43 Years Ago, Pakistani Politicians Defended Treason, They Do It Again

We ignored Agartala conspiracy, released the traitors who broke up the country two years later. We are doing it again in The Memo case. The coincidence is unnerving. Forty-three years ago, Pakistan’s politicians and courts acquitted a traitor accused of helping a foreign country invade Pakistan. The evidence of treason was strong. But the politicians ganged up and generated enough disinformation against the military and ISI and to cover up for the traitor.

The traitor was released.

The case was dropped.

Two years later, the traitor led a revolt in support of the invading army of India.

Today, Pakistani politicians and courts repeat history: they have almost buried a case of treason, The Memo case.

This is a case where a group of Pakistanis attempted to conspire with another foreign power, the United States, to neutralize Pakistan’s military and nuclear weapons. Had this Memo happened when George W. Bush was president, there would have been many takers in Washington. Unluckily for President Zardari, Husain Haqqani and their other unnamed accomplices, there were no takers this time although many people in Washington continue to spew venom against Pakistan and its military every chance they get.

The Memo case is a breathtaking incident of treason in Pakistan. [For full details of the treachery, see a brief report at this link: http://bit.ly/wpCNso ]

The Agartala conspiracy case of 1969 bears many similarities to The Memo case of 2011, where the main accused, former envoy to Washington Husain Haqqani, was ordered released by the Supreme Court today.

Even during the trial, he and his spouse Farahanaz Isphahani, a Member of Parliament and a presidential aide, were allowed to manage a media campaign against the country’s military in foreign press, spreading disinformation about possible assassination if the trial went ahead. Haqqani’s counsel issued statements accusing the military of a range of crimes, and the government’s media machine bluntly threatened a key witness and planted stories to paint the case as a ploy by the military against failed politicians.

WHAT HAPPENED AT AGARTALA?

A brave Pakistani intelligence officer, Lt. Col. Shamsul Alam, the commander of the East Pakistan Detachment of Inter-Services Intelligence, or ISI, uncovered the conspiracy through first-class intelligence work.

The facts were straightforward. A politician, Sheikh Mujeeb, and an accomplice, Mohammad Ali Reza, traveled to eastern Indian city of Agartala and held meetings with Indian intelligence officers to convince them to back his plan to break away East Pakistan from the federation and establish an independent pro-India state.

Pakistani spies, including very able native Bengali officers, pursued the secret meetings and contacts throughout 1967. Mujeeb and his gang was nailed by the end of the year.

In January 1968, a sedition case, State vs. Mujeebur Rehman and others was launched. A total of 35 key conspirators were arrested, both civilian Pakistanis and military officers.

The Indian agents were so rattled they planned to assassinate the ISI officer who collected the evidence against them. This would have eliminated an adversary and intimidated junior intelligence officers into abandoning the case.

A Pakistani officer from East Bengal Regiment was recruited to kill Lt. Col. Alam. But Alam was a brave officer. He not only resisted the attackers but chased them and exposed them. For this he was awarded Pakistan’s highest medal of bravery in peace times, the Sitara-e-Basalat, or the Citation of Bravery.

The process of compromises and cover-ups began soon afterward.

Some 1,500 Pakistanis were arrested. There were 227 witnesses and 7 approvers. The trial dragged throughout 1968 and until January 1969. The number of accused facing trial fell dramatically for political expediency.

The traitors gained public sympathy because of disinformation by politicians and media and delay of justice by judiciary. This helped politicians portray the traitors as victims of military highhandedness. They were released early 1969 and the case was dropped.

WERE THERE TRAITORS IN AGARTALA CASE?

Forty years later, some of the accused admitted that the charges against them were true. Deputy Speaker of Parliament in Bangladesh, Shawkat Ali, who was a conspirator on trial in 1968, admitted during open house proceedings that all treason charges against them were true and that they conspired with India to break up of Pakistan.

Another Bangladeshi legislator, Tofael Ahmed, said had ISI not uncovered the conspiracy, the secession of East Pakistan would have happened ‘peacefully’, with help from Pakistanis recruited by India.

These admissions were made in public in Bangladesh in 2010 and 2011. But they came forty years late. Thanks to the conspiracy of silence by Pakistan’s political parties, government, judiciary and the courts, the traitors succeeded in helping India launch an unprovoked invasion of Pakistan in 1971.

In The Memo case, former civilian officials, some retired military officers, and senior officials in the Zardari government planned to decapitate Pakistani military. The case is being buried now for political expediency.

Let’s hope Pakistan and Pakistanis do not pay a bigger price for this a few years down the road.