Mujibnagar: The green, sleepy village of Meherpara in the Kusthia district of East Bengal woke last Saturday to an invasion by an international brigade of journalists. Like the mystified press corps, which had been asked to assemble at six that morning at the Calcutta press club for an "important announcement", the villagers had no idea they were about to witness the formal proclamation of the Sovereign Democratic Republic of Bangla Desh in their village, renamed Mujibnagar.

Indian border security forces stood smilingly by as the convoy of two dozen cars carrying reporters and television crews crossed into Bangla Desh by a rocky dirt road, to meet the Awami League leaders in a lush mango grove in Meherpara - just over a mile from the Indian border, and about 25 miles west of Chuadanga, besieged by the Pakistani army.

As Acting Head of State Syed Nazrul Islam arrived in a green Toyota jeep an assorted guard of honour - men of the EPR (East Pakistani Rifles) and Ansar (home guard) troops - was drawn up. The purpose of the occasion, said Nazrul Islam, was "to show that the government of Bangla Desh exists, not in imagination, but right on the soil of Bangla Desh". But the venue chosen was close enough to the Indian border to dissuade the Pakistani air force, which had bombed Chuadanga the day before, from trying to make a strafing run.

This genocidal bombing, shelling and machine-gunning of the Bengalis has driven the last nail into the coffin of Pakistan. As Prime Minister Tajuddin Ahmed told the applauding crowd, "Pakistan is now dead and buried under a mountain of corpses. . . and independent Bengal is a reality sustained by the indestructible will and courage of 75 million Bengalis who are daily nurturing the root of this new nationhood with their blood." He was not exaggerating: the heroism of the half-fed and illequipped Mukti Fauj (liberation forces) has been astounding - and their failure to withstand a sophisticated military machine the more tragic.

"When we can get hold of a rifle," said one Mukti Fauj officer, "we give it to a man and tell him to go to the front and get himself killed -but first to kill as many Punjabis as he can." But this suicidal courage has not yielded them the victory; the announcement of a provisional government over clandestine radio on April 14 was the only good news in a week which saw a series of key towns fall to the Pakistanis, and they are sweeping eastward in a bid to close the Indo-Pakistani border which looks like succeeding.

Major Osman, the Mukti Fauj commander in chief who also addressed the Mujibnagar gathering, spoke of his determination to fight 20 or even 30 years to liberate the country. But the leadership appears to be banking heavily on foreign intervention to end the war. Tajuddin appealed to outside powers: "In the name of humanity, act now and earn our undying friendship." Every day recognition is delayed, he claimed, "a thousand lives are lost".

If the proclamation of a government helps lure the world off the fence, it may not solve internal problems. The announced cabinet is an all-Awami affair, reflecting the overwhelming electoral mandate given Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. But already the NAP (National Awami Party) is pointing out that Mujib's platform was autonomy, not independence, and that it was their leader Maulana Bashani who first called for a sovereign East Bengal this January.

Not that the NAP is eager to join a government, the main purpose of whose existence is to secure international recognition and massive military aid. The tactics employed so far by the Mukti Fauj have been those of conventional positional warfare. It hopes this way to achieve a quick victory over West Pakistani forces - provided it is reinforced by foreign aid on a massive scale. And to the government's understandable anxiety to put an end to the massacre and other sufferings of its people by a prompt resolution of the conflict is added the openly expressed fear that protracted war would mean a takeover by extremist leaders from the moderate Awami League.

This is the reason the NAP prefer guerilla tactics to a quick military decision, and a Vietnam-style national liberation front to a provisional government. It has made no public comment on the April 14 announcement, but two days earlier one NAP leader told me he was seeking to set up a front, with two objectives acceptable to all parties: to liberate the country and establish people's sovereignty. It would steer clear of international aid in favour of longterm guerilla struggle: "We don't worry whether China openly supports us or not, whether Russia tries to mediate or America tries to replace Yahya Khan. We have to wage our own battle and we are sure to win."

The front idea was obviously coldshouldered by the Awami League. But the NAP leader claimed all the Naxalite groups in Bangla Desh - the Matin-Sikdar and Zafar-Menon groups - with the exception of Mohammed Toha's EPCP (M-L) (East Pakistan Communist Party - Marxist-Leninist) had pledged their support. Toha's objection was apparently that he put class struggle before national struggle. The NAP leader was not prepared to scratch the Awami League from the front: "Even Chiang Kai-shek had to collaborate with Mao in fighting the Japanese. Although there is no Mao among us the Awami League cannot ignore a militant party like ours if it is serious about fighting the colonial army of West Pakistan."

Without any formal agreement, at the grassroots level a united front has in fact been taking shape. In the villages, local Awami League, NAP and EPCP (M-L) leaders have made local defence plans and organised supplies for the Mukti Fauj in concert. Operations were directed from the offices of the Awami League, but it held no monopoly on what was decided. In one village, the local Awami League secretary enlisted the oratorical skills of the local EPCP (M-L) leader, a middle-aged schoolteacher, to combat a whispering campaign launched against the League and the liberation war by the ultrarightist Moslem League and Jamat-i-islami.

The formation of the provisional government will be welcomed in Bangla Desh as a step towards ending the barbarities of the war. Already it has made an impact on the Pakistan deputy high commission in Calcutta which on April 18 declared its allegiance to Bangla Desh and ran up the green-and-gold flag to the cheers of its staff. But its control, even over areas not yet overrun by Pakistani forces, is uneven. Even sympathetic commentators in different parts of Bangla Desh suggest the party's leadership is already feeling the strain of the war. And many Awami League members of the provincial and national assemblies have gone to India with their families, leaving room for NAP and other leftist elements to take over.

If local leaders are not in evidence, and the Pakistani army's ruthless destruction of cities to "save" them from the rebels continues to demonstrate painfully the ineffectiveness of Mukti Fauj tactics, popular faith in the Awami League's ability to provide leadership will be irreparably flawed. If there is no foreign armed intervention within a couple of weeks, the Mukti Fauj will be compelled to fan out into the villages and begin guerilla warfare a step which would increase the probability of an eventual National Liberation Front of Bangla Desh.