American Journal of Theoretical and Applied Business

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Indian Military Involvement in the 1971 Crisis of East Pakistan: A Justification of Level of Analysis

Received: 31 August 2019    Accepted: 26 September 2019    Published: 15 October 2019
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Abstract

The liberation war of Bangladesh in 1971 was a watershed moment in the page of South Asian history and the trajectories of the then Cold War politics. Although many people of East Pakistan jumped into the liberation war taking whatever they had in hand inspired with the flammable 7th March speech of the Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and started guerilla fight against West Pakistan army, the then Indira Gandhi government sent Indian military in favor of East Pakistan was also vital. It is till now a matter of interest that why Indira Gandhi sent military for liberating Bangladesh despite many studies have been carried out on this issue. Therefore, this paper attempts to investigate the factors causing Indian military involvement in liberating Bangladesh from West Pakistan. In doing so, this article applies Kenneth Waltz’s three levels of analysis- Individual, State and International. Moreover, this paper focuses on the conceptualization of the Level of Analysis and describes the background of the liberation struggle of East Pakistan and the Indo-Pakistan dissension. Based on secondary data, this paper takes the Indian military involvement as a case study of the Level of Analysis. By sincere exploration of previous history and utilization of Waltz’s Level of Analysis in International Relations, it is found that the shrewd leadership of Indira Gandhi, the internal organization of India, and the then bipolar system were vital factors influencing the Indian military involvement in the 1971 crisis of East Pakistan. It is also argued that the military involvement of India was shaped by the combination of the three levels of analysis.

DOI 10.11648/j.ajtab.20190504.11
Published in American Journal of Theoretical and Applied Business (Volume 5, Issue 4, December 2019)
Page(s) 84-89
Creative Commons

This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, provided the original work is properly cited.

Copyright

Copyright © The Author(s), 2024. Published by Science Publishing Group

Keywords

Indian Military Involvement, Liberation War of Bangladesh, Waltz’s Level of Analysis

References
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[2] Marwah. O. (1979). India's military intervention in East Pakistan, 1971–1972. Modern Asian Studies, 13 (4), 549-580. doi: 10.1017/S0026749X00008465.
[3] Hossain, A. (2011). Bangladesher muktijuddo oh Indira Gandhi [Bangladesh’s liberation war and Indirah Gandhi]. Bangladesh Asiatic Society Potrika, 19, 1-20.
[4] Haider, Zaglul. (2009). A revisit to the Indian role in the Bangladesh liberation war. Journal of Asian and African Studies, 44 (5), 537-551. doi: 10.1177/0021909609340062.
[5] Agarwal, A. (2014-2015). The United States and the Indo-Pakistani War of 1971: A critical inquiry. Indian Journal of Asian Affairs, 27/28 (1/2), 21-42.
[6] Waltz, K. N. (1959) Man, the state, and war: A theoretical analysis. New York: Columbia UP.
[7] Das, Shuva. (6 Aug., 2018). The tide of nationalism in the rise of Bangladesh. [The book review of Bengali Nationalism and the Emergence of Bangladesh: An Introductory Outline by Ahmed. The Daily Star. https://www.thedailystar.net/book-reviews/the-tide-nationalism-the-rise-bangladesh-1545907.
[8] Mustafa, G. (2014). The separation of East Pakistan: Socio-economic factors. Asian Journal of Multidisciplinary Studies 2 (1), 45-51. Retrieved from http://www.ajms.co.in/sites/ajms2015/index.php/ajms/article/view/156
[9] Andrio, D. (2016). India’s role in the emergence of Bangladesh as an independent state. International Relations, 16 (4), 736-744. doi: 10.22363/2313_0660_2016_16_4_736_744.
[10] Bhutto, A. Z. (1969). The myth of independence. London: Oxford University Press.
[11] Paul, T. V. (2006). Why has the India-Pakistan rivalry been so enduring? Power asymmetry and an intractable conflict. Security Studies, 15 (4), 600-630. doi: 10.1080/09636410601184595.
[12] Waltz, K. N., Bull, H. & Butterfield, H. (1979). Theory of International Politics. Mc-graw Hill. Available at: https://www.britannica.com/topic/Theory-of-International-Politics.
[13] Singer, D. J. (1961). The Level-of-analysis problem in International Relations. World Politics, 14 (1).77-92. doi: 10.2307/2009557.
[14] Mingst, K. A. & Arreguín-Toft, M, I. (1998). Essentials of International Relations. New York, USA: W. W. Norton.
[15] Role of India. (n. d.) Retrieved from http://www.genocidebangladesh.org/role-of-india/
[16] Nag, K. (2018, Aug. 16). AtalBehari Vajpayee: A mercurial moderate, BBC NEWS. Retrieved from https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-45205033
[17] Jha, C. D. (1971). Roots of Indo-Pakistani discord. The Indian Journal of Political Science, 32 (1), 14-31.
[18] Al Jazeera English. (2017, July 28). India and Pakistan: Forever rivals? – Up Front [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=61B2dnvRNXU
[19] Ray, J. L. (2001). Integrating levels of analysis in world politics. Journal of Theoretical Politics, 13 (4), 355-388. doi: 10.1177/0951692801013004002.
[20] Morgenthau, H. J. (1954). Politics among nations: The struggle for power and peace (2nd ed.) New York: Alfred A. Knopf.
[21] Corders, S. (2015). India’s response to the 1971 East Pakistan crisis: hidden and open reasons for intervention, Journal of Genocide Studies, 17 (1), 45-62. doi: 10.1080/14623528.2015.991207.
[22] Waltz, K. N. (1964). The stability of a bipolar world. Daedalus, 93 (3), 881-909. Retrieved from https://www.amacad.org/daedalus
[23] Shelly, M. R. (2012, December 16). Super powers in liberation war. The Daily Star. https://archive.thedailystar.net/suppliments/victory_day/2012/pg4.htm
Author Information
  • Department of International Relations, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman Science and Technology University, Gopalganj, Bangladesh

  • Department of Economics, Rabindra University, Rajshahi, Bangladesh; BK School of Research, Sirajganj, Bangladesh

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  • APA Style

    Shuva Das, Bezon Kumar. (2019). Indian Military Involvement in the 1971 Crisis of East Pakistan: A Justification of Level of Analysis. American Journal of Theoretical and Applied Business, 5(4), 84-89. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ajtab.20190504.11

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    Shuva Das; Bezon Kumar. Indian Military Involvement in the 1971 Crisis of East Pakistan: A Justification of Level of Analysis. Am. J. Theor. Appl. Bus. 2019, 5(4), 84-89. doi: 10.11648/j.ajtab.20190504.11

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    Shuva Das, Bezon Kumar. Indian Military Involvement in the 1971 Crisis of East Pakistan: A Justification of Level of Analysis. Am J Theor Appl Bus. 2019;5(4):84-89. doi: 10.11648/j.ajtab.20190504.11

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  • @article{10.11648/j.ajtab.20190504.11,
      author = {Shuva Das and Bezon Kumar},
      title = {Indian Military Involvement in the 1971 Crisis of East Pakistan: A Justification of Level of Analysis},
      journal = {American Journal of Theoretical and Applied Business},
      volume = {5},
      number = {4},
      pages = {84-89},
      doi = {10.11648/j.ajtab.20190504.11},
      url = {https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ajtab.20190504.11},
      eprint = {https://download.sciencepg.com/pdf/10.11648.j.ajtab.20190504.11},
      abstract = {The liberation war of Bangladesh in 1971 was a watershed moment in the page of South Asian history and the trajectories of the then Cold War politics. Although many people of East Pakistan jumped into the liberation war taking whatever they had in hand inspired with the flammable 7th March speech of the Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and started guerilla fight against West Pakistan army, the then Indira Gandhi government sent Indian military in favor of East Pakistan was also vital. It is till now a matter of interest that why Indira Gandhi sent military for liberating Bangladesh despite many studies have been carried out on this issue. Therefore, this paper attempts to investigate the factors causing Indian military involvement in liberating Bangladesh from West Pakistan. In doing so, this article applies Kenneth Waltz’s three levels of analysis- Individual, State and International. Moreover, this paper focuses on the conceptualization of the Level of Analysis and describes the background of the liberation struggle of East Pakistan and the Indo-Pakistan dissension. Based on secondary data, this paper takes the Indian military involvement as a case study of the Level of Analysis. By sincere exploration of previous history and utilization of Waltz’s Level of Analysis in International Relations, it is found that the shrewd leadership of Indira Gandhi, the internal organization of India, and the then bipolar system were vital factors influencing the Indian military involvement in the 1971 crisis of East Pakistan. It is also argued that the military involvement of India was shaped by the combination of the three levels of analysis.},
     year = {2019}
    }
    

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    AB  - The liberation war of Bangladesh in 1971 was a watershed moment in the page of South Asian history and the trajectories of the then Cold War politics. Although many people of East Pakistan jumped into the liberation war taking whatever they had in hand inspired with the flammable 7th March speech of the Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and started guerilla fight against West Pakistan army, the then Indira Gandhi government sent Indian military in favor of East Pakistan was also vital. It is till now a matter of interest that why Indira Gandhi sent military for liberating Bangladesh despite many studies have been carried out on this issue. Therefore, this paper attempts to investigate the factors causing Indian military involvement in liberating Bangladesh from West Pakistan. In doing so, this article applies Kenneth Waltz’s three levels of analysis- Individual, State and International. Moreover, this paper focuses on the conceptualization of the Level of Analysis and describes the background of the liberation struggle of East Pakistan and the Indo-Pakistan dissension. Based on secondary data, this paper takes the Indian military involvement as a case study of the Level of Analysis. By sincere exploration of previous history and utilization of Waltz’s Level of Analysis in International Relations, it is found that the shrewd leadership of Indira Gandhi, the internal organization of India, and the then bipolar system were vital factors influencing the Indian military involvement in the 1971 crisis of East Pakistan. It is also argued that the military involvement of India was shaped by the combination of the three levels of analysis.
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