When Pakistani Army ordered ‘mass rape of 400,000 women’: Recalling the horrors of Operation Searchlight

Permanent Representative of India to the United Nations, Harish Parvathaneni, during a debate on women, peace and security.

As Islamabad attempted to highlight the "plight" of Kashmiri women during a debate at the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), India tore into Pakistan over its “genocidal mass rape of 400,000 women” during Operation Searchlight in 1971.

India's permanent representative Parvathaneni Harish slammed Pakistan for continuing its "delusional tirades", particularly regarding Jammu and Kashmir.

His remarks came after Counsellor Saima Saleem, who is part of Permanent Mission of Pakistan to the United Nations, alleged that the Kashmiri women have "endured sexual violence for decades".

"Every year, we are unfortunately fated to listen to the delusional tirade of Pakistan against my country, especially on Jammu and Kashmir, the Indian territory they covet. Our pioneering record on the Women, Peace and Security agenda is unblemished and unscathed," Harish said.

He said Pakistan conducted Operation Searchlight in 1971 and sanctioned a systematic campaign of genocidal mass rape of 400,000 women citizens by its own army. “The world sees through Pakistan’s propaganda," he said.

The UNSC debate on Women Peace and Security was held to mark 25 years of Resolution 1325.

What is Operation Searchlight?

Operation Searchlight, which was launched on the night of March 25, 1971, was carried out by the Pakistan Army in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) to suppress growing calls for independence. At 11:30 pm on March 25, 1971, the Pakistan Army launched the operation. Heavily armed troops moved out of Dhaka Cantonment, targeting multiple key locations simultaneously.

The operation was overseen by Pakistan's military commander, General Tikka Khan, who was nicknamed the "Butcher of Bengal".

Various reports suggested that the Pakistani army during Operation Searchlight killed an estimated three million people, raped roughly 4,00,000 women, besides setting houses on fire and causing enormous destruction to infrastructure. This was one of the largest refugee crises in the 20th century. The crackdown also. forced millions of Bengalis to flee to India.

The United Nations recognised the mass killings in East Pakistan as acts of genocide under Resolution 1430 (1971).

The first detailed report on the atrocities was published by Pakistani journalist, Anthony Mascarenhas, in London’s Sunday Times, on June 13, 1971. Mascarenhas was among a group of Pakistani journalists invited by the government to write in favour of the military actions. He fled to London to report what he had witnessed. In his famous report titled “Genocide”, he wrote as quoted by Frontline: “I saw Hindus hunted from village to village and door to door, shot off-hand after a cursory ‘short arm inspection’ showed they were un-circumcised. I have heard the screams of men bludgeoned to death in the compound of the Circuit House in Comilla. I have seen truckloads of other human targets and those who had the humanity to try to help them hauled off for disposal under the cover of darkness and curfew.”

What did Saima Saleem say?

Saleem spoke about the “plight” of Kashmiri women who have been "for decades of occupation have endured sexual violence deployed as a weapon of war”.

"To exclude Kashmiri women from the Women, Peace and Security agenda erases its legitimacy and undermines its universality. The Jammu and Kashmir dispute is on this Council's agenda and therefore, future reports must reflect their plight accordingly," she said.