Rape during the Bangladesh Liberation War During the 1971 Bangladesh war for independence , members of the Pakistani military and supporting militia s raped between two - and four hundred thousand Bangladeshi women in a systematic campaign of genocidal rape . Scholars have suggested that rape was used to terrorise both the Bengali - speaking Muslim majority and the Hindu minority of Bangladesh . The rapes caused thousands of pregnancies , births of war babies , abortions , incidents of infanticide and suicide , and , in addition , led to ostracisation of the victims . Recognised as one of the major occurrences of wartime rape anywhere , the atrocities ended after armed forces from neighboring India intervened . Although the reasons India officially offered for intervening did not include any humanitarian ones , these are today widely seen as paramount . Despite the Pakistani government ' s attempts to censor news during the conflict , reports of atrocities filtered out , attracting international media - and public attention , and drawing widespread outrage and criticism . After liberation , rape and other atrocities were also committed on a much smaller scale by the Bangladeshi resistance group , " Mukti Bahini " ( " Liberation Army " ) , which targeted the Urdu - speaking Bihari minority , rumored to have collaborated with the Pakistanis . Almost 40 years after the events of 1971 , a 2009 report published by the War Crimes Fact Finding Committee of Bangladesh accused 1 , 597 people of war crimes , including rape . Since 2010 the International Crimes Tribunal ( ICT ) has indicted , tried and sentenced several people to life imprisonment or death for their actions during the conflict . The stories of the rape victims have been told in movies and literature , and depicted in art . Background . Following the partition of India and the creation of Pakistan the East and West wings were not only separated geographically , but also culturally . The authorities of the West viewed the Bengali Muslims in the East as " too Bengali " and their application of Islam as " inferior and impure " , and this made them unreliable . To this extent the West began a strategy to forcibly assimilate the Bengalis culturally . The Bengali - speaking people of East Pakistan were chiefly Muslim , but their numbers were interspersed with a significant Hindu minority . Very few spoke Urdu , which in 1948 had been declared the national language of the Pakistan . To express their opposition , activists in East Pakistan founded the Bengali language movement in February 1952 . Earlier , in 1949 , other activists had founded the Awami League as an alternative to the ruling West Pakistan - based Muslim League . In next decade and half , Bengalis became gradually disenchanted with the balance of power in Pakistan , which was under military rule during much of this time ; eventually some began to call for secession . By the late 1960s , a perception had emerged that the people of East Pakistan were second - class citizens . It did not help that General A . A . K . Niazi , head of Pakistani Forces in East Pakistan , called East Pakistan a " low - lying land of low , lying people " . There had been opposition to military rule in West Pakistan as well . Eventually the military relented , and in December 1970 the first ever elections were held . To the surprise of many , East Pakistan ' s Awami League , headed by Sheikh Mujibur Rahman , won a clear majority . The West Pakistani establishment was displeased with the results . In Dacca following the election a general said " Don ' t worry , we will not allow these black bastards to rule over us " . Soon President Yahya Khan banned the Awami League and declared martial law in East Pakistan . With the goal of putting down Bengali nationalism , the Pakistan Army launched Operation Searchlight on 25 March 1971 . According to Eric Heinze the Pakistani forces targeted both Hindus and Bengali - speaking Muslims . In the ensuing 1971 Bangladesh genocide , the army caused the deaths of up to 3 million people , created up to 10 million refuges who fled to India , and displaced a further 30 million within East Pakistan . Historian Ian Talbot has compared the methodical planning behind the genocide to that of the Nazi Holocaust . Rounaq Jahan alleges elements of racism in the Pakistan army , who he says considered the Bengalis " racially inferior — a non - martial and physically weak race " , and has accused the army of using organised rape as a weapon of war . According to political scientist R J Rummel , the Pakistani army looked upon the Bengalis as " subhuman " and that the Hindus were " as Jews to the Nazis , scum and vermin that best be exterminated " . This racism was then expressed in that the Bengalis , being inferior , must have their gene pool " fixed " through forcible impregnation . Belén Martín Lucas has described the rapes as " ethnically motivated " . Pakistani Army actions . The attacks were led by General Tikka Khan , who was the architect of Operation Searchlight and was given the name the " butcher of Bengal " by the Bengalis for his actions . Khan said — when reminded on 27 March 1971 that he was in charge of a majority province — " I will reduce this majority to a minority " . Bina D ' Costa believes an anecdote used by Khan is significant , in that it provides proof of the mass rapes being a deliberate strategy . In Jessore , while speaking with a group of journalists Khan was reported to have said , " Pehle inko Mussalman karo " ( First , make them Muslim ) . D ' Costa argues that this shows that in the highest echelons of the armed forces the Bengalis were perceived as being disloyal Muslims , nor patriotic Pakistanis . The perpetrators conducted nighttime raids , assaulting women in their villages , often in front of their families , as part of the terror campaign . Victims aged 8 to 75 were also kidnapped and held in special camps where they were repeatedly assaulted . Many of those held in the camps were murdered or committed suicide , with some taking their own lives by using their hair to hang themselves , the soldiers responded to these suicides by cutting the women ' s hair off . " Time " magazine reported on 563 girls who had been kidnapped and held by the military ; all of them were between three and five months pregnant when the military began to release them . Some women were forcibly used as prostitutes . While the Pakistani government estimated the number of rapes in the hundreds , other estimates range between 200 , 000 and 400 , 000 . The Pakistani government had tried to censor reports coming out of the region , but media reports on the atrocities did reach the public worldwide , and gave rise to widespread international public support for the liberation movement . In what has been described by Jenneke Arens as a deliberate attempt to destroy an ethnic group , many of those assaulted were raped , murdered and then bayoneted in the genitalia . Political scientist Adam Jones has said that one of the reasons for the mass rapes was to undermine Bengali society through the " dishonoring " of Bengali women and that some women were raped until they died or were killed following repeated attacks . The Pakistani army also raped Bengali males . The men , when passing through a checkpoint , would be ordered to prove they were circumcised , and this is where the rapes usually happened . The International Commission of Jurists concluded that the atrocities carried out by the Pakistan armed forces " were part of a deliberate policy by a disciplined force " . Author Mulk Raj Anand said of the Pakistani army actions " The rapes were so systematic and pervasive that they had to be conscious Army policy , " planned by the West Pakistanis in a deliberate effort to create a new race " or to dilute Bengali nationalism " . Amita Malik reporting from Bangladesh following the Pakistan armed forces surrender , wrote that one West Pakistani soldier said : " We are going . But we are leaving our Seed behind " . Not all Pakistani military personnel supported the violence , general Sahabzada Yaqub Khan , who advised the president against military action , and major Ikram Sehgal both resigned in protest as did air marshal Asghar Khan , Baloch leader Ghaus Bakhsh Bizenjo , National Awami Party leader Khan Abdul Wali Khan all protested over the army actions . Journalists Sabihuddin Ghausi and I A Rahman , Sindhi leader G . M . Syed , poet Ahmad Salim and air force member Anwar Pirzado as well as Ghousi and I A Rahman , professor M R Hassan , Tahera Mazhar and Imtiaz Ahmed were imprisoned for their dissenting views on the violence . Malik Ghulam Jilani , also arrested had openly opposed the armed action in the East , a letter he had written to Yahya Khan , was publicized widely . Altaf Hussain Gauhar , the editor of the newspaper Dawn was also imprisoned . In 2013 poet Faiz Ahmad Faiz and Jilani were honoured by the Bangladeshi government for their actions . Militias . According to political scientist Peter Tomsen , Pakistan ' s secret service , in conjunction with the political party Jamaat - e - Islami , formed militias such as Al - Badr ( " the moon " ) and the Al - Shams ( " the sun " ) to conduct operations against the nationalist movement . These militias targeted noncombatants and committed rapes as well as other crimes . Local collaborators known as Razakars also took part in the atrocities . The term has since become a pejorative akin to the western term " Judas " . Members of the Muslim league such as Nizam - e - Islam , Jamaat - e - Islami and Jamiat Ulema Pakistan , who had lost the election , collaborated with the military and acted as an intelligence organisation for them . Jamaat - e - Islami members and some of its leaders collaborated with the Pakistani forces in rapes and targeted killings . The atrocities by Al - Badr and the Al - Shams garnered worldwide attention from news agencies ; accounts of massacres and rapes were widely reported . Mukti Bahini actions . The Mukti Bahini rebels targeted the minority Biharis ( also called stranded Pakistanis ) who had given support to the West Pakistan regime . Bihari women were raped and tortured during the war and in its aftermath by Bengali males . The killing of 300 Biharis in Chittagong was used by the Pakistani government as a justification to launch their crackdown on the Bengali nationalist movement . Pakistani General Amir Abdullah Khan Niazi wrote in his memoirs that thousands of men and women had been killed or raped in Chittagong . International reaction . There is an academic consensus that the events of the nine - month conflict were a genocide . The atrocities in East Pakistan were the first instances of war rape to attract international media attention , and Sally J . Scholz has written that this was the first genocide to capture the interest of the mass media . The women ' s human rights organisation Bangladesh Mahila Parishat took part in the war by publicising the atrocities being carried out by the Pakistani army . The Nixon administration of US aligned with ( West ) Pakistan as part of its military strategy against communist expansion into the region , but American public support for the people of Bangladesh ( East Pakistan ) was increased by televised reports from the region . Owing to the scale of the atrocities , US embassy staff had sent telegrams indicating that a genocide was occurring . One , which became known as the Blood telegram , was sent by Archer Blood , the US Consul General in Dhaka , and was signed by him as well as US officials from USAID and USIS who at the time were serving in Dhaka . In it , the signatories denounced American " complicity in Genocide " . In an interview in 1972 Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi justified the use of military intervention , saying , " Shall we sit and watch their women get raped ? " The events were discussed extensively in the British House of Commons . John Stonehouse proposed a motion supported by a further 200 members of parliament condemning the atrocities being carried out by the Pakistani armed forces . Although this motion was presented twice before parliament , the government did not find time to debate it . Before the end of the war the international community had begun to provide aid in large quantities to the refugees living in India . Although humanitarian aid was given , there was little support for the war crimes trials which Bangladesh proposed at the end of the war . Critics of the United Nations have used the 1971 atrocities to argue that military intervention was the only thing to stop the mass murder . On 1 August 1971 George Harrison and Ravi Shankar organised The Concert for Bangladesh in New York , which raised almost $ 240 , 000 for the refugees . Writing to " The New York Times " , a group of women said in response to women being shunned by family and husbands " It is unthinkable that innocent wives whose lives were virtually destroyed by war are now being totally destroyed by their own husbands " . International aid was also forthcoming owing to the issue of war rape . According to Susan Brownmiller , mass rape during wartime is not a new phenomenon . She argues that what is unique to the Bangladesh Liberation War was that the international community , for the first time , recognised that systematic rape could be used as a weapon to terrorise the people . Aftermath . In the year following the war , there was a Bangladeshi government - mandated victim relief programme , supported by the World Health Organization and International Planned Parenthood Federation . Dr . Geoffrey Davis , a physician who participated in the programme , estimated that the commonly cited figure of 200 , 000 were probably " very conservative " compared with the real numbers . Davis has also said he heard of numerous suicides by victims , and of infanticide s during the course of his work and estimated that around 5 , 000 rape victims had performed self - induced abortion s . Estimates of forced pregnancies vary . A doctor at the rehabilitation center in Dhaka reported 170 , 000 abortions of pregnancies caused by the rapes , and the births of 30 , 000 war babies . Davis estimated that between 150 , 000 and 170 , 000 women had abortions before the state - mandated programme had even started . Other estimates of the number of pregnancies resulting in births range from 25 , 000 to the Bangladeshi government ' s figure of 70 , 000 , while one publication by the Centre for Reproductive Law and Policy gave a total of 250 , 000 . Many of the victims suffered from sexual infections and feelings of intense shame and humiliation , and a number were ostracised by their families and communities or committed suicide . According to one Australian doctor who had spoken to the New York Times , the majority of the women who were raped had venereal disease . Feminist writer Cynthia Enloe has written that some of the pregnancies were intended by the soldiers and perhaps their officers as well . in 1972 journalist Liz Trotta interviewed rape victims and , was one of a minority of American reporters to cover the mass rapes following the conflict . A report from the International Commission of Jurists said , " Whatever the precise numbers , the teams of American and British surgeons carrying out abortions and the widespread government efforts to persuade people to accept these girls into the community , testify to the scale on which raping occurred " . The commission also said that Pakistani officers not only allowed their men to rape , but enslaved women themselves . Unlike the Mukti Bahini who on their return home received a hero ' s welcome , the survivors of rape , who were held in rehabilitation centers , were seen as a symbol of " social pollution " and shame , with very few welcomed back by their families or returned to their old communities . Sheikh Mujibur Rahman called the victims " birangona " ( " heroine " ) , but this served as a reminder that these women were now deemed socially unacceptable as they were " dishonored " , and the term became associated with " barangona " ( " prostitute " ) . The official " marry them off " and " war - heroines " strategy failed as few men came forward , and those that did expected the state to provide a large dowry . Those women who did marry were usually mistreated , and the majority of men , once having received a dowry abandoned their wives . On 18 February 1972 the state formed the Bangladesh Women ' s Rehabilitation Board , who were tasked with helping the victims of rape and to help with the adoption programme . Several international agencies took part in the adoption programme such as Mother Teresa ' s Sisters of Charity . The majority of the war babies were adopted in the Netherlands and Canada as the state wished to remove the reminders of Pakistan from the newly formed nation . However not all women wanted their child taken , and some were forcibly removed and sent for adoption , a practice which was encouraged by Rahman , who said , " I do not want those polluted blood in this country " . While many women were glad for the abortion programme , as they did not have to bear a child conceived of rape , others had to go full term , filled with hatred towards the child they carried . Others , who had their children adopted out so as to return to " mainstream life " would not look at their newborn as it was taken from them , others cried . In the 1990s many of these children returned to Bangladesh to search for their birth mothers . Forty years after the war two sisters who had been raped were interviewed by Deutsche Welle . Aleya stated she had been taken by the Pakistani army when she was thirteen , and was gang raped repeatedly for seven months . She states she was tortured and was five months pregnant when she returned to her home . Her sister , Laily , says she was pregnant when she was taken by the armed forces , and lost the child . Later she fought alongside the Mukti Bahini . Both say that the state has failed the " birangona " , and that all they received was " humiliation , insults , hatred , and ostracism . " War Crimes prosecutions . In 2008 , after a 17 - year investigation , the War Crimes Fact Finding Committee released documentation identifying 1 , 597 people who had taken part in the atrocities . The list included members of the Jamaat - e - Islami and the Bangladesh Nationalist Party , a political group founded in 1978 . In 2010 the government of Bangladesh set up the ICT to investigate the atrocities of that era . While Human Rights Watch has been supportive of the tribunal , it has also been critical of reported harassment of lawyers representing the accused . Brad Adams , director of the Asia branch of Human Rights Watch , has said that those accused must be given the full protection of the law to avoid the risk of the trials not being taken seriously , and human rights activist Irene Khan has expressed doubt about whether the mass rapes and killings of women will be addressed . Khan has said of her government ' s reaction : Jamaat - e - Islami Deputy Leader Delwar Hossain Sayeedi , the first person to face charges related to the conflict , was indicted by the ICT on twenty counts of war crimes , which included murder , rape and arson . He denied all charges . On 28 February 2013 , Sayeedi was found guilty of genocide , rape and religious persecution , and was sentenced to death by hanging . Four other members of Jamaat - e - Islami Bangladesh , including Motiur Rahman Nizami , have also been indicted for war crimes . Abul Kalam Azad , a member of the Razakars , was the first person to be sentenced for crimes during the war . He was found guilty of murder and rape in absentia , and was sentenced to death . Muhammad Kamaruzzaman , senior assistant secretary general of Bangladesh Jamaat - e - Islami faced 7 charges of war crimes including planning and advising on the rape of women in the village of Shohaghpur on 25 July 1971 . The ICT sentenced him to death by hanging on 9 May 2013 . In July 2013 Ghulam Azam was given a ninety - year sentence for rape and mass murder during the conflict . Pakistani government reaction . After the conflict the Pakistani government decided on a policy of silence regarding the rapes . They set up the Hamoodur Rahman Commission , a judicial commission to prepare an account of the circumstances surrounding the atrocities of the 1971 war and Pakistan ' s surrender . The commission was highly critical of the army . The chiefs of staff of the army and the Pakistan Air Force were removed from their positions for attempting to interfere with the commission . The Commission based its reports on interviews with politicians , officers and senior commanders . The final reports were submitted in July 1972 , but all were subsequently destroyed except for one held by the Pakistani premier Zulfikar Ali Bhutto ; the findings were never made public . In 1974 the commission was reopened and issued a supplementary report , which remained classified for 25 years until published by the magazine " India Today " . The report said that 26 , 000 people were killed , rapes numbered in the hundreds , and that the Mukti Bahini rebels engaged in widespread rape and other human rights abuses . Political scientist Sumit Ganguly believes that the Pakistani establishment has yet to come to terms with the atrocities carried out , saying that , in a visit to Bangladesh in 2002 , Pervez Musharraf expressed regret for the atrocities rather than accepting responsibility . In literature and media . A photograph taken during the conflict of a woman who had been assaulted featured in a photography exhibition in London . Titled " Shamed Woman " , but also called " Brave Woman " , the image was taken by Bangladeshi photographer , Naib Uddin Ahmed . The image is considered by John Tulloch to be as " classical a pose as any Madonna and Child " . One of the more emotive photographs at the exhibition , the woman has her hands clenched , her face completely covered by her hair . Tulloch describes the image as having the " Capability to reveal or suggest what is unsayable " " Orunodoyer Ognishakhi " ( " Pledge to a New Dawn " ) , the first film about the war , was screened in 1972 on the first Bangladeshi Independence Day celebration . It draws on the experiences of an actor called Altaf . While trying to reach safe haven in Calcutta he encounters women who have been raped . The images of these " birangona " , stripped and vacant - eyed from the trauma , are used as testimony to the assault . Other victims Altaf meets are shown committing suicide or having lost their minds . In 1995 Gita Sahgal produced the documentary " War Crimes File " , which was screened on Channel 4 . In 2011 the film " Meherjaan " was shown at the Guwahati International Film Festival . It explores the war from two perspectives : that of a woman who loved a Pakistani soldier and that of a person born from rape . In 1996 the book " Ami Birangana Bolchi " ( " The Voices of War Heroines " ) written by Nilima Ibrahim was released . It is a collection of eyewitness testimony from seven rape victims , which she documented while working in rehabilitation centers . " Rising from the Ashes women ' s narratives of 1971 " , was published in English in 2012 , it includes oral testimonies of women affected by the Liberation War . As well as an account from Taramon Bibi , who fought and was awarded the Bir Protik ( Symbol of Valour ) for her actions , there are nine interviews with women who were raped . The book ' s publication in English at the time of the fortieth anniversary of the war was noted in the " New York Times " as an " important oral history " .