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<b>Indira Gandhi, not US, credited with ending 1971 war</b>
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Tuesday, April 11, 2006  
By Khalid Hasan

WASHINGTON: Henry Kissinger’s claim that it was the Nixon administration that leaned on India after the fall of Dhaka not to carry the war to West Pakistan has been challenged by a new book, which asserts that the decision was entirely that of Indira Gandhi, the Indian prime minister.

In his new biography of the late Indian leader, author and journalist Inder Malhotra writes,<b> “It was eight in the evening (of 16 December 1971) when she (Mrs Gandhi) declared ceasefire in the West. She needed the time to discuss the matter with the cabinet colleagues and with opposition leaders. To those who predictably urged that the ‘unfinished job’ in West Pakistan, too, should be completed, she replied, ‘In Bangladesh the people and the army would be battling to defend their homes. We should not subject our forces to undue ordeals’ … the military leadership endorsed this policy wholeheartedly.”</b>

He adds, <b>“In view of this, how ridiculous it is that almost to this day Kissinger has gone on claiming that Indira was saved only by the US warning to both India and Soviet Union. PN Dhar is right when he says that Kissinger’s laboured account of how the war ended had the compelling quality of a ‘spy thriller’. Others call it the proverbial ‘Big Lie.’”</b>

Turning to the Simla Conference in the summer of 1972, Malhotra writes, <b>“The essence of the Simla Accord was a private and verbal agreement between Indira Gandhi and Zulfi Bhutto that the line dividing Kashmir … would, over time and gradually, be converted into a permanent border. The key word was ‘gradually’. Bhutto pleaded that he could not possibly include this commitment in the written text but told Indira: ‘Aap mujh per bharosa kijiye.’ (Please trust me.) The text of the Agreement did indicate the direction in which the two countries were moving. For the UN-sponsored Ceasefire Line … was converted into a bilateral Line of Control. Both sides committed themselves fully to respect the LoC ‘without prejudice to either side’s traditional position on Kashmir.’ Later, it became clear that Bhutto – living up to his reputation of being so slippery that compared with him an eel would be a leech – reneged on his Simla commitment.”</b>

Malhotra refers to an in the Times of India in 1995 by PN Dhar to <b>“make Bhutto’s secret commitment public”. This was denied vehemently in Pakistan, including by some who were present at Simla. Dhar’s comment was, “About the only (Pakistani) in authority who did not react was Pakistan’s then prime minister, Benazir Bhutto.” As a teenager, Malhotra recalls, she had accompanied her father to Simla and had been “kept informed of every twist and turn in the protracted negotiations”. </b>

Malhotra also records an amusing exchange between Gen Zia-ul-Haq and Mrs Gandhi at Harare in April 1980 during the Nonaligned Summit. <b>The day Zia and Indira were to meet, that very day’s newspapers quoted Gen Zia making certain uncharitable remarks about the Indian prime minister. When they met, Zia opened the conversation with, “Madam, please do not believe everything you read in the newspapers.” Mrs Gandhi replied, “Of course not. Aren’t they calling you a democrat and me a dictator?”</b><!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->