DACCA, Pakistan, March 15 —President Agha Mohammad Yahya Khan, arrived here to day to Study, the situation in East Pakistan and to hold talks that are likely, to determine whether this eastern part of the Pakistani nation will break away from the West and be come a separate country.
The outlook for anything less than a parting of the two sections — separated by 1,000 miles of Indian territory—did not appear promising.
The East has already by passed the authority of the central Government's military administration here and has established a system of voluntary self‐rule under the Awami League, the majority party in the East, that is just short of independence.
Directives were announced early today that were aimed at a take‐over of the administration of East Pakistan.
Relations Are Worsening
With relations steadily worsening between the military authorities and the East Pakistani people, the momentum to ward an independent state has become a powerful force.
Sheik Mujibur Rahman, East Pakistan's nationalist leader and head of the Awami League, has been seeking a program that would retain a central government but with, limited powers over extensively autonomous eastern and western provinces.
This program was, to be incorporated into a new constitution that the recently elected National Assembly, in which the Awami League has a majority was to adopt. But the Assembly session has been delayed and may never be held.
Now public opinion in the East has moved beyond feelings of even, a few weeks, ago, Increasingly the demand here is for independence.
“The only link possible now is a loose confederation between East and West,” one high Awami League source said here today.
Emphasizing the state of popular feeling, Dacca this evening erupted with massive processions through the streets. The crowds Shouted “Hail Independent Bangla Desh” and “Liberation Now.” Bangla Desh, which means Bengal homeland, is the name for East Pakistan that is now preferred here. It derives from the traditional name for this region.
President Yahya, who took six days to get here from West Pakistan after announcing that he was coming, was slow after arriving in making contact with Sheik Mujib. Four hours after he had reached his house he had not sent word to the Awami League leader that he had come and would like a meeting. Sheik Mujib has said he is willing to see him.
The President arrived after making the six‐hour flight from Karachi around the tip of India, made necessary by India's banning of Pakistani flights over Indian territory.