized by the Department of General History, University of Karachi. The seminar provided students of the department, who are the new generation, with an opportunity to listen to speakers shedding light on a tragic event in the history of Pakistan.

Summing up the proceedings, the Dean of the Faculty of Arts, Dr Abu Zar Wajidi, who presided over the seminar, emphasized that the present generation should also know the historical background of the conflict between the two wings of Pakistan, which began taking shape in 1948 when urdu was declared the national language of Pakistan.

He said the ideology of Pakistan was not introduced in educational institutions soon after a separate homeland for the Muslims of South Asia came into being and it was only in 1969 that the ideology was included in the curricula.

He feared that if issues such as socio-economic development and political injustice were not addressed, again Pakistan could see a threat to its territorial integrity. “The denial of proper representation to the people of East Pakistan in the armed forces and civil services could be considered one of the causes of the conflict,” he said.

A Bangladeshi researcher, Prof Shamsul Muktadir, said there was a kind of information blackout about what was happening in Bangladesh today or what had happened in 1971. “The two countries should increase their cooperation in the fields of education, trade and culture, as they have many a thing common between them,” he emphasized.

He noted that in the past many years Bangladeshi military officials had been trained in Pakistan, but there was a near-complete absence of people-to-people contact which was necessary for progress in relations between the two countries.

He pointed out that unlike politicians and others in the power corridors, academics worked with the sword of reason and it was their duty to examine the issues of conflicts independently, free of national bias, distortion and subjectivity.

Later replying to question from students, Mr Shams said he did not buy to the idea that a formal apology from Pakistan was the only way to stimulate Pakistan-Bangladesh ties. “Officially, none of the Bangladesh governments has sought an apology from Pakistan with regard to military atrocities on Bengalis of East Pakistan in 1971, but it is the intelligentsia of the country which has demanded such things,” he said.

Dr Moonis Ahmar of the Department of International Relations said relations between Bangladesh and Pakistan were influenced by the emotions of the people of the two countries. It was now more than 30 years that East Pakistan separated from Pakistan, but nothing concrete had so far been done for reconciliation between the peoples of the two countries, he remarked.

He said the two countries had diplomatic missions, leaders of government had also been visiting each other’s countries and agreements on trade, commerce and cultural cooperation had been signed, but still there was a need to formulate and adopt strategies to give a positive direction to Pakistan- Bangladesh relations.

He called for closer relations between the two countries, increasing the volume of trade, exchange programmes in education, culture, media, business, science and technology and other areas of development and the resolution of the issue of stranded Pakistanis.

Mr Ahmar, who had been at Dhaka for several months last year under a research programme, observed that there was no short cut to closer relations between the two countries. He suggested that to create goodwill among the people of Bangladesh, the government of Pakistan should express regret for the atrocities committed by Pakistan’s armed forces in the then East Pakistan in 1971.

He said Dhaka and Islamabad should also condemn the killing of both Bengalis and Urdu-speaking people in 1971.

Defence analyst Ikram Sehgal, who is an eyewitness to the dismemberment of East Pakistan and who claims to have emotional relations with Bangladesh, said Pakistan and Bangladesh had much to offer each other.

“We have a lot of resources to meet the needs of the region, we could have complementary economy, and we are capable of taking the mutual trade up to 40 per cent from the present level,” he maintained.

Like other speakers, he too stressed the need for abolishing the visa system and removal of tariff barriers between the two countries because such measures, according to him, would lead to an unofficial confederation of the two countries.

Teachers of the general history department, Asrar A. Siddiqui and Hina Khan, also made presentations at the seminar.