He Paid With Half His Country!

History is replete with stories from the India - Pakistan War of 1971. However, some exciting anecdotes began in 1947 and went on. One such story is that of General Sam Manekshaw, the Chief of the Indian Army and General Yahya Khan, the President of Pakistan, in 1971.

General Yahya Khan had severely mismanaged the situation in East Pakistan from 1968 (now Bangladesh) and had sent in his most ruthless soldier, General Tikka Khan, to control things. Tikka Khan went by the moniker of Butcher of Balochistan and would soon be labelled Butcher of Bengal. Hapless civilians were slaughtered, women molested, families uprooted, and millions crossed the international border into India as refugees for sanctuary.

India prepared for war as the refugee inflow turned untenable. In December 1971, as the Pakistan Airforce bombed Indian military airfields, the Indian army, the navy and the airforce attacked Pakistan on several fronts. The war was soon over, with Pakistan losing the Eastern Wing of their country, even as Lt. General Niazi signed an instrument of surrender and, in a ceremonial act, handed over his sidearm to India's Lt. General and theatre commander Jagjit Singh Arora. He surrendered with an incredible 93000 servicemen, making it one of the largest surrenders in the history of war. Bangladesh was born!

However, why is this story about Sam Manekshaw? Before the partition of India, Manekshaw and Yahya Khan (President of Pakistan during the 1971 war) were friends and on the staff of Field Marshall Sir Claude Auchinleck in Delhi. Sam Manekshaw owned a red James motorcycle, which Yahya had an eye on and wanted as he left Delhi for Karachi (Maneckshaw was a Lt. Colonel and Yahya Khan, a Major in the British Indian Army). He offered to buy the motorcycle for Rs. 1000. Manekshaw agreed to the sale. Partition happened in August 1947, and Yahya Khan took the red motorcycle to Pakistan, never paying the thousand rupees he owed to Sam Manekshaw. A helpless Manekshaw kept waiting and never forgot.

After the Instrument of Surrender was signed on 16 December 1971, Gen. Sam Manekshaw was heard quipping, "Yahya never paid me the Rs. 1,000 for my motorbike, but now he has paid with half his country." What a terrible price to pay!

As a leader of men, Sam Manekshaw always said that a sense of humour is integral to good leadership.  Sam Manekshaw was hit by bullets in the battlefield during the World War II. The surgeon at the hospital asked Sam Manekshaw what had happened to him to which he replied: "I was kicked by a donkey". The surgeon is said to have said: "You have a sense of humour and so worth saving".