World: East Pakistan: The Politics of Catastrophe

(2 of 3)

Yet, in the face of this, Pakistan's government proved shockingly inept and many of its people cruelly callous. Four days after the cyclone hit, East Pakistan's governor, Vice Admiral Syed Mohammad Ahsan, was still downplaying the catastrophe, saying that "only" 16,000 had been killed. Though people were still reported floating alive offshore three days after the cyclone, the Pakistani navy was never ordered to search for survivors. Some 500,000 tons of grain were stockpiled in East Pakistan warehouses, but the 40-odd Pakistani army helicopters that could have airlifted them to the delta sat on their pads in West Pakistan. India, the government explained—falsely—would not allow the craft to be ferried over 1,000 miles of its territory. President Agha Mohammad Yahya Khan waited a total of 13 days before making a formal visit to the Ganges area to see the toll for himself.

Privileged Families. Leaders of East Pakistan's Peking-and Moscow-oriented parties seized on the relief debacle to reinforce their demands for more autonomy for their region. The cyclone aftermath deepened the hate and envy felt by East Pakistan's dark, rice-eating Bengalis for the taller, fairer—and wealthier—wheat-eating Sindhis, Punjabis and Pathans of West Pakistan, the dominant half of the divided Moslem country. Anti-West Pakistan riots among the Bengalis forced ex-President Mohammad Ayub Khan into retirement last year. Successor Yahya, who has scheduled for next week the first general elections since Pakistan won independence 22 years ago, has taken some steps to correct the economic and political imbalance between East and West. But he has a long way to go. In the world's fifth most populous nation (pop. 130 million), a group of "20 families"—nearly all in West Pakistan—control 66% of Pakistan's industry and 80% of its banking and insurance assets. Only two of the enormously privileged 20 bothered to contribute to the disaster relief effort. Their ante: $100,000 each. Yahya has contributed $9,000 from his own pocket and $116 million from the treasury.

No Visas. Even as Yahya was stepping up his relief budget, Islamabad, the national capital, was balking at accepting aid from neighbors. When Indira Gandhi offered help, a Pakistani official told the Indian High Commissioner: "We don't know if it will be needed." The Pakistanis refused Indian helicopters, mobile hospitals and river craft, doubtless because they were worried that New Delhi might look better than Islamabad. Indian Airlines transports loaded with relief supplies were refused permission to land at Chittagong because the crews did not have visas. New Delhi was told to send the stuff by truck instead; less conspicuous.

Officials, however, had no monopoly on insensibility. In Bhola, young Pakistanis in freshly laundered clothes played badminton only 30 minutes away by pedicab from areas where decomposing bodies lay rotting. Few Bengalis bothered to bury the "strangers" from other towns washed up on their beaches. In Patuakhali, British troops dug graves for the dead, while Pakistani soldiers lounged in their barracks.