Mohammad Ahsan
The Pakistan Eastern Command headquarters was inaugurated in Dacca Cantonment, Dacca on 23 August 1969 and Lt. Gen. Sahabzada Yaqub Khan was appointed as the commander; on 1 September 1969, the Chief Martial Law Administrator of the country, General Yahya Khan, sent Vice-Admiral Syed Mohammad Ahsan as Martial Law Administrator of East Pakistan. Syed Mohammad Ahsan, when Commander-in-Chief of the Pakistan Navy, had established the naval forces in East Pakistan; the naval presence was tripled in East Pakistan with more officers from West Pakistan deployed in the region. Earlier, The Chief of the General Staff at GHQ, Rawalpindi, Major General Sahabzada Yaqub Khan, decided to run a series of exercises in East Pakistan to formulate an integrated battle plan for the province in 1967. Dubbed "Operation X-Sunderbans-1", it was run by (then) Colonel Rao Farman Ali under the command of Major General Muzaffaruddin (GOC 14th Division); the conclusions of this exercise formed the basis for the Pakistani operational plan in 1971.