You would think that 40 years after '71 everything there is to be known is known, and that there is no more to uncover. The following picture must be very familiar to all Bangladeshis. It shows a Pakistani soldier checking in the lungi of a man to see whether he is Hindu or Muslim, and if he is Hindu, he will probably be taken away to be killed.
Its a very common image, and is burned into the minds of Bangladeshis as an example of typical Pakistani/Islamic brutality, intolerance and backwardness.
However, the fact is that the picture ISN'T of a Pakistani soldier at all, but an Indian soldier "checking for weapons". The picture is from a book by an Indian photographer called Kishor Parekh, called "Bangladesh- A Brutal Birth"
Kishor Parekh
Now here is the original, undedited photo.
Caption in the book -- "Indian Troops Grimly round up villagers suspected to be Pakistani spies they peer into Lungi in search of weapons."
And, here is another photo of the same scene.
Caption - "...Indian troops grimly round up villagers suspected to be Pakistani spies...The Jawans (soldiers) I was travelling with weren't too gentle: they had suffered casualties..."- Kishor Parekh, Bangladesh War 1971.
Sources: 1.
WPPh --> ENTER (World Press Photo)
2.
WPPh --> ENTER (World Press Photo)