DACCA, Pakistan, Aug. 4— A Bengali pedicab driver had parked his flamboyantly decorated tricycle taxi out side the entrance to the Intercontinental Hotel and was watching people go in and out.

After a few minutes a tall martial‐law policeman noticed the pedicab man and barked a few words in Urdu. Bengalis generally do not speak Urdu but the meaning was clear, and the pedicab man moved off a few paces.

Unsatisfied, the policeman slung his rifle on his shoulder, walked over and hit the Bengali, a little man, hard across the face with an open hand. This time the pedicab man, wiping his mouth, moved across the street.

Large but Undetermined Toll

For a time he gazed with out expression at the police man who had hit him, then resumed his scrutiny of the hotel entrance.

In common with West Pakistan's army and the subject Bengali population, policeman and pedicab man had ample reason to distrust each other. But it seems at this point that they will have to live with each other for a long time to come.

Since March 25, when the army undertook to crush the Bengali separatist movement, an undetermined but large number of people here have been killed, wounded, arrested or made homeless. Some seven million Bengalis are believed to have fled to neighboring India; despite the privation and disease they face there, they are showing little disposition to return.

The Bengalis who remain tend to view the army as a merciless tyrant, and for their part, they have not made the administration of East Pakistan easy.

The pedicab man outside the hotel may have been innocently resting or waiting for a fare. On the other hand, a small crater in the concrete sidewalk near where the policeman was standing marks the place where terrorist grenades recently came close to killing three visiting officials of the World Bank.

Every night there are the sounds of explosions or gun fire here in the capital of the eastern region, and during the day jeeps full of troops, sirens wailing, push their way through the swarms of pedicabs, people, goats and cows in the muddy streets.

The rumors here and in every other town in East Pakistan are incessant, alarming and usually distorted. Since the Government rigidly censors the press and radio, people depend on the grapevine for news.

East Pakistanis have the uncomfortable sensation of being watched at all times by potentially mortal foes.

Scrutiny on All Sides

The foreigner, whose presence and activities are closely noted by the martial‐law authorities, usually receives his first clandestine communication from agents of Bangla Desh, as the autonomy movement is known, within a few hours of his arrival.

The men who run East Pakistan, wherever their place of birth and whatever their point of view, are also constantly aware that they are observed.

“I work in a room full of civil servants,” a minor official said. “The man at the desk to my left may be a police spy. The man at my right may be a Bangla Desh agent. Either one is perfectly capable of arranging my death and the death of my family. I don't do very much or say very much and therefore I'm still alive:”

During the last few months East Pakistan has scarcely erased the scars of its blood bath or the trauma of its military occupation, but people are getting used to things as they are, and are living along.

The towns are not as full as they once were, and in Dacca, Jessore, Rajshahi and other cities there are huge vacant lots where bazaars, houses and Hindu shrines stood before March 25.

People are patching walls and roofs and painting fresh signs in the burned‐out bazaars. Bankers are talking business over tea once again. One leading foreign company reports that it is selling 50 sewing machines a week in East Pakistan—only a fifth of its normal sales but far better than at any time since March.

In the countryside guerrillas are systematically destroying or damaging bridges, high tension wires and communications lines. The army replies with search‐and‐clear operations against hamlets, using tactics reminiscent” of Vietnam.

Despite the conflict most roads are heavily traveled by the ubiquitous pedicabs in which most East Pakistanis get around. There seems little or no fear of guerrilla mines or ambushes.

While there are small signs of a return to more normal conditions, malnutrition has been reported in some parts of East Pakistan, especially in the southern region devastated by a cyclone last November. But in most other parts of the region the abundant fish, tropical fruit and rice seem to be feeding people adequately. The ragged beggar children in towns are still asking for money, not food.

‘All This Is Impossible’

Most noninvolved residents of East Pakistan believe that if the Bengalis were offered a plebiscite they would choose independence.

“Anyone can see that all this is impossible,” a Bengali said, pausing beside the road. “We ceased to be part of Pakistan on March 25, when the army came to colonize us. But life doesn't just stop. In our hearts we sing the Bengali hymn but our mouths must be silent for a long time.”

“People talk of a resistance war, but it's not so simple,” “The West Pakistani soldiers come from races steeped in war. They need no conscription because their army already has too many volunteers. They love war, But for a Bengali a gun is a strange thing. Normally we don't shoot or hunt, and we are afraid of killing or dying. I think for most of us, resistance will take the form of simply doing nothing.”

Economists feel that this attitude will continue dragging down the economy of the Eastern region, and with it the entire nation.

Nonetheless, it seems clear that whatever the economic or political consequences, President Agha Mohammad Yahya Khan has no intention of letting East Pakistan become Bangla Desh.

Is Bankruptcy Ever Fatal?

“This is a matter of religious belief and unshakable national determination,” one of his officers said. “Our critics say we will go bankrupt, or this that and the other. Well, since when has a nation ever died because of bankruptcy? Let the bankers worry—we shall preserve Pakistan.”

Probably a majority of Western diplomats privately denounce Pakistan's military rule and consider the Government's methods as a policy of genocide. But many businessmen—tea planters, small manufacturers, bankers and others—view the army as the last remaining stabilizing force.

With trade reviving, the dock area of Dacca is noisy, jammed with pedicabs and sampans, vendors, beggars and hurrying merchants. There is a blend of smells— some savory, others not so savory.

A Bengali wandering through the area noted a woman seated on a curb, methodically picking insects from her baby's scalp.

“There is Bengal,” he said. “Whether we are ruled by Punjabi colonels or Bengali politicians, she will still be sitting there picking too many insects off too many infants.”