| This project will use the event history analysis like new nationalist movement, student and political movements in late nineteen sixties to investigate the Bengali nationalism and the decomposition of Pakistan in 1971. Nationalism and nationhood are not the outcomes of a static ethnicity but are contingent product of nation-state era. This dissertation will also investigate the reasons of the decomposition of Pakistan in 1971 and the role of India in this historical juncture and the emergence of Bangladesh with a new nationalist identity.;Nations, nationality, nationhood and nationalism are socially produced concepts constantly contested, negotiated, reinforced and rejected by the contending actors. This dissertation will identify the changing nature of Muslim nationalism in pre-independent colonial India leading to Pakistan as an Islamic republic and finally established a new national identity through a freedom movement for independent Bangladesh based on Bengali nationalism.;Using content analysis of the archival materials, speeches, memoirs, biographies, newspaper articles, party manifestos, parliamentary debates and proceedings and rulings in India, national and international responses and reactions, printed materials on civil war and liberation struggle in the then East Pakistan and also nine-month long armed struggle of the people of East Pakistan, Bengalis, I will examine how the patterns of political struggle culminated to the liberation of a new nation decomposing the state of Pakistan in the peak hour of global Cold War. I will also explore how the students of Eastern wing of Pakistan raised their voice to protest against economic disparity perpetrated by central government of Pakistan predominantly constituted by the civil and military bureaucracy and wealthy political elites of western wing that caused the ultimate armed struggle. Finally, this dissertation will contribute to a fuller understanding of sociological and political changes of the region, civil war and different faces of nationalism and also contribute to the empirical literature of sociological and political movements in post-colonial transitioning societies. |
