A Boy’s Journalist Father Goes Missing During the 1971 War

Dhiman is a boy living with his parents in Calcutta in 1971.

His father, Bijoy, works as a newspaper reporter.

One evening, Bijoy says he will travel with another reporter after the Border Security Forces invite members of the press.

The journalists are not told where they will go.

Bijoy leaves early the next morning and comes home late at night.

He tells Dhiman and his mother that he has been to East Pakistan, where a war is taking place.

The passage explains that the conflict began after Pakistan’s leaders did not hand over power following an election.

It also describes the army’s crackdown, called Operation Searchlight.

The excerpt does not say that Bijoy disappears; it ends with him returning home.