Word: mujib
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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Relations between Dacca and New Delhi have been cool since the assassination last August of Bangladesh's founder-president, Sheik Mujibur Rahman, in a military coup. India had strongly backed Sheik Mujib in Bangladesh's war for independence and was distinctly unhappy about the pro-Pakistan sympathies of the so-called seven majors who overthrew him. Although the majors were ousted last month in a bewildering series of coups and countercoups (TIME, Nov. 17), Bangladesh's new military rulers, headed by Major General Zia-Ur Rahman, have apparently carried on their predecessors' policy of less dependence...
...like the Bangladesh radio station are sealed off with barbed-wire fences and guarded by small groups of rather bored soldiers armed with M-1s and machine guns. In the countryside, sporadic gunfire can be heard at night, and there are reports of continued fighting between pro-and anti-Mujib factions in the army. The political violence has unleashed a wave of bloodletting among rival satraps in rural areas, who see the confusion as an opportunity to settle old vendettas. For the rest of the people, there is an obvious dread of some calamity just around the corner, but nobody...
...fought for independence from Pakistan retained their arms after the fighting ended. The 35,000-man army simmered with discontent, and rivalries between volatile factions were held in check mainly by the prestige of Sheik Mujibur Rahman, whom Bengalis revered as Bangaban-dhu (friend of Bengal). But last August Mujib and his family were massacred by the "seven majors," a group of young officers who staged a brutal lightning coup against Mujib's increasingly corrupt and autocratic regime. Lacking broad popular support, the young officers ever since have faced twin dangers: revenge by Mujib's outraged supporters...
...week of coup and countercoup apparently began with murder. Late Sunday night a number of prominent political prisoners, including two former Prime Ministers and other followers of Sheik Mujib, were murdered in Dacca jail. As news of the massacre spread through the city, crowds blamed the crime on the ruling majors...
...deal was approved by Bangladesh's civilian President Khondakar Mushtaque Ahmed, who turned out to be the week's next political victim. As students and followers of Mujib rioted in Dacca to protest the escape of the majors, Khondakar resigned and was replaced by Sayem. Real power, however, seemed to lie with a ten-man military council. The council's heads included Major General Khalid Musharraf, who almost immediately arrested and displaced his boss, Lieut. General Zia-Ur Rahman, as army chief of staff...