On the fateful night of March 25, 1971, the Pakistani army officially launched its campaign of genocide in erstwhile East Pakistan, by unleashing death squads that mercilessly killed thousands of unarmed, innocent Bengalis in one single night. "Kill three million of them," said Pakistan President Yahya Khan at a February conference, "and the rest will eat out of our hands." The prime targets of Operation Searchlight were the Dhaka University teachers and students, the lifeblood of the resistance movement, who were exterminated in their hundreds.