National Observer

The civil war in East Pakistan lasted but a few weeks this spring as the polished, disciplined Pakistani army quickly crushed the ragged, disorganized Bengali resistance fighters. But East Pakistan's short-lived bid for independence has spawned millions of refugees, a huge world relief effort, and a host of humanitarian and political problems in the Indian subcontinent, one of the economically poorest, most heavily populated areas of the world.

The core of the trouble is the vast outpouring of East Pakistanis into the border lands of neighboring India. The exodus has exacerbated the already tense relations between India and Pakistan. Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi has warned that the refugee situation constitutes a "threat to peace" in the area. Some Indian politicians have been urging Indian military intervention in East Pakistan .

India alleges that predominantly Moslem Pakistan is committing genocide against the Hindu minority in East Pakistan, forcing the Hindus to leave or risk death. The Pakistanis contend that Indian expressions of sympathy and support for the Bengali rebels precipitated the outflow of East Pakistanis. East Pakistani leaders accuse the central government of Pakistan of conducting a pogrom in East Pakistan against supporters of the independence movement. Indian officials fear the continued feuding between Indian and Pakistan will spark another outbreak of clashes between India's Hindu majority and Moslem minority.

RESIDENTS RESENT REFUGEES

The $50,000,000 international relief effort for the East Pakistani refugees has become tinged by controversy too. Prime Minister Gandhi last week described the aid as "pitiable and a tenth of what is required." Private U.S. relief agencies assert that the Gandhi government is hampering the relief program by refusing to allow foreigners into areas where the refugees have crowded.

In these areas, resentment against the refugees is growing among Indian residents, who fear the refugees will take their land and their jobs or will spread disease. Indian states untouched by the influx of East Pakistanis are balking at a government attempt to relocate the refugees in the interior so as to alleviate the overcrowded conditions in the border states.

Through it all, the refugees continue to pour out of East Pakistan. Since the civil war erupted in their homeland on March 25, about 6,000,000 East Pakistanis, leaving most of their possessions behind and walking for days, have streamed across the border. Day after day, more arrive. Possibly as many as 100,000 East Pakistanis cross the 1,349-mile border each week.

Many never complete the arduous trek. Disease, malnutrition, and exhaustion take a heavy toll. A cholera epidemic has taken the lives of an estimated 10,000 refugees. The shipment of millions of doses of cholera vaccine to India apparently has curbed the spread of the disease in the refugee camps that the Indian government has set up along the border. And U.S. officials say sufficient food is now reaching the refugees.

But the vast program of feeding and oaring for the refugees now is being complicated by the early arrival of the seasonal monsoons in India. The heavy downpours are hampering distribution of supplies, and have turned the camps into seas of mud. Relief officials fear that the rains will lead to widespread incidence of pneumonia and other diseases in the camps.

About three-fourths of the refugees are in the state of West Bengal, one of India's poorest areas. The remainder are in the states of Tripura, Assam, and Meghalaya, The Indian government's relocation program, which got under way last week, is aimed at moving thousands of the refugees from East Bengal to an isolated area in the interior state of Madhya Pradesh, and moving about 100,000 of the 500,000 refugees in Tripura into northern Assam.

INTERNATIONAL AID

Four American C-130 transport planes and two Russian Antonov-12s are transporting the refugees out of Tripura. The airlift is part of a major international aid effort being co-ordinated largely by the United Nations. U.N. officials say $38,000,000 in pledges of cash and supplies has been made through the world organization and $12,000,000 has been pledged directly to India by governments or private relief agencies. The United States is the biggest contributor, with a total pledge of $17,000,000 in supplies, mostly food, and an outright grant of $500,000 to the U.N. A State Department official says the United States is "prepared to provide more if necessary."

The U.S. Government is contributing, from existing stocks in India, enough food to meet the needs of about 1,250,000 refugees for a three-month period. The United States also has contributed $1,000,000 doses of cholera vaccine.

The major U.S. volunteer agencies involved in the relief program are Care. Inc., Catholic Relief Services, and Church World Service/ Lutheran World Relief. Care is providing for the partial feeding of about 400,000 refugees, and has purchased 3,000 tarpaulins to provide shelter for 60,000 persons. Catholic Relief Services is taking care of the food, shelter, and medical needs of about 100,000 refugees. This week John Cardinal Dearden, archbishop of Detroit and president of the U.S. Catholic Conference, will ask all Catholic parishes in the United States to take up a special collection for Pakistani refugee relief. An official of Catholic Relief Services said similar special appeals in the past have brought in about $1,000,000.

Church World Service/Lutheran World Relief has been working with the World Council of Churches through the Christian Agency for Social Action, Relief, and Development (CASA) in India. CASA has set up 10 milk- distribution teams and purchased and distributed 500 tarpaulins. The organization also has put together five medical teams and is planning on setting up five more. Church World Service itself is planning further aid totaling about $100,000 and has offered $300,000 to the World Council of Churches for refugee relief.

The aid effort so far has concentrated solely on the refugees in India. But there are indications that the situation in East Pakistan may be equally as grave. The Pakistani government has allowed few foreigners into the 55,126-square-mile province since the civil war eluded. But reporters who have traveled through the province say railways were disrupted and bridges destroyed in the fighting, making food distribution difficult in the traditionally rice-short province, whose pre-war population was 70,000,000. The relief program for the estimated 1,000,000 East Pakistanis left homeless by a cyclone and tidal wave last November apparently has slowed down considerably.

An indication of the gravity of the food shortage in the province is that the Pakistani government last month reportedly appealed to U.N. Secretary General U Thant for all immediate U.N. grant of 250,000 tons of food grains and 100,000 tons of edible oils, The Pakistanis reckoned that they would need 2,000,000 tons of food through June 30, 1 972.

Despite the Pakistani aid appeal, efforts to establish an international relief program in East Pakistan have been blocked by the reluctance of tire military-backed government of Pakistan to allow foreign relief workers into the provinces U.S. and U.N. officials, however, said last week headway had been made toward setting up a relief program. The United States earlier this month donated $1,000,000 to the Pakistani government for the acquisition of coastal vessels to help distribute food supplies to the cyclone-disaster area.

Representatives of an 11-nation Pakistan-aid consortium, which includes the United States, have been conferring with Pakistani officials on a resumption of aid. The consortium cut off all economic and military aid to Pakistan on the lay the civil war broke out, The consortium has hinged a resumption of aid on the willingness of the Pakistani government to reach a political accommodation with Bengali leaders in East Pakistan.