Instead of repressing their past, nations learn from it. Throughout its evolutionary history, every nation has made mistakes, learned from them, and corrected its course. Alternatively, it has chosen to ignore its past mistakes and suffered the same fate.
No country on Earth can claim to be exempt from this never-ending cycle of compassion or brutality in history. The young and developing nations can learn a lot from the recent history of the world about how to chart a safe and secure path towards modernity and prosperity.
Europe endured two global wars that left great amounts of destruction, the Napoleonic Wars, and religious conflicts that lasted for more than thirty years and destroyed numerous kingdoms. The Holy See was created by the Europeans when they divided the pope from political matters. They teamed up with Russia to remove the malevolent genius, Napoleon. Following the two World Wars, the European countries united to form the European Union. Japan, the Federal Republic of Germany, and other countries that were devastated and humiliated during World War II reversed their course and rose to glory.
Between 1945 and 1990, humanity suffered greatly as a result of the Cold War between the two rival superpowers. There were two camps at war in the world. The development of WMDs was spurred by the Cold War, and global security was precariously precarious. The globe sighed with relief with the fall of the USSR. However, the Cold War has returned due to the USA and China’s developing divergent political, economic, commercial, and geopolitical objectives. China is attempting to keep the disparities within a reasonable bound after learning from its past.
Nations ought to never be reluctant to absorb lessons from their previous errors. We repeated the same error in Kargil because we failed to learn from the failure of “Operations Gibraltar.” We disregarded the fact that we failed to manage the Awami League, the largest party, following the 1971 election, which cost us the majority of Jinnah’s Pakistan and threw the nation into a serious crisis. When we overthrew the legal National Awami Party government in Balochistan in 1973 and dispatched security troops to pacify the Baloch, we committed the same error again. In 2002–2006, we again chose to settle disagreements with Sardar Akbar Bugti through force rather than negotiation. Regardless of the public mandate, elections have been carefully manipulated since 1985 to produce the desired outcomes and compliant regimes. In Balochistan in particular, this is the case.
Bengal was seen as a burden on our economy. This is mentioned by General Ayub Khan in his book “Friends -Not Masters.” In “A Stranger in his own country,” General Ghulam Hussain describes in graphic detail the way our commanders, Generals K. K. Niazi and Tikka Khan, felt about Bengalis and how they carried out “Operation Searchlight.” No matter how terrible the past is, there are a lot of lessons to be learned from it.
The report of the Hamoodur Rehman Commission is a part of our misguided past. Prime Minister Z.A. Bhutto constituted a one-member Commission at the beginning of the 1970s to ascertain who was accountable for the deplorable situation in East Pakistan. A shortened version of the Commission’s report was leaked in Pakistan ten years ago, despite the fact that the full report was never released to the public. Since then, it has been distributed and appropriately translated into Urdu. Also, it is openly offered online.
Following its breakup with Pakistan, Bangladesh had turbulent times marked by recurrent military coups and countercoups as well as a bitter political feud between Begum Khalida Zia and Begum Hasina Wajid.
As the political heir of her late father Sheikh Mujeeb, the latter won the elections and served as Bangladesh’s prime minister from 1996 to 2001. She is currently completing her third term as prime minister and is the longest-lasting female prime minister in history after winning the elections once more in 2009.
She does not rule in a democratic manner. With regard to her political rivals, such as Begum Khalida Zia and the leaders of the right-wing Jamaat Islami, she has been merciless. Begum Khalida Zia and several high-ranking Jamaat leaders were imprisoned by her, and some of them were even executed for their support of the Pakistan Army during the 1971 war. Nonetheless, the nation is now headed towards economic prosperity thanks to the continuation of the current government’s policies of economic reform, stringent public financial management, women’s emancipation, export incentives, and the development of an environment that is welcoming to foreign investment and the relocation of textile industries.
In comparison, Bangladesh’s social and economic metrics are remarkable. There are many fewer newborn deaths there than in Pakistan, vaccination rates are good, there are no gunshot deaths among polio drop administrators, and the life expectancy is 72.5 years as opposed to 66.5 years in Pakistan. Bangladeshi women are more likely than Pakistani women to be employed (33.2%), compared to 25.1%. Bangladesh’s debt per person was $883 in 2020, a substantial decrease from Pakistan’s $1190. Bangladesh’s foreign exchange reserves were estimated to be worth $32 billion that year, four times more than Pakistan’s $8 billion.
Bangladesh’s growth rate prior to the Covid issue in 2019 was 9.15%, which was significantly greater than both India’s (4.18%) and Pakistan’s (0.99%). In comparison to Bangladesh, which had growth rates of 7.29%, 7.84%, and 9.15% in the same years, Pakistan experienced growth rates of 5.5%, 5.84%, and 0.99% in 2017, 2018, and 2019 respectively. (World Bank GDP growth rates prior to Covid).
Bangladesh owed a lot to its exports, which surged to $39.34 billion in 2018, for such remarkable growth rates. Pakistan’s $23.33 billion was behind. With Pakistan’s GDP of $320 billion and Bangladesh’s GDP of $461 billion in 2022, the ordinary Bangladeshi is richer than the average Pakistani due to the Pakistani currency’s 30% devaluation in 2019 and subsequent sharp decline in 2022. In 1971, Bangladesh was 70% richer than Pakistan; in the present, Bangladesh is 45% richer than Pakistan. Isn’t this a time for us to reflect?
