An appallingly warped document
The Ministry of Liberation War Affairs couldn't have presented the nation with anything worse than a Razakars' list replete with mistakes on the eve of our 49th Victory Day. To say that the list is a sloppy work will be an understatement. It betrays a total lack of seriousness, sincerity and interest in presenting to the nation something that happens to be an important and historical document. Any error therein has unmitigated ramifications. It is shocking that the Razakars' list should contain names of well-known freedom fighters and even martyrs. It is a faux pas of the greatest magnitude that brooks no justification and deserves the severest stricture.
The Liberation War Ministry's excuse that it had not made the list is a fig leaf for the grievous hurt and humiliation that it has caused to not only those freedom fighters and martyrs whose names have been wrongfully included in the list of Razakars; it has also demeaned all the freedom fighters and the Liberation War as a whole. Saying that the ministry has only reprinted the list published by the home ministry, 48 years after it was first published, cannot help shirk the responsibility for the disgraceful, shocking and scandalous document. We feel it was the responsibility of the Liberation War Ministry to go through a document published nearly half a century ago and remove any error that might have been there before publishing it. Apparently, there were quite a few.
The Liberation War Minister's comment that his ministry would withdraw the list if there were more mistakes and then correct it after investigation will do little to assuage the wounds inflicted by this disgraceful list. Why was such a list, which was not properly verified, published at all? Why such utter apathy regarding something so vital?
The Liberation War holds the most respected pride of place in a nation's life and, equally so, in the hearts of those who risked death to confront and fight the Pakistan army. One can understand the feelings of those freedom fighters and their families and also those of the martyrs whose names appear in the list wrongfully. And the least the ministry can do to assuage the frayed sentiments is to first withdraw and verify and then republish the list free of all errors.
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